Joe Danger Special Edition

Ever wondered what would happen if you were to attempt to breed Trials HD, Tony Hawk’s Pro Skateboarding and a big lump of happy?  I must confess, it’s not something that has ever troubled me, but I now know the result if you did.  The smile inducing Joe Danger SE would be the bundle of joy in your hands.  I was lucky enough to take delivery of this little beauty and I’m going to tell you why you should be cooing with joy over it too.  First, though, you have to answer a very simple question.  Do you play games for the enjoyment aspect?  If you answered yes, read on.  If you’re a misery guts and answered no, read on too, it might make you change your mind.

Poor Joe Danger, he’s a washed up, out of work motorbike stuntman, much in the mould of 1970’s motorbike mentalists.  Even worse, he is being harassed by colourful, evil Stig look-a-likes called “Team Nasty”.  There’s only one way to regain some pride and dignity and that’s by taking part in some crazy bike-fuelled fun.  I hate pigeonholing games into a specific mould, so in an attempt to be original, I’ll say that Joe Danger SE is a side scrolling, trick filled, bike-em-up.  You take control of Joe with the usual right trigger to accelerate, left trigger to brake method.  He blasts across the cartoon-like land with ease. Snitially small ramps pop you a little way into the air but soon enough, big ramps appear and the jumps get bigger.  School buses have to be cleared and loop the loops spun through.  You can wheelie your motorbike easily by pulling back on the controller, which has the effect of filling your boost gauge.  Fill it right up and with a button press, Joe has a temporary boost of speed.  Press “X” and you can duck under objects; release it and Joe will bunny hop his bike. When you are in the air you can use a combination of bumper button presses to perform tricks and gain more points. Easy?

It’s not instantly easy, there seems to be so much going on.  Sometimes you are watching for barriers to duck under while attempting to wheelie and boost in a vain attempt to keep your score multiplier going.  Gladly, it all becomes second nature very quickly and you are checking out the scoring potential of the next obstacle.  There is no such thing as a straight end to end race in the game. Each level, of which there are over 100, has various jumps, springs, bombs and hazards to use or avoid before you reach the end.  It really makes the game something very special indeed, you are constantly watching ahead for whatever the game throws up.  Generally you are only faced with a race against Team Nasty at the end of each set of levels.  The other levels are filled with various fun filled objectives that sap your time like only a good game can.  Some levels require you to keep your combo score running for the whole level (easier said than done), others have you collecting a certain number of items in a time limit.  Some of the trickier levels have you collecting the word “DANGER”, with each letter in a different location and some require you to land on targets with a degree of accuracy.  Even worse!  Some levels ask you to complete ALL of the aforementioned tasks.  If you are successful you receive medals which you can then use to unlock more levels. It gives a lovely sense of progression.

For an XBLA game, Joe Danger is very well featured too.  Along with the main game you can also play local multiplayer matches on the predefined tracks.  If that’s not enough, you can make your own tracks, using the easy to manage sandbox mode.  You can also make single-player levels and share them with your friends.  A new feature to the Special Edition of Joe Danger is called “The Lab”.  You can look on the Lab as a few things. Firstly, it’s a training mode, helping you to come to grips with some of the control nuances in the game, with each section of the Lab dealing with different disciplines.  Secondly, it can be seen as a behind the scenes look into the mechanics of the game, albeit with the same comedy twist which runs through the whole game.  Progression in the game also unlocks different costumes and skins to use, my current favourite being the fez-hatted monkey.  If you are lucky enough to be reading this in the run up to Christmas 2011 you can pick up, for free, and only until the Christmas period is over, Santa Danger.  Going on to the marketplace on the 21st of December this gives you something new in the form of Santa and a quad bike!  I’ve played it and it’s great, the quad bike is sturdy but very bouncy and great fun to use to go back over levels you’ve already finished.  Good old Santa can actually help you get to some bits you might have been struggling with.  A nice wee Christmas add on. Sorry if you’re reading this at a later date, you’ve missed a snow filled add-on.