The perfect skill game
Okay here's the deal if you played and liked Trials HD then stop reading this review and buy Trials Evolution because it is exactly what you want from a sequel. Everyone else, please continue (what follows is a review for the non-OCD non-hardcore gamer).
Trials Evolution is at its core a pretty simple skill game. You are trying to maneuver your rider + bike through a series of 2D obstacle courses while trying to hold the balance. This may sound simple on the paper but is surely easier said than done and if you don't believe me please open a tab and look at a youtube video with the words "trials" and "hard" in it.
The game starts out with some relatively easy tracks, as well as a tutorial level which explains you the basic controls and best-practices for certain situation on the course. While the early levels feature some standard environments like a dirtbike track, some industrial areas etc. the later stages go literally bonkers. With tracks that resemble movie sets, castles, WW2, stonehenge, a level from Limbo and a course that pretty much turns around you while driving in it and behaves like the dream sequence from Christopher Nolan's Inception. The courses get more and more difficult as well with (compared to TrialsHD) a more or less linear difficulty curve. In between the different sets of track you'll get a rundown of the different techniques that you'll need to master if you want to complete the next set of tracks via a series of tutorial levels. The game never treats you unfair or throws things at you that are completely beyond your skill level, as long as you take it slow and learn from your mistakes.
Singleplayer aside, there is a multiplayer option allowing you and your friends (up to four players, local and online) to hit some tracks together and allowing you to share the pain in some of the more difficult tracks.
Also there is a level editor that allows you to create your own tracks and put them online to share them. The editor comes with a standard and a complex mode, with the complex mode probably being on par with the Little Big Planet level editor. This thing may be to much for most people out there but I gurantee you that some crazies will wrap their heads around this thing and come up with a huge amount of user made tracks for you to play.
So is it worth the 1200 MS points? Yes.
Thanks for reading.
