"This game skates, trips, and stays on the ground."

You know, I get leery of games that have misspelling in them, like this game for example. X-Bladez: Inline Skating. Hmm, you know, I don't know if the game developers are trying to imply that this game is cool or something with the ‘z' in the end. What I have to sum up this game in a matter of words it would be, ‘wow, I wished they revamp and made this game better!' Sorry folks, that's all the enthusiasm I can muster for this game.

Why? Let me tell you why: graphics for this game is grainy, with pixels being blocky and chunky; and the most important element in the game – the game play – is no fun at all. Nor is there any depth in the game.

Right, so let me talk about the game play first! When you play the game, the interface takes you straight into the character selection mode. You have the option of picking a blonde girl, a scrawny looking kid with thick reading glasses, a black guy, a white kid with spiked hair, a Emo looking type of guy, and a girl with pink hair. That is all the characters you can play as in the game.

I think the selection of characters is all right; it seems pretty diverse to me in terms of nationality and ethic group, but does it matter what character you pick besides from the character model? Is one skater faster then the other? I scientifically tested it out and my hypothesis was indeed correct: there isn't any big difference between the character's speed in the game. The game developers should've put stats in the skater so there is an advantage over one to the other.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that this is a racing game with the inline skate as the racing theme. There is neither any tricks to do nor any ramps to fly in this game; it's strictly racing. I'm glad this game isn't another one of those games that make you race around indoor in some gym or something.

But rather in this game you're racing outside in various trademark places such as an Air Port, Great Wall of China, Houses of Parliament, Eiffel Tower, Cannes (a water Damn) and some other famous places. Note that you have to beat the game in some mode in order to unlock the stage.

Oh yeah, I forgot you could do another thing in the game: Jump. I don't know what is the use of that function because there is hardly a time in the game where you would need that. Most of the time you'll be too busy skating to be jumping around.

In closing, I think this is one of those no name game that no body plays developed by some amateur company that no body knows about; while I congratulate them on publishing this game, I have to scold them for making a half baked game of poor quality. Perhaps they should have a better design next time in order to make this game fun and playable for the gamers. I don't recommend you buy this game. Rent at best.

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 09/22/05