_____________________________________ \ ___________________ __________ / \ \ _______________ \/ ______ / / ____________\ \ \ \ / / / / / ______________\ \______ \/ / / / / / ________ ________ \ / / / / / / ____ \ / ____ \ \ / / / / / / / /__/ / / /__/ | / / / / / / /_____ / /_____ / \ \ \ / / /_______ \ /_______ \ \ \ \ \ / / ___ / /___ / / / \ \ \ / / / /____/ // /____/ / / \ \ \ \ \ \_________/ \_________/ / /\ \ \ \ \ \________________ _______/ / \ \ \ \ \ /___ _____/ / /____________/ \__________\ \ \ /____ / / ___ /_________________/\_______________\ \ / / / / \ / / / _ / / /_/ / / / / / _\ / / / / 0 | / / / / /_/ / _/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / /___ / _ \ / /___/ / / / /__/ /__/\ \ \_/ /_____/ \_/ \_/ \_____ / / / \__\ __ / / / /______________ _______________ / /__/ / / ASCII ART BY \____\Viktor Nilsson\ \_______/ / \___________/ SSX Tricky Expert Advice FAQ FINAL VERSION (11.08.02) Compiled by gondee gondee5@yahoo.com ------------------------------------------------------------ | Advice by members of the PS2 SSX Tricky GameFAQs Board, | | and Internet contributors: | | gondee, happymachines, TypeZero, FishEye, ElysiumKaori, | | SiCo, UrzaMTG, Smartypantz711, Calibur, Packing Heat, | | FirebrandX, The JRage, dvdemons, dunc, SSJHyundo, Gaz, | | jonesy, sweetmeats, Fahran, Erick's Living Room, Dankman | | DDRKirby, and ssx4ever | ------------------------------------------------------------- If you are an author listed on this FAQ, and you want me to remove your submission, just e-mail me: gondee5@yahoo.com. Table of Contents: ----------------- Prove your Mettle! We have a Winner! Prelim: This FAQ a. What is the FAQ about? b. Is this official? c. Making this FAQ better - How can I submit? d. About the different sections e. Basic Trick Techniques f. Advanced Techniques 1. Shortcut Listing a. Garibaldi b. Snowdream c. Elysium Alps d. Mesablanca e. Merqury City Meltdown f. Tokyo Megaplex g. Aloha Ice Jam h. Alaska 2. Racing - Fastest Routes a. - h. Above 3. Showoff - Highest Scoring Routes a. - h. Above i. Pipedream 4. Glitch Shortcuts a. Elysium Alps b. Mesablanca c. Merqury City Meltdown d. Tokyo Megaplex e. Aloha Ice Jam 5. Legends - How good is this advice? a. Merqury City Scoreboard 6. Epilogue - Assorted Details & Features a. Legal b. Thanks and Credit c. Contributors section d. Version details --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- HOW GOOD ARE YOU? PROVE YOUR METTLE ----------------- Basically, you think you're good at SSX Tricky. Godly, if you must say so. Now it's time to prove it. Merqurycity.com - The SSX Fan Site, presents the SSX Tricky Scoreboard! http://www.merqurycity.com/ Click on the SSX Tricky Scoreboard link near the bottom of the page and be surprised at how good your "skills" actually are. Remember, you can be let into this arena by showing you're good through walkthrough or screenshot. But you'll need video of your run to stay King of the Mountain because everyone wants to knock you off. Competition is fierce on the Merqury City Scoreboard. WE HAVE A WINNER ---------------- A call was put out, and they came with their tapes of their phenomenal runs. In the end, one gamer stood tall above the rest. One of the very authors in this guide, happymachines, took home the coveted title of SSX World Champion. His name will now be put in the official Twin Galaxies Book of Video Game World Records. Congratulations happymachines! For more information, see the SSX Tricky World Championship Results at: http://www.twingalaxies.com/firebrandx/ssxtg.htm --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- PRELIM: THE FAQ TO THE FAQ a. What is this FAQ about? --------------------------- This FAQ is an attempt to record all the feedback from various players across the Internet and on the SSX Tricky Gamefaqs boards. Please note that most of the advice here is for advanced or expert SSX players. I can't stress this enough... there are some very high level strategies in this FAQ. If you are looking for answers to basic questions like "How do I do so-and-so trick" then look elsewhere. Some of these routes on the courses will take hours, if not days, to master. I would wager they will generously lower the times and boost the scores of any novice player who tries them. I will always attempt to validate the info here, but as with any FAQ, there can be errors. If you would like to report one, see "Making this FAQ better" at the end of this section. b. Is this FAQ "official"? -------------------------- In two words: heck no. This FAQ is nothing more than the collective wisdom of a group of players online who would like to help out others. It's not intended to be the final word on any of these tracks. However, you would do well to pay attention to these strategies. The advice here is from some of the best SSX Tricky players across the internet, including several who lead the Merqury City Scoreboards. For more information on that, see the LEGENDS Section at the end of this guide. The advice used here is much-the-same language used by the original author I've attempted to fix any glaring errors and spelling mistakes, but remember to keep the author in mind if you have a problem with some of the advice here. c. Making this FAQ better - How can I submit? -------------------------------------------------- As of 11/08/02, I am no longer accepting submissions for the SSX Tricky Expert Advice FAQ. However, if you think you have something revolutionary to tell me, let me know: gondee5@yahoo.com. d. About the different sections ------------------------------- There are four distinct sections to this FAQ. The SHORTCUTS section is a list of all the shortcuts for a given course. It's simply a list, it doesn't tell you which ones are faster or more difficult unless the author says it is. The RACING section of this FAQ lists the fastest path down the track as the players have discovered them. They are by no means the final word as players are always discovering new routes, but they should help you lower your times. These are paths that may augment the use of 'manual resetting' shortcuts, but there will be NO glitch shortcut information in this section of the FAQ. Also note that some tracks may have more than one guide...try all of them and see which one works best for you! :) The SHOWOFF section lists the author's favorite routes on the course to get the highest score possible by catching different colored snowflakes. Please keep in mind that manual resetting in showoff is deemed an essential technique and is utilized in most of the guides. The GLITCH SHORTCUT section is at the end of the FAQ, in case players who dislike certain tactics won't have to read it if they don't want to. See "Advanced Techniques" for more info on Glitch Shortcuts. e. Trick Techniques ------------------- It is assumed in this FAQ that you know how to do flips, spins, grabs and Ubers. If you don't, consult the instruction booklet and practice. Nothing is a substitute for learning the game inside and out. However, here are a few tips to help those who constantly e-mail me with questions about TRICKS they can find out in five minutes: 1. If you don't know how to do a certain trick for the trickbook, USE THE TRICK TUTORIAL. Seriously folks, the trick tutorial will tell you and SHOW you how to do the correct trick. Just remember that when you are in the tutorial, the black indicators that tell you what directions to push are not arrows, they are pictures of the Directional Pad. For example, the Up Button on the Playstation 2 Control Pad looks like a black down arrow. 2. Make SURE you are using the character's default board type. If you are not, the trick will not come out even if you are doing the right motions. Double check your board before you try this. 3. If your character isn't strong enough to do a trick yet, try using trick boosts in Race Mode. Sometimes that can help you with a difficult trick. 4. Remember that some tricks just take practice and require an insane amount of spins (level 5 especially.) Watch the direction the character spins in the tutorial and spin to the same side. And finally, just practice. You'll learn the difference between a 1620 and an 1800 soon enough. f. Advanced Techniques & Terms ------------------------------ Throughout this FAQ you may come across terminology that you don't understand. For the most part it's pretty obvious, but for those of you who don't know, here are different techniques used in advanced racing and Showoff: Terms: ------ TO UBER: To Do an Uber trick. CHAR UBER OR SIG UBER: A Character-specific or signature Uber. Only One Character has this Uber and it is generally longer and worth more points than regular Ubers. CLEAN RUN: A run with no cheats, codes, warps, glitch shortcuts, or crashes. Basically playing the game with no enhancement and getting a perfect run with no mess-ups. This is the sort of run you need to enter Twin Galaxies Contests. Advanced Techniques ------------------- a) MANUAL RESETTING WARP: The Manual Resetting Warp, or "Select trick" involves pushing the manual reset button ('Select' on the PS2 and X-box, 'Y' on the GC controller) at certain points in the race. Doing this will cause your racer to warp ahead on the track and save you time. (It is called the 'Select Trick' because it originated on the PS2 system with the first SSX, where the Select button was the manual reset button. This trick is still present in SSX Tricky.) NOTE: There is some controversy with using this trick, because some people consider it cheating. It's up to you to decide whether to use this, but for the purposes of this FAQ we will list it, since the majority of competitive