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By Seth Goolnik BBC In real life we cannot battle undead hordes. We cannot save the princess from a quasi-tortoise dragon. We cannot munch pills using our giant disembodied head. But we can don tight-fitting Lycra and barrel down a hill, just like in Torino 2006. The official game of the 2006 Winter Olympics, Torino allows you to imitate reality and play through eight of the events that form the competition. Skiing, bobsleigh and skating are all present, along with the "fly like an eagle" ski jump. Push the button Following in the long tradition of Olympiad games pioneered by Daley Thompson's Decathlon, Torino is all about engaging simplicity. Each of the events has a different control system. These range from the incredibly straightforward to the straightforward. Plunging through the gates in Alpine Skiing involves pushing left and right, Speed Skating means pushing X and O in rapid rhythm, and Ski Jump is balancing a cursor in the centre of the screen. TORINO 2006 Format: Multi-platform (PS2 reviewed) Graphics: 5 Sound: 5 Gameplay: 4 Enduring appeal: 3 Overall: 4 As each of the eight events have different mechanics to master, Torino takes a while to get to grips with. But once you have fathomed the foundations, the game begins to feel more frosty than even this subject matter deserves. As you plunge through perfunctory performances for each event, it is unsatisfying all too quickly. Rarely do you battle actual opponents, zooming and jumping in isolation, and so not having the thrill of something to rail against. And so you compete and then must wait in limbo to find if you are better than Belarus. Such sports games have normally excelled in the multiplayer and Torino allows up to four players in customisable tournaments. But, as in single player, it has not learned from the vicious joy of Track and Field. Even in Speed Skating with its multiple skaters, there is no split screen mode. Given the simplicity of Torino's implementation you cannot help wishing for more. Where are the Ice Hockey, Snowboard or sinister sounding Skeleton events? The main issue of Torino really is one of longevity. As you push X to slip down a computational slope, paying for the privilege of listening to someone attempting to pronounce "Oval Lingotto" in broken American, there is suddenly an obvious thought - I could have spent this on Lycra. Story from BBC NEWS: |