Whirl Tour | DJcube

Adventure. Asphalt. Attitude.

NA release: 5th November 2002
EU release: 21st March 2003
JP release: N/A
Developer: Papaya Studio
Publisher: Crave, Vivendi Universal
NGC Magazine Score: N/A
Mods Used: None

Even after four Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater and lots of clones, there were still new games that started with the concept of “Tony Hawk’s but…”. With Whirl Tour, the concept seems to be “Tony Hawk’s but…it has a story like a bad platformer game”. You’re a member of a band who just seems to randomly duck while on stage when the rest of your band members get taken through a portal. You have to rescue them with the help of your trusty motorised scooter.

The motorised part is rather irrelevant, though, as the gameplay is just a stiff and awkward version of an earlier Pro Skater game, it would make no difference replacing it with a skateboard. The biggest difference is that you have a life bar, and falling over too much will end your run early. Other than small details, the seven objectives are pretty much the same across all the levels, with things like a high score, finding objects, grinding past five objects (which triggers a cutscene without stopping your character, making you crash) and beating bosses.

But the one unique part – the bosses – isn’t done well. They either cause ground shocks or throw objects. To defeat them, you do a trick into them and repeat until they’re defeated. The levels themselves also have squandered potential. There are some interesting levels – a theme park, a flying temple, an underwater hanger and so on, but none of them are fun to skate (or scoot) around, having issues like lots of grindable edges close to each other while not giving you enough control to end up on the one you want.

When you complete objectives you unlock two variants of the map you’re one. One is a linear race where you race your mutated band members to rescue them (it’s a shame you can’t play as their mutated form, the designs are far more interesting), and a simple challenge map with one objective. Some decent ideas to add a bit of variety, but wasted on a game like this.

Poor

All in all, Whirl Tour is about as basic as an extreme sports game as you can get. Of course, once you realize that everyone is riding a scooter, what would you expect? For the most part, the control handles well, and some of the level design is fairly decent, but the goals aren’t unique or challenging enough to really bring any excitement into the game. There are a few decent two-player modes, and there’s a fair amount of stuff to unlock, so the game should provide for a reasonable amount of playing time if you don’t find yourself bored after a while, which is pretty likely.
Chris Roper, IGN

Remake or remaster?

No reason for one.

Official Ways to get the game

There’s no official way to get Whirl Tour.