By Jim Rossignol on June 19th, 2008 at 8:47 am.
It’s not every day the PC gets an extreme sports game, and it’s even less routine that said game is a free MMO. Anyway, that’s precisely what Project Powder is. The game will be available as part of the Outspark Free MMO Portal, and it’s actually looking like a lot of fun. Needless to say, Project Powder is one of those fantasy snowboarding type games, only with some multiplayer aspects to allow you to socialise and race against all the other folk in the game. A niche of a niche, clearly, but it might just be enjoyable. Take a look at the footage below – are they snowboarding in the jungle?
Those girls throw snowballs like… girls.
19/06/2008 at 08:53 Soy Bob says:
Someone’s made SSX the MMO, complete with draw-in and slight frame-rate drops. Want.
19/06/2008 at 09:14 cskozmo says:
Holy crap! This looks surprisingly awesome. Looks like they tossed in a little Mario-Kart style items in there, which is just like the best snowboarding game ever; Snowboard Kids on the N64. Also want.
19/06/2008 at 09:19 Mike says:
Snowboarding on grass…hmmm. Sand would be passable but not grass. I haven’t played a snowboarding game since ‘Supreme Snowboarding’ so this will be interesting.
19/06/2008 at 09:21 Valentin Galea says:
That chick in the middle of the screenshot , looks like she peed herself!
19/06/2008 at 09:23 Jim Rossignol says:
We here at Rock, Paper, Shotgun are proud of the quality of our readership…
19/06/2008 at 09:35 MisterBritish says:
Ha ha!
Dissapointing lack of crippling ragdoll on the crashes; a ‘trials’ approach to crashes could have been fun.
19/06/2008 at 10:20 The_B says:
Quick question, and this may highlight my ignorance of popular dance music, but was that a Faithless song on that trailer, and if so – which one?
19/06/2008 at 11:05 moa says:
forget “peed chick”, that guy is holding head trophy in his hand ;]
19/06/2008 at 11:47 parm says:
So, right, I’m confused. How do these free MMOs, like, make money? That thing looks like it was quite a long way from free to make.
19/06/2008 at 12:11 Butler` says:
I think the word you’re looking for is “advertising” parm!
That and micro-transactions, which is a buzzword that means “sell you useless shit for small change”.
19/06/2008 at 12:12 Thomas Lawrence says:
I read the words “MMO Portal” and got all excited about a persistent-world Aperture Science Enrichment Centre for a moment.
19/06/2008 at 13:02 Denis says:
This looks surprisingly interesting! At least they’re trying something very different. I mean, essentially, it’s going to be a social networking site with flash graphics and some cool games to play with friends, but it looks great. Did I miss the release date, or has that not been announced yet? I’ll be keeping an eye on this.
19/06/2008 at 13:47 sana says:
Mario Kart with snowboards and some MMO bits. Technically not so exciting, but it does look nice! Except for that “snowflake beam of death” thing.
19/06/2008 at 15:24 Optimaximal says:
I thought ‘project powder’ was something you did if you sneezed whilst snorting cocaine…
19/06/2008 at 15:40 Lord_Mordja says:
That would be one of the cash shop items.
19/06/2008 at 16:05 Valentin Galea says:
I got SSX Blur on Wii and I find it very hard…
I wonder how this will handle?…
@Jim Rossignol: forgive me for speaking my mind:P but that screenshot is hilarious – pee stains and head-trophy!
19/06/2008 at 17:47 Belo says:
The guys are all wearing typical urbban style clothes.
…and then the two girls look like their fashion sense came out of a Kingdom Hearts MMO.
19/06/2008 at 18:25 wedge55 says:
This game looks like a lot of fun! Snowboarding + MMO = Win.
By the way, they’re currently accepting registrations for the closed beta at http://www.playprojectpowder.com
I just signed up!
19/06/2008 at 18:57 born2expire says:
arcade snow/skateboarding games have to go away, its insulting to my 15 years skate/snowboarding. why is it so hard to make a “realistic” game, skate was easily the closest, but the game still punished you if you didn’t play it like tony hawk.
20/06/2008 at 05:59 RenK says:
@born2expire: how is a “unrealistic” game insulting to the fact that you snow board for real? Of course, the fact that you find a VIDEO GAME insulting to your lifestyle is just silly…
honestly though, if i wanted realistic snowboarding i’d go for real. When i play a video game i want it to be fun… Many a fun night were spent on SSX:tricky on the PS2. The thought of a free MMO of the same kind is awesome.
20/06/2008 at 10:28 duel says:
this is ssx tricky isnt it? that game came out in 2001…
20/06/2008 at 10:35 aldo says:
arcade snow/skateboarding games have to go away, its insulting to my 15 years skate/snowboarding.
Just like Mario Strikers is insulting to my 18 years playing football, Sega Rally is insulting to my 3 years driving in a rainy country and Half Life 2 is insulting to my entire childhood of pointing sticks at people and going ‘pyow pyow’?
21/06/2008 at 18:54 GiGinge says:
I signed up for the closed beta too, downloaded the program this afternoon, havn’t run it yet but it is installed, still a few days until the closed beta period anyway
02/07/2008 at 06:47 tim_buck2 says:
hey, im in the closed beta and its uber fun so far i have not played anything like this game and any new game that comes out to try and be like it will only be some cheap immitation. yes its free and yes they have a cash shop to make money but you can get alot of the stuff you need to play w/out the cashshop and the shop just makes the game more fun so if you wall want its a fun game and i encourage all of you to try it when it comes out and is released to the public
05/08/2008 at 09:34 Master Shake says:
This game goes open beta on August 7th source: Project Powder Pro , can’t wait!
08/08/2008 at 06:07 Project Powder Wiki says:
Just got done playing, this game is awesome!
08/08/2008 at 06:10 Project Powder Wiki says:
Anyone want to start a Project Powder Crew?
23/10/2008 at 02:48 hydra9 says:
Hehehe, look at the second person from the left in the screenshot. They’re holding the severed head of a defeated rival!
Now that’s xxxxtreme!
05/03/2009 at 07:37 Kat says:
Well its fantasy .. You wouldn’t be seeing people throwing their boards up and spinning around and catching then puting back their binds on in real life LOL. So I guess its no wonder they’re in the jungle?
06/05/2009 at 14:05 GetMandra says:
Project Powder is beta for almost one year and has only minor updates since the first release. I switched to “Snowbound Online” -> same game, more features, more updates and a bigger community.