racers do use this trick. However, according to the Twin Galaxies SSX Tricky World Record contest rules, using this in official contest racing is ILLEGAL. (http://www.twingalaxies.com/firebrandx/ssxttg.htm) It is considered a legal tactic of Showoff however, and not against the Twin Galaxies rules. b) TAP-BOOSTING: You gain boost by doing tricks, and spend it by holding the boost button. However, it is an little known fact that tapping the boost button repeatedly (instead of just holding it down) causes your boost to last MUCH longer (almost three times as long) while still maintaining near-top speed. In order to best utilize the boost that you get, you should HOLD the boost button until you reach top speed, and then tap it to maintain close-to-top speed for as long as possible. Using this on straightaways for characters who have a hard time acquiring boost is key to good times on longer races. It is important to remember that this tactic is not nearly as good as getting all six letters of TRICKY filled up (and having unlimited boost), but it's a good tactic to know if there are no places to get six Ubers in a race. c) GLITCH SHORTCUTS: These are a new breed of "shortcuts" in SSX Tricky, and they are VERY controversial. What this "glitch" entails is falling or jumping off the track, literally, In effect, you are "jumping off the world". In most cases where you fall off the world, the game will reset you after about 1 minute. The key here is that the game will reset you MUCH further ahead in the track after you fall a certain distance. You can utilize this strange effect to your advantage by manual-resetting out of "falling forever" at a certain point - usually after 30 seconds or so. (This varies depending on the track and the individual glitch shortcut, however.) Again, this will save you time and set you much further ahead than you would have been if you had raced "normally". I will list all known glitch shortcuts at the END of the FAQ, but only as a documentation. Not every player agrees that taking advantage of glitches is an ethical way to race, but you decide for yourself. I will always surround glitch shortcuts with ** stars ** and CAPITAL LETTERS. Keep in mind that glitch shortcuts ARE TOTALLY ILLEGAL in official Twin Galaxies world record races. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. SHORTCUT LISTING 1a. GARIBALDI - Shortcuts ---------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) Right off the bat, look for a rail to the right of the regular jump through a few of those yellow cushions. Grind this rail to the bottom (if you have boost that will help immensely). This will spit you out right before the second jump. 2) If you don't take #1, at the bottom of the huge drop is a blue SSX sign, bust through this to take a few turns and jumps to the second jump. 3) After the second jump, look for a blue SSX sign far to the right to go into the Garibaldi "Untracked area." This area is huge, with several slopes and valleys. Sticking to the left will lead you back to the track around the beginning of the repeating, intersecting jumps. If you stick to the right, you'll continue on into the second half of the untracked area and come out even later on the track. 3a) AUTHOR: sweetmeats - After the first huge drop and around a corner or two, there is the blue SSX sign on the right that takes you to the Untracked area. A few feet away on the same side is a break in the fence right at the top of the hill. What you need to do is aim for the break in the fence and jump from the hill. You'll probably hit the billboard but when you land on the snow that separates the Untracked part from the main course (the "mountain" the billboard is on), continue down the middle of the mountain and very shortly you will go into a blue ice cave. This is short but shoots you out high above the track, past the first checkpoint. 4) Continuing on the main track will take you over a few jumps, and lead you to a red SSX sign on the right. This leads to a jump over the main path far below, and into a parallel valley in deep powder to the left of the main track. This leads to yet another jump that goes over the main path once more and then intersects again. There is a cable to the right here that will take you onto the billboards, but is not much of a shortcut. 5) Ahead is the area where the path splits, and both sides lead to a series of large jumps surrounded by crowd stands. When the path splits, go down the middle, and you will see a blue SSX sign. This path will take you straight down the middle of the path, skipping all the turns and jumps! Beware of poles and other obstacles, however. 6) If you take the path to the right instead of going down the middle, you will see another SSX sign on the right. This is the second entrance to the Untracked section previously mentioned. Stay to the left here and bust through another Blue SSX sign that leads you to through an ice tunnel and back onto the main path. However, if you skip this SSX sign, you will exit out and jump over a rushing river, go underneath a bridge, and go onto shortcut #8. 7) Immediately after exiting this area, look for a blue SSX sign to the FAR left on the other side of a yellow barrier wall. This leads to an ice tunnel which spits you out on the side of the track by the series of jumps over an ice river. However, you can't get to the jumps if you took this shortcut. 8)If you had skipped #7, the normal path leads to a jump and look for a blue SSX sign high on a hill to the left. Busting through this sign causes you to grind a rail to a series of jumps over a rushing river! You can also access this shortcut by looking for it from the Untracked area mentioned above. There are three or four jumps, and this section eventually exits back onto the main track right before the very last jump. 9) Continuing on the main path takes you to a series of three jumps in between narrow rock canyons. Before this, there is a blue SSX sign that you can bust through to take a jump through the center section of the canyons. Not much of a shortcut though... 10) Down the main path aways, and you will come to a very sharp right turn on the top of a large hill. This shortcut is obvious and easy, just jump over the turn and go down to the track below. 11)Towards the final section of the track you will come to another series of jumps. In the middle is another blue SSX sign which will dip you through a tunnel and out a jump that leads you to an ice path on top of the rock formation. Follow this to the main path. Only thing left is the gigantic jump at the end. Try cutting hills or taking it slow, and good luck on your time! :) 1b. SNOWDREAM - Shortcuts ------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) At the beginning of the race, cutting to the right (by the big yellow cushion things) leads to a large black rail in the snow that you can grind to get an early lead. 2) A little later on there is an SSX sign to the left which leads to a rail grind. Grinding this rail eventually ends with you grinding on a yellow barrier fence for some distance. 3) Again there is an SSX sign further down the course on the left that leads to a grind. This one is shorter, but still good to look for. 4)In the middle of the race there is a blue SSX sign in the center of the track which leads to a rail grind where you can boost off a snowblower at the very end. This is a decent shortcut. 5) Directly after this (around a curve) is an area with a blue SSX sign that you can bust through by jumping off a ramp. You can also look for green flares on the turn before that signal the beginning of this shortcut. This leads to the largest shortcuts in Snowdream. The path splits a short ways ahead; to the left the course leads you past a small wooden bridge to a pagoda-type structure. The easiest way to get past this is to grind the small bridge onto a narrow ledge, and jump off the ledge onto the roof of the structure, making your way back to the main course. To the right, before the first bridge, is a short ice path that leads to a grind on a fence which drops you back onto the main path. An alternate route is to jump onto the hilltop where the rail starts, and grind to the left, skipping the large turns and coming out where the "pagoda" shortcut comes out. 6) AUTHOR: Fahran - The other shortcut missing is the one I tend to use and I find is slightly faster (and only very slightly at that) and easier than the pagoda shortcut. Instead of taking the left shortcut to the pagoda, keep going over the jump on the main track, and directly ahead is another blue SSX sign. Jumping over the fence to the right of the track here leads to an ice path that heads over the hill and includes a speed boost so you can make the jump (and pop the big balloon) on to the upper section that criss-crosses the main track. 7) Immediately after the pagoda shortcut, look for a rail on the left that you can grind that leads to a grind on a yellow fence. 8) There are various points later in the race where you can cut off the main path and ski across powder to another section of the course. Look for those large yellow "cushions" for a few of them. 9) In the last sections of the race, there are a few cables that lead to fence grinds. These are really the only "shortcuts" left, so take care and try to hit the ones you think are most advantageous. The rest of the track is cake, good luck! 1c. ELYSIUM ALPS - Shortcuts ---------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) At the beginning of the track there are two signs, one to the far left (red) and one to the right (blue). The red sign leads to a series of cable/billboard grinds and leads to a shortcut #3. The blue sign cuts underneath the crowd stands, down the next hill in some thick powder and back onto the main track. 