Games you've recently finished

Snowboard Kids (n64)

It's one of those multiplayer racing games with a snowboarding twist, which means a bunch of power-ups, and "x laps till finish" and the like. though being a snowboarding game, there is no "brake" function

Single Player- is pretty decent, they have a couple different modes to choose from:
Time attack- beat your best times
Speed attack- go through several courses while picking up all the fan (speed) power-ups you can do create a minimum lap time.
Trick attack- Go through the same course trying to get as many points as you can.
target attack? (i forgot the name of it)-go through a course shooting at the snowman as you reach the bottom.
Battle race- race against 3 computers to the finish (i would consider this the "main mode")

i thought the trick mode was the poorest of the modes, because there seemed to be a cap in performance, which hence truncates the "replayability" of the mode. the aim is to get the highest score within 3 minutes. tricks have values of 1, 15, 20, and 40. the course has a halfpipe in which you can stay until time is about to run out, a time at which you can shuffle down to the end of the course and get your G (gold i'm presuming). the only make-or-break part of this course is the rail at the end. if you ride onto the narrow rail (a bit more difficult than it should be) you get 2x the final point total. so, it's not as deep a mode as i'd liked it to have been.

you get G for finishing a track on any of the modes (except for time attack) which may be used at the shop for purchasing a board. there are a total of 9 boards that are sold at the shop (3 must be "unlocked") six of them are replicas of the basic "balance", "speed" (high speed rating, low trick and corner), and "trick" (low speed rating, high trick and corner). which means you can have different paint schemes (16 to choose from?) for each to add some spice to the selection. the 3 "unlockable" boards, however, have completely different stat distributions and are worth the money.

the "main gameplay" is as follows: the race starts, as you travel down the slope they have items to pick up, the "shops" as they're called are either blue or red, if you have 100G on you, you can run into them and recieve an item in return (you have one slot for each color, giving you the ability to hold a "red" and a "blue" item at the same time). the red ones give weapons and the blue ones give misc. objects. to get G, you can pick up coins on the slope or perform tricks off of jumps. using the items, you try to hold your lead, or wreak havoc on the CPU.
though once you get to the bottom of the course everyone must pile onto the ski-lift. the ski entrance admits one person at a time, and keeps the entering intervals to 5 seconds. the ski lift function can make or break the player's ranking on several accounts as follows:

-not being able to stop, 2 people could push their luck for getting in first and attempt entry simultaneously, which would result in one of them crashing into the wall, allowing the trailing CPU/Players to "cut" in line.
-placing a rock before the entrance may cause one of the CPU/Players to trip, pushing them further behind in the race

there are several other possibilities of changing order with this mechanism. after repeating the process a few more times, the race ends. if you come in 1st, 2nd, or 3rd. you get to take the G with you to use at the shop.

there are a total of 9 different racing courses along with that extra trick course each with their own theme.

there are 5 standard characters, each with different handling statistics

there is 1 unlockable character in the game who has respectable stats (he's statistically the best character in the game) that is limited to his own individual board set which is equivalent to the trick, balance, and speed boards (meaning, he can't use the special boards).

multiplayer is a frenzy, i also appreciate that the power-ups are well balanced. there are 5 attack power-ups:

Snowman-the only non-homing item, but bounces around until it makes contact with a player, turning them into a snowman that travels in a straight path until they run into something or a couple seconds pass.

Parachute-the player hit with this item gets plucked into the air and glides slowly down to the ground. the player travels the direction they were facing when they were hit.

Ice-freezes a player in place for a couple seconds creating an obstacle for anyone behind the frozen playercicle.

Bomb-explodes on contact (player/wall) with a mild radius, which means it's formidable when used against players that are riding alongside eachother or creating congestion at the ski-lift

Hand-slaps the player it makes contact with, sending them tumbling forward for a couple seconds. the player then pauses for a moment (having lost momentum) to stand back up.

the misc items (blue) are as follows:
Mouse- (low frequency)steals all G from every player and gives it to user.

Fan- propels the player for several seconds

Rock- small obstacle used to trip anyone that runs into it

Washpan- Hits opposing players, stopping them in their tracks for a few seconds.

Ghost- slows down the player in the lead for several seconds. if the leading player uses it the player closest to the leader gets slowed.

Invis- The invisible player is impervious to everything negative except for collisions, rocks, or ghosts. if the player collides/hits a rock, the effect neutralizes.

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gripes with the game==
i was surprised how challenging it became to face the CPU which had a condition that grew more and more apparent...
CPUAD-CPU Apathy Disorder.
in the last race of 9 laps, i found that as long as i was in 4th place, the computer didn't fight against itself to keep the 1st CPU from winning. this frustrated me because the CPU, when not threatened, is able to lap players. I've tried my hardest to lap the CPU, but have been unsuccessful in every attempt.sadly, CPUAD makes this a one-way relationship. also, the computer seemed to be able to get whatever item it liked (instead of it being random). i didn't mind this as much, because the computer would use the item when threatening conditions arose, though...not being close enough to them to hit them with anything, i was not able to drag them to my lap count. The CPU has flawless control of the character selected, though sometimes they conflict and certain characters can't possibly make a turn or two, but regain their standing shortly after. these add up to a pretty intense difficulty.
the only reason i managed to beat the CPU as quickly as i did was the result of coincidence. The CPU was gaining quickly as i was nearing the finish line and hit me with a parachute, which would have been devastating except for one minor detail. the parachute doesn't shoot the player straight into the air, but rather propels them a moderate distance forward before gaining altitude. so it's more of a Scoop than a Pluck.

It was pretty challenging, i find it to be a better game to play with friends than to play by one's self. and a pretty good multiplayer game at that... speaking of... the only multiplayer function is a battle race, so it's good for a while at least..

a bit lengthy, but i hope it's worth something to someone (;^_^)

Jam it back in, in the dark.