I for one, love a good bike ride. There`s nothing more I like than grabbing my BMX out of the shed and going for a nice long ride along the seafront, taking in the views, and taking it out for a spin. So, when Bike Mayhem 2 was announced for Xbox one, I shrivelled with excitement, and having being disappointed by the last few bike/BMX games I had played, was hoping that it would excite me and one I would lose time into. Well, cross BMX bikes with Trials (If you`ve played that on either the Xbox one or 360) and you get Bike Mayhem 2.
Bike Mayhem 2 is the latest creation by Goldmark Studios, an independent studio who are based in Vancouver, and have taken their latest creation to more than just the PC network, by releasing it for the Xbox One. It`s predecessor had huge success, being downloaded over 7 million times, but could Bike Mayhem 2 live up to the hype and challenge that had been laid down by the previous one? In my opinion, yes it can.
You have to take on a variety of trails across 34 different mountains, and these trails will range from picking up enough skill points, to completing it in a quickest time format. There are 3 stars on offer to collect across each trail, and over 180 to collect altogether. You take on the task of riding your BMX through Rocky Mountains, surviving the obstacles that will be in force to make sure you don’t get to the end of the trail, or to get some skills going that even the professional bikers would be proud of. Your job is simple. To either complete the trail in a quickest time possible, or to get the most skill move points you can. End of the day, the objective you are to get those stars, as there`s nothing better than seeing the stats at the end of a trail, and seeing that you`ve got full stars on it. I actually found it quite enjoyable, and although it doesn’t offer an awful lot in the way of variety (as all you are doing are either completing it in a quickest time or getting the most skill move points) it`s a very fun game, that the younger ones, and perhaps the older generation would enjoy. The skill moves at first can be a little bit difficult to pull off, but that comes with time and practice. If anything, it`s more just about timing them right, making sure you`ve got enough air space to perform a trick, otherwise you`ll be crashing down, and then go back to the beginning of the trail. Shortly, you`ll be flying through the air pulling tricks off left right and centre. Of course, just don’t try any of that down the park.
There`s no doubt that this game was designed for the younger generation. The more and more I played it, the more and more I thought that the younger kids would enjoy being able to fly though the air performing tricks, and it just felt like a game that had been designed for that target audience. Whether Goldmark meant to specifically target that audience I`m not sure, but it certainly does feel like it.
Graphically, it looks quite nice and unique to a ID game. An artistic style, but I did find that across different trails it was the same, with just a change in the track layout that you would travel along. There wasn’t really anything different in terms of different art that could be unique to a separate trail. Not a biggie, but for me, I`d personally like to have seen something a little bit different and a bit more variety across the board.
You`ll find that the game and most of the tracks, are incredible easy to complete, and even the most challenging ones can be completed with a few attempts. Of course, the further into the game you go, the more challenging the trails become, but nothing that is really too challenging that can`t be completed after a few attempts.
There is an online mode, but unfortunately I cannot say anything about that as whenever I played it the servers never seemed to be up. I don’t know whether I was just unlucky at the timing of when I played it, but I didn’t get a chance to experience the online. I don’t tend to expect much from the online side of things when it comes to ID games as of course, sometimes ID developers would rather have a compelling and great single player, rather than a multiplayer base.
You can download user maps that people have created, and create your own. You can add hills and things and pieces and make them as easy or as difficult as you wanted. Some are incredibly dull and boring, and some can be incredibly compelling and challenging. You can download them in a matter of seconds.
Overall, I think Bike Mayhem 2 is a great game for the kids and younger generation. Some more maturer gamers would probably find this boring and too easy after the first 10 minutes, but I enjoyed it, maybe that was due to my love of riding bikes and going for bike rides, but for the kids, this is a great one that will keep them enrolled and engaged for a few hours.
A huge thank you to XCN for supplying us with a review copy.