2) After the second jump, off to the right on the descent of a small hill is a cable grind that will take you across several billboards (on the right side of the regular track) and spit you out by the first checkpoint. This is different than shortcut # 1. At the bottom of the jump after the moving platforms, there is a ramp to the right. Slowing down at the top of the hill and then boosting onto this ramp will take you to the next shortcut: 3) Riding the rails or taking the ramp will lead you to a twisting ice path far above the rest of the track. After a long jump at the end, you will land at the beginning of shortcut #4. 4) Directly past the first shortcut is a path to the right of the normal track that is framed by small wooden fence. Going up this path will require you break through a wooden board barring the way, and will spit you out onto a series of short ledges that skirt along the side of the mountain. There are two choices here: going high will lead across a few jumps and down a long ramp to the rest of the track. Taking the low path will skirt across even more short platforms, and require that you grind one of two branches to go back to the main course. Either way is much faster than the regular track. 5) If you had skipped #4, there are a series of SSX signs on turn embankments on the regular track. Busting through these cuts you through several sharp turns, and the second sign enables you to catch a series of branch grinds back across another embankment. 6) Going around the next few turns, there are a few shortcuts in the next section (the section with the platform jumps with rails on the side.) Off to either side of the platform are ice paths which lead to rail grinds (these were in the first SSX.) Separate from these, off to the right at the beginning is a small cable grind up to the crowd stands, putting you past the entire area. 7) At the end of this path there is a red SSX sign to the left. Busting through this will lead to the old SSX path. This path consists of a regular straight path, or a red sign off to the left which leads to a forest and then a large jump to shortcut # 9. 8) If you had ignored the red SSX sign at #7, you go through a small cave and then back onto the normal track. This leads to an ice path with many small jumps...there are numerous shortcuts here (none as fast as #9) that you can find by grinding branches that lie against hills or cutting embankments. Explore and see which one you like best. 9) This shortcut was in the first SSX, and it is still by far the fastest way. Going this way leads you to a series of steep cliff jumps over the regular ice path in #8. There are three jumps, which lead you to a slight turn on a hill where you can either jump back onto the main ice path or grind a set of branches to continue the shortcut. The branches are much faster and led you out on the main path at the steep drop at the checkpoint. 10) Directly past this drop is a red SSX sign to the right. Busting through this will lead to a snowy plain and then back onto the normal track if you do not jump at the end. Jumping at the end will lead you to shortcut #11. 11) You can reach this either by jumping or skiing from the lower track, but to the left of the next section is a large tunnel which leads to the halfpipe. At the end of this tunnel is a cable which leads to the next shortcut. 12) On either side of the ice-halfpipe with the glass barriers are cable grinds which lead you past the ENTIRE halfpipe if you can catch them. There are no real shortcuts in the remainder of the race, so race to the finish line and good luck! 1d. MESABLANCA - Shortcuts -------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) From the start of the race, there are two red ramps, jump the second one to go to a shortcut on a ledge above the normal tracks. There are three choices here: The first is to continue going down the main shortcut path, which will spit you out around a few steep curves and back onto the course. The second is to ski to the right of this part and go up a very narrow ramp, which will launch you over a barrier and onto a forest path. The third option is to jump to the FAR right and go down a shortcut back onto the main course that bypasses the first sharp turn. 2) The alternate way to get onto the forest path is to continue on the normal path until you reach the third turn (a right turn) and ski up over the embankment. You'll have to make it through a few trees, but it's much easier than the path above. This will lead you to a jump over a river and a large billboard (there is a red snowflake in Showoff here.) 3) After this part the path bisects, and in the middle there is a rail that goes over a hill. 4) Over the next jump and to the left is a gigantic Seeiah billboard. Cutting past this leads you to a rail grind across a large tree branch that juts over the hill. Jump at the end of this to make it past the billboards below. 5) A couple of jumps later, there is a blue SSX sign. This will lead you to a raised path over the regular track, and down into the mines. This is the earliest way to get into the mines. All entrances to the mines spit you out past the suspended bridge. 6) Around a few turns is another blue SSX sign, which grinds onto a rail. After a short rail launch, you will attempt to jump onto raised railroad tracks (on poles) above the regular path! This is difficult, but if you manage it, you can boost across these rails to the tunnel that leads to the suspended bridge over the waterfalls. 7) Skipping shortcut #6 will lead you to a few more turns and a point where the path bisects around a platformed tower. Taking the right path will let you crash through a pit covered by boards and down into the mines again. 8) If you cut the first turn after the bridge, you can ski across some rough terrain, to the start of the ravine shortcut. This shortcut is quite long, and you actually jump over it several times on the main path. It leads to two red sign shortcuts you must access by jump at the end of it. 9) During the ravine shortcut, if you cut behind a crowd stand, you'll see a branch across the adjoining hill that you can grind to a red sign. Grinding this is very difficult, but when you do, it will lead you to three successive jumps over the high plateaus and eventually land you past those narrow canyons in the middle of the track very far ahead. 10) The second red sign is accessed by jumping a small ramp near the end of the ravine shortcut. Again, this isn't easy, but upon making it, you bust through another short tunnel with boards (be sure to jump at the end) and then upon making this jump, you end up back on the main track. 11) Across the next section, you can cut across embankments to save a lot of time. Just experiment and see which ones net you the most advantage. 12) The quickest way across the area with the bisecting trails that cross over each other (with rails lining them) is to jump on the rails and grind you way past this section. Not easy, but definitely worth it. 13) RIGHT past this section, cut to the far right. There is a narrow path through the canyon that will lead you directly to the end. After this, it's just a quick jaunt to the finish line. Good luck! 1e. MERQURY CITY MELTDOWN - Shortcuts ------------------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1. Right off the start, bust through the SSX sign and catch the rail over the next building (you'll crash through a capital-type dome, very cool). From there continue going perfectly straight. 2. Fly off the upturned rail with boost and you'll fly onto the top of a building and crash through the skylight. :) After a couple of quick jaunts over some more rooftops, you'll come out on the main path. 3. Going down a few hills and you'll see two split paths and a building with a grey double door right in the middle. Crash through the door and through the adjoining inside area. Fly out to the next building and avoid the exhaust fans if you can...boost and jump to the next building in front (this can be difficult.) Cut to the right and jump through a VERY narrow space in between buildings. This will lead you to another red SSX sign that cuts in between more buildings and eventually takes you back to the main path. 4. After a few split turns you can cut through a pair of really narrow towers, not much of a shortcut, but everything helps. 5. Further down the line you'll see a gigantic billboard of Seeiah off to the left, cut by that and you'll cut across a steep, narrow downhill shortcut in between buildings right by another gigantic billboard of Kaori. 6. Now you have two choices: there's another shortcut between buildings (you'll see a cop car flashing) or you can continue further down the main path until you see another red SSX sign. That's the parking garage shortcut. Go to the lowest level and go to the end of the garage. There are two shortcuts here: 7. A building on the left which leads to an upturned rail that leads right to a hovering UFO :) If you get enough boost and hit the light from the UFO you'll be transported to the forest by the bridge, but in thick powder. 8. The building on the right - Catch the first rail at the end and you'll catch the next rail as well, this will lead you to an inside part with a low roof, slow down on that second rail. Complete this part to the next roof and somehow look for an adjoining roof to leap onto. This should lead you to another rail, then to another building, followed by a leap to a building top with a SPLIT rail. Taking that rail lets you fly off a rooftop with a gigantic blimp in front of you, and then down onto a ice river which lead to fan shortcut that leads past the bridge. 