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Carve Review - Xbox

Whenever any gamer sees a Jet ski game, they immediately think 'it'll never be as good as Wave Race 64'. Carve attempts at claiming the spot of best watercraft racer, but it has a few down points that really devastates its position in the leader's board. Prepare for fast-paced action as you and your team-mate take on three other teams across different parts of the world, and extreme opposite environments to claim your team as the number 1 watercraft racing team in the world. Realistic weather conditions, believable environments, and Xbox Live capabilities means that Carve will not disappoint a watercraft racer fan for the $39.95 that it retails for.

Gameplay

With 27 courses to unlock in three different levels of difficulty, Carve can be clocked in about a dozen hours without breaking a sweat. Each tournament has 4-6 races, and there are 5 tournaments to participate in. You have to place at least fourth (in a group of 8) to proceed to the next race in the tournament and you must win the tournament to unlock the next one. Luckily, each tournament comes with the opportunity of three continues if you keep losing on certain courses. Along with the main tournament mode comes Quick Race, Arcade, and Trick Tutorial. Carve definitely feels a lot more like an Arcade game than it does a singleplayer tournament game. Perhaps the removal of the buoys in the Tournament mode would have created a much nicer feel to the game and a more competitive atmosphere. Gamers these days don't want a buoy to get in the way of some good old fun.

Carve seems to have been created to pursue a team type game, unfortunately what Argonaut were trying to pull off hasn't seemed to be reflected in the final result. Each team has different skill levels in different categories such as Rush, Speed, Tricks, Blocking and Teamwork. It's basically pointless picking a team with good teamwork however, as there isn't any way of communicating with your team mate to see what they're doing and see how you can utilize their position in the race. It really makes no difference at all what position your team mate comes in the race, as it doesn't affect your score one bit. Decisively blocking members of other teams is almost impossible as you're constantly turning and dodging these very annoying distracting buoys, making sure you don't get disqualified by going through the wrong way. In Carve, if you go to the wrong side of 5 buoys, you are disqualified - which can really hurt if you're in front and then accidentally hit something which sends you flying.

Carve has two different kinds of turbo - Rush and Double Rush. Whenever you pull off a successful trick, you get an instant rush. This is useful, unless you need to turn soon. Double Rush is a (continued next page)