Previews

EGX 2014: Hands-on with RAD Boarding, the totally tubular trick-based runner inspired by Tiny Wings

Like, bodacious.... dude!

EGX 2014: Hands-on with RAD Boarding, the totally tubular trick-based runner inspired by Tiny Wings
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| RAD Boarding

Canadian developer Other Ocean Interactive surfaced at Tokyo Game Show and Eurogamer Expo to showcase its latest ride: RAD Boarding.

In RAD Boarding you play Rod Geiger, the '90s celebrity who's long overdue for a comeback. His goal is to ride out the volcanic apocalypse in style.

To do so, you'll be traversing up mountain peaks, down mountain troughs, and pulling off sick tricks, all while keeping ahead of the lava chasing after him.

The controls are pretty simple - tap and hold downhill to gain momentum, and release when hiking uphill. Tricks can be performed during airtime by swiping in different directions.

Yes, it's distinctly similar to Tiny Wings, only with more of a focus on pulling off tricks. In doing so, you'll activate the RAD Meter system which livens up the visuals and music, and grants you some neat bonuses to boot.

There are Jetpack Joyride-style mission goals in the shape of the bucket list and it looks as if there'll be plenty of collectables, outfits, tricks, and upgrades to uncover.

A tombstone is dropped when the lava finally catches up with you, leaving a marker behind for friends if you're all hooked up to the socials.

More Worms-esque tombstones can be unlocked as you progress, with some carrying the odd stat boost to get ahead too.

We're promised a total of five environments in the game, but what most stood out for me in my playthrough was the inclusion of a random boss encounter.

Each boss has a different requirement to defeat it. Mine was a behemoth grizzly bear thing nicknamed Tiny, that had me perform all manner of cool tricks before I could appease him enough to go off and mind his own business.

RAD Boarding will be free-to-play, and we're promised that any purchases will remove ads from the game entirely.

It's scheduled to be released around the end of October 2014, with the Android version following a few weeks later.

Danny Russell
Danny Russell
After spending years in Japan collecting game developers' business cards, Danny has returned to the UK to breed Pokemon. He spends his time championing elusive region-exclusive games while shaking his fist at the whole region-locking thing.