9. AUTHOR: FirebrandX - There is also another sewer tunnel that is VERY hard to get into. This one is on the left fork just before the icy half pipe section. It's a big concrete cylinder sticking up from the snow and has a wooden cover on top. If you jump just right, you can clear the lip and drop through the top part, breaking the wooden cover. This will take you through a another series of fan blades, and eventually into the start of the ice river. 10. Directly after the entrance to shortcut #8, you will see go through a large ice tunnel which leads back to the normal track. Above this area is a large indoor "food court" area. You access this by jumping from the small ramp (a ramp without paint) and flying up here. You ski through a series of tables & chairs, and then start downhill indoors. Aim for the white "beam" on the glass in the middle of the track, busting through the glass here will put you on a rail that you can grind to the next building. Grinding this will lead you to another indoor section (an office with cubicles) -- be sure to ski to the left to avoid the cubicles. Upon busting through the glass here, you are faced with two choices 1) Boost full-speed through the opening, off the building and back onto the main track or 2) Slow down almost completely before busting through the glass and look to your right -- grind the RAIL on the right corner of the building that leads to the BLIMP mentioned above. This is a MUCH easier way of accessing the ice river shortcut! 11. After skiing down the ice river, you bust through a brick wall into a sewer tunnel with large fans that as in the first SSX. The fans go faster this time, but no problem getting through this, same as the old shortcut, but without the low walls. This juts you out into section underneath the overpass jumps, and skiing around the side of the last glass ramp back up to the normal track leads you to the sewer shortcut that was in the first SSX. 12. The subway connection is back again, and this time it's much easier. It is located BEHIND the final glass ramp that leads back onto the main track from the lower snowy area beneath the series of raised highway overpasses. Ski around behind the last ramp and you will see a brick wall that you can bust through to make your way into the tunnel. Simply slow down if you see the subways this time - it's much easier. 13. If you take the upper level (going up the glass ramp underneath the overpasses) there are only a few major shortcuts that are worthy of mentioning. Down the path aways, there is an opening in between buildings (look for the red trash dumpsters). Jumping out onto here will let you drop directly onto the lower level on the final stretch to the finish line. 14. If you skip shortcut 13 and continue on the normal path, ahead and below you is a glass and concrete wall that you would have slalomed around had you taken the lame normal path. Right above this wall is a hard to see pipe. Your goal is to jump onto that pipe. Practice. Try landing on it sideways. This rail is hard to see against the dark underside though, so look very carefully! You should be able to jump through the dome for some mad style points at the end. 15. In this same area, to the right of the glass and concrete walls is a path that leads down. It is easy to miss because the ice blends in with the fog that appears before you hit the shortcut. Very crafty. Going down this shortcut will run you by a few more subways (they're parked) and cut you out directly beneath the raised high way above. From there it is just a quick run to the finish line! 1f. TOKYO MEGAPLEX - Shortcuts ------------------------------ AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) In the area where you land from the air tunnel, there are two suspended "pipes" (not really halfpipes, but still) on either side which branch off into other pipes and lead down the track. Explore each of them to see which you like best. 2) Directly above the area where you land from the wind tunnel is a raised ledge that leads to two red and white rails. You can access this ledge by jumping onto it as soon as you land from the wind tunnel, or if you access a ramp near the wind tunnel, you can ride onto the suspended halfpipe, and enter the wind tunnel higher up through an opening, which will cause you to float directly onto this platform. Taking either one is a wild ride, turn your board sideways and see how long you can stay on. In some cases you can ride these rails for an entire lap or more! 3) About halfway through a lap is a switch you can hit which causes a ramp to raise. Jumping about halfway up causes you to fall into a tunnel which splits right and left and ends with a fan blowing you up and out back onto the course. 4) Near the end of the lap is a series of circular "doors" you must open by hitting switches. Hitting the one in the middle will cause a door to open to an green underground tunnel which splits left and right. This also leads to boost up and out of the tunnel, although you can catch a red rail at the end to boost across the curves up ahead. 5) Near the end of the race you pass through an area with fans underneath a glass and steel platform. Going on the fans (or boosting from a ramp earlier) will cause you to go on top of the platform, where you can ride onto a suspended halfpipe which leads to the wind tunnel opening discussed in #1. 1g. ALOHA ICE JAM - Shortcuts ----------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) There are a set of blue SSX signs not long past the beginning of the race (these are from the first SSX.) Busting through either one will put you in a shallow stream. After this, through a few turns there is another blue SSX sign on a banked turn. Going through this one will enable you to skip a nasty turn. 2) There is a red SSX sign off to the right immediately after the blue signs. This will put you through a short tunnel with a fan and dump you out in front of the glass tunnel with the ramp. 3) Through this glass tunnel is a ramp at the end. Boost without jumping to fall into a large underground tunnel. This will save you a huge amount of time. 4) Right after this tunnel, there are a set of cables in the middle of the tunnel that lead to another underground tunnel with fans. Slowing down at the end of the previous tunnel with help you grind the cables. This second underground shortcut spits you out in the valley between two ramps, right before the jump over the large billboard. 5) Directly ahead you will see a large ice face. It leads to several suspended plastic tunnels in the sky, which spits you out past all the steeply banked ice turns in the next section. 6) If you miss the face (or fall out of the tunnels), there is a red SSX sign to the far left which leads to a long, flat cable grind. This will put you past those annoying ice turns again. 7) Near the end of both of these shortcuts is a ravine which leads to the "indoor" section of the track. You can either grind the rails or jump over the ravine. There is a red SSX sign to the far left that is the third crucial shortcut and can give you first place easily. Busting through that lets you steer around a few pipes and rocks and lands you neatly at the end of the race. The normal way is MUCH longer. 8) There are various red signs in the normal section of the course that cut you over hills and save you time, but not as much as shortcut #7. 9) Toward the end of the race, there are two ways to go. The first is to stay on the bottom portion of the track and board over floating icebergs to the finish line. The shortcut here is to catch the "ski lift" wires going up (there are two sets), and ride them up to an upper tunnel which neatly bypasses the annoying icebergs. Just be careful you do not land in the burning barrel after the finish line! ;) 1h. ALASKA - Shortcuts ---------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) Get ready, this track is HUGE. Right from the first drop, there are red SSX signs to either side. Busting through the one on the left can take you to a rail you can grind that leads you back to the main path. Neither path is much better than going down the normal track. 2) After a short series of turns, there is a VERY steeply banked ice turn. (It is directly after a Luther billboard, but before a Seeiah billboard) You reach this shortcut by boarding left, up the embankment and onto an ice path. This leads to an upper ice path and a jump (this section is very difficult) that leads to THREE ice tunnels that you must bust through to reach. The top tunnel leads to an extraordinarily long ice tunnel that spits you out at the open path by the ice river. This shortcut is huge! The middle path is another long ice tunnel, which leads to a rail that you can ride to a few ledges on top of the ice canyon for a bit, which ends back on the main course. The bottom path is a short tunnel around the next set of turns and back onto the main path. If you catch an ice ledge, you can board across a small series of platforms and back onto the main path. And there is still ANOTHER shortcut -- to the left of these tunnels is a red SSX sign that you can jump to from the same ramp. This takes you to another series of rail grinds that lead you to the ramps in the next shortcut. WHEW. 3) There are two ramps here that jump over a river section. Taking the far left ramp boosts you to an upper ice path with a few jumps that lead you past the entire narrow section by the ice river. The other ramps can lead you past a sharp turn, and back by the river. Finally, there is a rail to the right on the river that you can grind if you get lucky enough to catch it from the jump. 4) Past this area is a split level with several mini ledges every second of so, no shortcuts through this area. Past this level, you can ride a snow ledge to the right and hop on a series of raised ice blocks into a tunnel in the next section. This leads to a tunnel much higher than the regular path, and much easier to. After hitting a steeply banked right funnel, you'll come out past all the sharp turns in that section to exit the ice tunnels. AUTHOR: Gaz - After the mogul run you hit a frozen riverbed with a few islands on it and the last one has a rail leading from it into a cavern. The rail leads to an elevated ice path that leads you through the caverns and brings you out just before the cave exit (where the trick boost is). It's a tricky shortcut to stay on, as the path is only about six feet wide (relatively speaking) and has no sides on it, so it's easy to fall off into the default path through the caves. The best advice I could give would be to slow down and take it steady as soon as you leave the entry rail and you'll still shave about five seconds off your finish time. 5) There are various paths in the ice caves (you can spot them by the stalagmites) that cut through the regular path. They are risky, but they are shorter. 6) After exiting the ice caves, cut to the left and skip ALL the sharply banked ice turns by skiing in the powder to the left of the normal track. Easy as pie. 7) After jumping the large pit here, you come to the "halfpipe" of Alaska. Not much here, but after that you reach the vertical "U turn" on this section. You can select shortcut past this, but not much else. 8) Next you come to a large jump. Boost down the middle and get massive air off this jump to catch an opening here. This takes you through a small ice cave, straight through to the middle path on the next section. 9) There are three normal paths here: far left, middle, and far right. Both far left and right are identical paths up soft hills and onto regular paths (there are speed boosts here in racing mode.) The middle path is a raised ice path with several soft hills. Boost down the middle, and jump as high as you can off the ramp here. If you get massive air, you land onto the top of the rock formation that the normal path goes around! A steep hill later and you are back onto the left path, which is a soft hill through the final ice cave section. There are no shortcuts for the remainder of the track until the final jump with the massive fans. 10) This isn't much of a shortcut, but there are rails on the upper ledge of the final jump you can boost down to the finish line. The whole upper path is much faster than the lower path, as a whole. Good luck on finishing this massively long race! --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2. RACING - FASTEST ROUTES 2a. GARIBALDI - Racing ---------------------- CO-AUTHORS: happymachines and FirebrandX -------------------------------------------- 1) Right out of the gate, punch someone. Yay for knockdowns giving you full boost. You won't be able to get a quick start, and you might have to reset the course until you're next to someone who has a comparable start to you (I use Elise, starting out next to Marisol, Eddie, or Luther is always good.) 2) Go to the cable. When you approach the cable, go ahead and use boost to get to it. You'll be able to get it back by tap-jumping while grinding the cable. This resets your boost meter to full if done right. As soon as you get to the end of the cable, do a Nac Nac. 3) Land. Do Uber #2 off the ledge in front of you. 4) After landing uber #2, boost on down to where the track merges back together. You'll want to aim in between the pylons and jump up the hill right at the gap in the fence. If timing is good, you can do uber #3 and #4 in this one jump. 5) You'll now be in a secret area with a tunnel-tube ahead amongst the trees. I go in between the trees well right of the tunnel-tube entrance. Ahead is deep snow and a ridge. Charge a jump and do uber #5 off the edge of it slightly to the right. You may land on a secondary lower ridge, immediately jump it and do uber #6. If you manage to clear the secondary ledge from the first jump, then this gives you enough air to do 2 ubers anyway. 6) You'll have full boost when you land, so blast straight ahead and keep sort of close to the left wall. At some point, you'll see a lone bush next to a tree. Right as you hit it, press select. This will put you back on the main track near a turn to the left. 7) Boost down the course until it splits. Take the right path, then go through the red sign to the right. go down the hill for a ways, and head towards the blue ssx sign. Hit select shortly before you reach it (yes, it's cheap. I know it's cheap. you know it's cheap. but such is life). You should find yourself approaching the bridge over the river. Go through the ssx sign on the left, down the pipe, you don't need to jump to cross the river. 8) Instead, you can press select about 2/3 of the way down the pipe-grind. This will put you just past that first river-gap. 9) After materializing past the first river-gap, continue on down the track. Just after the right turn in the track, press select. You will be placed past the jump ahead. 10) Aim straight with maybe a little leftward angle and let the track gradually pull you as it turns left. You should glide up on the far edge of the turn. You'll be facing toward the arch down below on the right. Blast for it and press select when you get fairly close. You be placed underneath it on the icy path. 11) Go down the path and turn sharply to the right before you get to the snowplow. By going up here, you'll be able to make the game register you as crossing the finish line, even though you are hundreds of feet away from it. You'll need to practice the perfect angle and you will need to jump the snow as there is an auto-reset boundary. If done correctly, you'll cross the finish line in mid-air. The actual finish line will be way down below. Super CHEESY!! 2b. SNOWDREAM - Racing ---------------------- AUTHOR: happymachines --------------------- 1) Punch someone as soon as you get out of the gate to get full-boost. 2) Do uber #1 off this first jump. Might take a couple of tries. 3) There is a pipe here that is really good to grind. You can get on it right at the curve (which is tricky, because the bank shoots you up in the air, making it hard to aim), or on the right side of the straightaway after the turn (this is easier to get on, but unless you turn sideways quickly, you're likely to fall off). 4) Boost down the rail, at the end of it do an uber trick. 5) Continue down the course. Eventually you will get to a split level jump. Take the smaller one, and do an uber trick. Then do more uber tricks on the next several jumps. There really isn't very much to do in the middle of the course except fill up your TRICKY meter. 6) After the long straight section, the path splits into three sections: left, right, and a sign in the middle with a pipe behind it. Bust through the sign and take the pipe. 7) After you are shot off the end of the pipe, take the turn, then you'll notice some green flares on the left. Cut through the green flare area (and try not to hit anything). A little bit farther up the course this shortcut is marked with a SSX sign way up in the air, but entering it here keeps you from having to jump. 8) There is a balcony/structure type thing ahead of you. Go on top of it (or on the railing, which I believe is slightly faster if you can do it), jump to the next structure, and from there onto the blue roof. Try to jump far enough so that you land on the downward sloping side. 9) Once you hit the ground again, turn sharply to the left, staying with the cliff wall. Ahead of you there should be a cable leading to the fence. Grind the cable, then the fence, then transfer to the pipe with the snowblower. You should now be on a raised ledge running parallel to the main path. 10) To the left, notice the giant cushions concealing the hole in the fence. Don't they look comfy? And yellow? Crash through them and cut through the powder. Make a beeline for where the fence starts up again ahead of you. 11) Another cable leading to a fence. You know what to do. 12) AUTHOR: gondee: Once you are on the fence, you must slide off after about two seconds, and boost down the remaining track. Grinding the twisty fence is slower then jumping off early and getting to the bridge. If you can do this smoothly you will save a few seconds. 13) AUTHOR: gondee: Try to go over the bridge as smooth as possible, jumping early over it if need be. There is a nasty polygon that can trip you on the right side, so be careful of that. Boost to the end and get an awesome time! 2c. ELYSIUM ALPS - Racing ------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) Out of the starting gate, go over the jump and do a good trick to build up your boost. Upon landing, swerve to the right of the moving platforms (skipping them) and slow down so you don't go flying over the jump. Instead, ski down the jump and boost once you to the bottom. Aim for the snow ramp to the right and fly off of that. 2) This should take you to the upper ice shortcut above the regular track on the left side. Boost down this until you come to the jump at the end with the trick bonus. Do an Uber off this jump and land on the ledge below and onto the ledges shortcut that you normally ramp up to after the first checkpoint. 3) Do not boost on these ledges, and after rounding the sharp turn-jump and the right turn-ledge, continue boosting without jumping. There are two ledges here, an upper and a lower ledge. You want to take the lower ledge and continue to boost without jumping across the next two ledges. You can bust Ubers off these ledges if you want. On the last ledge, hit one of the rail-logs and boost off it back onto the main path. 4) You are now facing a large banked right turn with large billboards. Skate along the left side of the embankment, and skate OVER the turn, beneath or in-between the billboards. This will take you to the area where there was a trick boost in the first SSX, except now it goes behind the crowd stands. Boost through the deep powder and back onto the main path. 5) Take the rail beside the ramps to the right, and boost over them. After this section, you'll see a red SSX sign to the left of the entrance to the caves. Go through that, and it will lead you to another old section of the game. Cut through the forest and go down the embankment (do an Uber) and back onto the old shortcut area with the jumps over the chasms. 6) Take all three of the next jumps (you can do Ubers over all of them, giving you unlimited boost). After the third jump, grind the log to the left and onto the downhill wide right turn back onto the main path and go off the steep jump without jumping. Look ahead and instead of going around the sharp banked right turn, bust through the red SSX sign directly ahead. This will lead to a flat area a slight upward slop a bit to the left ahead. Prewind and do a big trick off of that. 7) You'll wind up in a new ice tunnel which leads directly to the half-pipe/walls area. Upon exiting the tunnel, look for a cable which you can grind which leads up to the billboards on the left side. Grinding this is easy if you turn you board horizontal to the cables. Boost all the way down this, bypassing all those walls and coming out on the other side. 8) Continue down the path until you come to the horizontal loop-de-loop. You have a few choices to speed through, the first is to just catch the speed boost and go through it normally. If you catch the left lip of the loop, you can also grind all the way down if you use boost. Finally, if you get lucky you can "select shortcut" right through this, but it doesn't work all the time. There is rumored to be a way to jump over the loop, but I've never been able to do it. :( 9) Out of the loop it's just a short jaunt to the finish line. Boost over all the hills without jumping and you should have one great time! :) AUTHOR: dunc ------------ 1) Do a quick grab off the first hill to fill up your boost bar quickly. 2) Do uber #1 off the first jump. 3) Steer to the right of the moving jump. If you don't use any boost, go pretty straight and don't jump, you should have enough time for quickie uber #2 down to the bottom. 4) Jump and uber #3 onto the upper shortcut. 5) At the kink in the upper shortcut you can jump and uber #4. 6) You'll come to the jump onto the old shortcut, uber #5 off it. 7) Don't boost on the ledges, and at the right turn, don't jump, but uber #6. (this is the hardest bit of the course). 8) Pick your way to the end of the ledges, then go over the large banked turn in between the air. The point to do this is in the large gap between the billboards. Ski down the powder to the ice, and take the rails on the left. The trees are wider than they look ... watch out! 9) ...and the rest is the same as the method above, but this method will get you Ubers faster! AUTHOR: ssx4ever ---------------- There is a way to completely bypass the horizontal loop-de-loop at the end. You must aim to go straight down the middle through the hole in the bottom of the sign. It's like threading a needle at 74mph. I don't think there's anything easy about it at all since it's very hit and miss. Try and land early (not that you have any control of this) before the end of the loop barriers - there's actually a line/crack in the ice to mark the spot. Landing early helps maintain greater balance and translates to a faster takeoff. Unsure whether it's better or not to grab the speed boost. Others might have a more informed opinion. 2d. MESABLANCA - Racing ----------------------- AUTHOR: happymachines --------------------- 1) Get a knockdown right out of the gate. 2) Jump a little bit on this first hill. It should carry you over the second hill, and you can do an uber while you're in the air. 3) Turn right, turn left, then start to drift up the left hand bank. If done correctly, you should cut through the woods a little bit, rejoining the path right after the next turn. 4) Jump the river. You can pull an uber trick in the air. 5) Get on the center rail. This is far trickier than it was in the first game, and is where I screw up most on this track. If you make it on, boost along it. 6) Head to the left a little. Do not take the shortcut that you always took in the first ssx. Instead, stay on the main path, you'll go into a dip. Coming out of it will send you up in the air, you should be able to pull off an uber trick while you're up there. 7) There should be a cliff wall on your left. Stay close to the wall. as the wall falls away from you, you should notice a blue ssx sign on the left. Go through it. 8) Cross the bridge, down the tunnel, into the mine car shortcut. 9) You'll be in the open for a second, then go back into another shaft. This part can be a little tricky; I'm still not completely sure how to handle it. Just make sure you line yourself up straight as best you can, and stop holding forward. I'm pretty sure holding forward will always cause you to wipe out. 10) Speed down the mine shaft. If you mess up where the tracks jump, you can hit select, no biggie. If you make it through, upon leaving the cave you can pull off an uber trick (you need to be watching your meter carefully to do this). 11) Once you're in the open again, head left. Instead of jumping over the river, jump down inside it (a couple of points about this: don't jump too far across the river or else you will crash into the far wall. It can be really hard to get your forward momentum in a new direction. jumping seems quicker than just letting yourself fall, and you can do an uber trick here). 12) Speed down the ice path. There are a couple of spots in here where you will wipe out just for going over them. Have fun finding them. 13) At the end of the ice path, jump down onto the normal course. I think you can do an uber trick here, although I usually screw up (if you do one successfully, you now should have tricky). If not, you can always do one of the two upcoming jumps in the canyon. 14) Proceed normally, after awhile you'll get to a trick boost. Once you hit the trick boost, head off the course slightly to the left. There should be a billboard in front of you, try to go between the legs of the billboard. Keep heading straight until you rejoin the course at the turn right before the part where the path splits and repeatedly crosses over itself. 15) Get onto one of the rails here. I don't know which one is the fastest. If you know, then tell other people. (Knowing is half the battle, after all). 16) Once you exit the rails, turn sharp to the right. You want to head to the right of all the trees; here you'll find a little shortcut cut through the rock. Head down this until you get to the end. 2e. MERQURY CITY MELTDOWN - Racing ---------------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) Right off the start, try as best you can to get to bust through the red SSX sign ahead of you. A slight tap in one direction (usually right) will do the job. After that, ride the rail to the adjoining ceiling, bust through the dome and do an Uber off the end. (The normal path on the track is just as fast, but without the opportunity for Ubers.) 2)Land and immediately boost without holding up on the control pad. You should boost off a very short rail ahead of you and fly onto an adjoining roof, doing another quick Uber and crashing through a skylight into a descending floor in a building. Tap-jump before you get to the wall ahead and you'll fly onto another roof. Do one more Uber off of this before you land and you'll have three within the first minute of racing! 3) After you land, get back onto the normal track and boost over the next couple of short hills, past a dumpster. Ahead is a point where the path splits or you can bust through a pair of doors. Busting through the doors isn't much faster (but is much more difficult), so cut to the left of the turn. Ski over a slight open area and ski back toward the straight part of the track ahead. There should be a trick icon ahead, so use that and bust an Uber off the jump there. 4) Ahead is a quick turn that goes right, and then left, back onto the straight area of the track. Ride the bank on the left turn and cut through the middle area between the normal paths. Ahead is a red SSX sign in between two buildings. (This is where the door shortcut would have led.) Bust through that pointed slightly middle of left. Once you pass the trashcans, aim to slightly middle of right and catch the speed boost ahead. Do your fifth Uber off the building and land. Go back onto the regular track. 5) Ahead is the point where the track diverges and winds around various buildings. Go around the first turn and then tap jump between the two buildings catching the speed boost on the other side. Bust an Uber at the checkpoint hill to have unlimited boost. Boost around the corner and aim toward the large billboard ahead. Cut through the steep hill behind the building, swerving to avoid the trashcans throughout this path. Ski back towards the main path, and jump at the peak of the slight hill to jump over a police car hiding directly over the peak. (Sneaky developers.) 6) Around the next corner is the parking garage. You must hit the UFO shortcut that hidden behind the garage, and here is the path I've found to be most successful. Ride the embankment and prewind, You must ski towards the left side of the second floor. Jump onto the SECOND level of the parking garage. From here aim towards the building to the left ahead. Once you land on the building, boost and aim for the very short, steep rail ahead. Boost off of that and if you have enough speed you'll hit the UFO and get warped to the wooded area past the park. This is very difficult, so don't expect to do it on the first try. 7) Once you appear from the UFO, ski back toward the normal path to the right. Try to slant ahead and avoid the trees as well. Once you are back onto the track by the bridge, do your last Uber if you haven't already, and get past the bridge as quick as you can. Typically I fall to the area below the bridge but if you ski across the regular bridges that's fine as well. 8) Once you are below the overpasses, ski to the end and go behind the last ramp that leads back to the normal course. Behind this ramp is the entrance to the subway. Bust through the "brick" wall and enter the subway tunnel. You can "select-shortcut" out of this once you are about halfway through, but if not, just slow down to avoid the subways if you need to. Bust out the opposite side and avoid the vehicle straight ahead. 9) Boost straight down the hill (watch out for a downturned streetlight) and make straight for the finish line. You should have a great time after this route! Good luck! AUTHOR: happymachines --------------------- 1) Grind onto the rail in the beginning, and speed boost down it like a greased eel. 2) Once you are on the flat part of the roof (it goes cable > pointed roof > flat roof) tap jump and do two Ubers. 3) Land, go straight ahead, and boost but do not jump off the rail. Do another Uber in the air, then crash through the skylight. 4) Once you land on the sloping ramp inside the skylight, do not boost, do not hold forward. You need to jump at the end of this in order to make it to the next building, but jump early. The goal of all that is to reduce your speed slightly. Once you're on the building, continue straight ahead. Do not boost, and do not jump off the end of the building. Do another Uber while in the air. If everything goes according to plan, you should land on a downward slope which will give you plenty of momentum to get over the hill in front of you. If you've been boosting, more often than not you'll land on the upslope of the bump, lose all momentum, and it'll take you a couple seconds to get back up to speed. 5) I like to go around the bump on the right side, as there are fewer obstacles there. Continue down the path, angling towards the left side of the course. The goal is to go between the pole and the building so that you lose as little time in the turn as possible. 6) Continue down the path, angling to the left. If you like, you can go through the fake wall shortcut here, but I don't. Off the path to the left, there is a lamp post, you want to be just to the right of it and aimed at the gap between the fence ahead of you on the left, and another lamp post on the right. Shoot through the gap. I usually do a tap jump here as well, otherwise when you land you can get bumped around really badly. 7) On the path ahead of you there is a jump with a trick boost in front of it. Do another Uber off this jump. don't worry about hitting the sign to the left, as it will break if you run into it, but the sign on the right is certain death. DEATH!!! 8) Turn right, then ride up on the bank ahead of you to break through the glass ssx sign between the two big annoying metal things. I have no good suggestions on how to do this reliably, save practicing. 9) While you're on the rooftops, avoid obstacles. Get the speedboost if you can, but mostly avoid obstacles. Those garbage cans can be REAL annoying. At the last rooftops, boost off it, and do your final uber trick while you're falling. 10) After landing, head just left of center. I don't like the shortcut where you jump off the fence into the building; instead the object is to board down the path on the left hand side keeping as straight and quick of a line as possible. So, just left of the building, just right of the fence, just left of the building (and if you're really feeling daring, go between the building and the pole). 11) Head between the two towers ahead of you, angled slightly to one side (I like right). You can either just let yourself drop, then bounce quickly off the snowbank before hitting the icy path and hopefully the speedboost, or you can try tap jumping at the very top in order to skip the bounce. It's your call. 12) Continue down the path, head for the gap between the pole and the fence. You can try to do another tap jump here, or you can not bother (it's the same basic situation that you just had). 13) Ahead of you is a right turn; continue going straight down this very steep, very fast alley. You might need to practice this alley, as it's hard to get a feel on how to not crash into the building on the right, or the other building on the left, or the garbage cans. Once you come out of the alley, rejoin the main path. **NOTE: happymachines included glitch shortcut information here. If you wish to finish the race using the glitch shortcut, it is much faster timewise, but also "illegal" for competition purposes. I am going to put this information in the GLITCHES section in case you want to read it. Below is the route you should take if you intend to finish the race normally. ** 14) Continue down the main path towards the parking garage. Tap jump off the bank right in front of it to jump up onto the second floor. Once you get on the downward ramp part, head towards the left. Jump so that you land on the building ahead and to the left, that has a pipe on it. Get on the pipe, do a boost jump off of it to get sucked into the UFO. 15) Reappear in the woods. From the angle you teleport in at, you want to start heading approximately 45 degrees to the right, if my memory serves. This should give you a path that's running roughly parallel to the main path. Dodge trees, and try to avoid inclines so you can keep your speed as high as possible. Eventually there will be a group of trees fairly close together on your left, with one of them just being a fairly tall stump. you want to go to the left of these trees. Ahead the snow should turn into rocks, then there's a drop into the frozen riverbed. Jump the rocks, landing in the river. 16) The frozen river feels faster to me, but I'm not positive. You can just as easily jump clear over the river and land on the main path. but if you take the river, crash through the tunnel, avoid the fan blades (plan ahead), and at the end be sure to slow down, cause that gate doesn't open nearly quickly enough. 17) Cut the straightest, fastest path you can underneath the highway bridges. You should be going too fast for the powder to slow you down, so feel free to cut dogleg corners by going off the path a bit. 18) Instead of going up the glass ramp at the end, swing around behind it and crash through the fake bricks. you can press select in here to be teleported pretty far ahead, but if you're going for a clean run, then just be careful to slow down for the subway cars, and the gate at the end. 19) At the other end of the subway tunnel, watch out for the police car that is obscured by a rise, and boost down the rest of the course. Wheeeee! Your goal using this path should probably be between 3:10 and 3 minutes flat. 2f. TOKYO MEGAPLEX - Racing --------------------------- AUTHOR: happymachines --------------------- 1) The most important thing that you must keep in mind while racing in Tokyo is: left. But more on this later. 2) Knockdown out of the gate, to get full boost right away. Go around this curve, and bust an uber at the jump at the bottom. If you're having trouble, there's a speedboost to the far left side, which should give you significantly more air time. 3) Down the path, avoiding the fans. The fans are your enemy. You hate the fans. They blow you up in the air, slowing you down A LOT. Go into the big blower tube thing, and do two ubers while you're floating upwards. 4) Once you land in the chute things up top, straighten yourself out so you're pointed straight ahead, then boost and jump up to the upper platform that has the rails on it. Do another uber while in the air, although it'll be real close. 5) Jump back down off of this, doing ubers as you go. If you can get two off, wonderful, you have tricky. If you can only do one, after you land you'll be in a zigzagging valley thing with tackling dummies. You should easily be able to get that last uber off of the sides. 6) Now that you should have your tricky meter filled, proceed down to the bottom of this valley thing, where there is the ramp, and the hole you can jump into, and rails to ride to the left and right. You don't want to mess with any of this. now is when 'left' comes in. Go forward and to the left. You want to go up the bank right before it starts curving back towards the center. Hitting it in the right spot should let you keep most of our speed (instead of fighting your way up a hill), while not being pulled back onto the course. 7) For the entire rest of the course, just stay on the left. Ideally, you want to be on the snow, far enough to the left that you bypass all of the annoying obstacles of the course, but not so far that you end up on the metal (which is slower), or that you need to lean against the hill to stay on the snow (also slows you down). You shouldn't need specific instructions for any of this, just stay to the left and keep your speed up. 8) All good things must come to an end... however Tokyo Megaplex is not a good thing, which is why it loops around in a circle. On the next lap, you're going to want to do mostly the same things, with the exception of how you get down onto the ground after the big fan. Just get back down and onto the left side as quickly as possible. 9) That's it. Two things to keep in mind for this board are A) it's a circle that you travel counterclockwise on. That's why you're always sticking to the left, because it's shortest path around, and B) riding the rails is not faster. Sure, you go a lot quicker, but you're going a lot quicker on a much longer route. AUTHOR: UrzaMTG --------------- Rail Solutions: 1. Start off, get a KO if you must, and just keep riding. At the jump, do some big trick like a misty/rodeo Unethical Experimental to fill up your boost as much as possible. 2. In the speed bump area, make for the left and hit the buttons to raise the ramp. Jump early off the ramp or you won't make it in the hole. I don't have a good place to jump yet because it's all instinct to me, maybe halfway up the ramp would work. 3. In the fan jump, do some stuff to make sure your boost is full. 4. Hopefully, you will land on top of the arrow signs without falling off. Take either rail, but I prefer the right rail because it is easier to get on and is less distracting. I often fall off the left rail at the first dip because the rail is camouflaged against the snow. 5. Ride the rail, and boost only when you get to steep inclines or when you need to jump from one rail to the next. When you get to these areas, I recommend that you turn your board sideways so that the chance the board will land on one of the catch rails is the highest. 6. Continue this until you see the glass level below you. From here to the end of the lap, there is only one rail that you can land on to continue up on this level. But if you can manage to stay on, the rail leads to the highest window and you will fly up above the arrow signs again. 7. Repeat steps 3-6 if you stay on the rail and steps 2-6 if you fell off at the end. 8. On the last lap, intentionally fall off the rail above the speed bump section. The height of the rail window will cause you to crash before you get to the finish, giving the other racers about 5 seconds to catch you. Emergency Exits: If you fall off the rail at any point before the button-commanded doors, there is a way to get back on. 1. The earliest way to get on the rails is if you missed the ramp jump in the beginning. Don't fret, but this is the ONLY part of the guide where a select trick MIGHT be used. If you missed the ramp, go through the normal doors, and when you are at the highest point of your jump. 2. The next way to get back on the rails is after the first pop-up poles section. Instead of going up the button-commanded ramp, go around it and up the ice ramps to the rails there. They both connect to one of the two starting rails, and at this point it doesn't matter which one you get on. 3. The next point is inside the hole you would go in if you did take the button ramp. At either end of the fork here is a fan jump. If you boost, aim for the direct middle of the fan, and jump just before you reach it, it should take you up on a rail. Again, turn your board sideways for the best chance to land on the rails. 4. All the other methods involve either riding the tubes from the beginning to the end, jumping off fans and landing on rails by pure luck, or ramping off embankments with more luck. 2g. ALOHA ICE JAM - Racing -------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1) Use this racing route to achieve a great time on Aloha Ice Jam! Be careful after starting the race that you do not barrel out at the first turn. It is much trickier this time and harder to avoid. There are a set of blue SSX signs not long past the beginning of the race (these are from the first SSX.) I recommend busting through these rather than the red SSX sign to the right, as it puts you in an easier position to take the ramp/tunnel shortcut, but either one is about the same speed. 2) After completing either shortcut, you will come out by a glass tunnel. Through this glass tunnel is a ramp at the end. Boost without jumping to fall into a large underground tunnel. This is critical shortcut number one. If you've managed to fill your boost, you can do two Ubers off this jump. 3) Right after this tunnel, there are a set of cables that lead to another underground tunnel with fans. Slowing down at the end of the previous tunnel with help you grind the cables. This second underground shortcut spits you out in the valley between elevated ramps, right before the jump over the large billboard. 4) Directly ahead you will see a large ice face. If you jump over the billboard, or ski to the ramps on the side, the mouth of the face should open. This is the second crucial shortcut. It leads to several suspended plastic tunnels in the sky, which spits you out past all the steeply banked ice turns in the next section. This shortcut is more difficult to maintain this time, but it's absolutely key to getting a great time. 7) Riding all the way to the end of the previous shortcut will spit you out on a direct line towards a ravine and a red SSX sign to the far left that is the third crucial shortcut and can give you first place easily if you race through it normally. 8) But here is the key to this shortcut, about halfway through the tunnel you will come across a very large ice boulder directly in the middle of the course. This is your marker - once you get past this, press the select button to reset past the ENTIRE shortcut and to the end of the race! Again, use of this is discretionary, but if you see people with times below 1:40, this is how they did it. Unfortunately, you must navigate those annoying floating ice platforms at the end of the race, but you can easily get a great time using this route! 2h. ALASKA - Racing ------------------- AUTHOR: happymachines --------------------- 1) Out of the gates, do some flips, grabs whatever. Get a little bit of boost. You're going to want to fill up your boost meter as quickly as possible. There are two good ways to do this. Either catch up with someone and punch them down, or if you hang back a little bit in the gates, everyone will hit the ground before you, and when they get in the middle they will crash. If you plow through them while boosting, sometimes you can score a cheap knockdown without falling yourself. 2a) Turn left, turn right. ahead of you is a billboard. If you feel like it you can jump up onto its side rails by using the little dip at the right turn, and then boost jump off the end which will take you to the elevated path. I don't do this, because I have a hard enough time with the beginning as it is. But I'm fairly certain this is faster, and you might be able to get an uber in there. 2b) Otherwise, turn left, turn right, turn left, and go up the side of the bank in the fourth turn, which will take you to the elevated path. 3) Go down the elevated path for a bit, at the end you want to jump off to the left, aiming for the ssx sign. Do an uber here. 4) Land, go around the corner, and jump straight out in the direction of the pipe rather than going on it. Do two ubers in the air. Land. 5) Get on the pipe that comes out of the ground to the right. This is usually kind of tricky, as its hard to hit, and you should be going very fast. If you manage to get on it, turn sideways, and boost up the first part of it. When exiting the pipe for the upper path, you have to be careful not to go too fast (which will launch you directly over the path), or have your balance too far to the left or right. 6) On the upper path, jump the first big gap. For the second one, I usually just tap jump and ride through the bottom of the chasm for the rest of this, but I've never actually checked to determine the absolute fastest path. Usually after a tap jump, you'll be headed right for the side of the cliff; twist yourself around so that you land sideways on the cliff, then speed down and to the right. (Or left, depending on your perspective) 7) Continue down the trail, doop de doo, till you get to the jump. Aim for the big white mound, try and jump clear over it while doing an uber. After landing, proceed along this icy riverside path as quickly as you can without falling in. Do the little jump in the middle, and at the end, pull another uber (I'm not Sure if every character has ubers quick enough to do here, it's a real close call). 8) Grab the speed boost. At several points during the moguls, you can do an uber. Find a place, then do an uber there, which should finish your tricky gauge. At the bottom of the moguls, hop along the snowy islands then take the rail and the top path through the caves if you can. If you fail (loser) take the left path, go through a big hole in the wall at the top of a bank in the ice caves, etc etc etc. I really hate these ice caves, and I also hate trying to describe how to get through them. So: if you took the left path, there's a hole in front of you to the left. Go through it. it saves some time. Then finish the sucky sucky caves. 9) As you exit the caves, jump off to the right. Rather than zigzagging back and forth along this icy path, just boost through the snow down the right hand side. boost, I say! Keep as straight of a line as you can, and rejoin the path right before the jump. 10) Jump the chasm. I prefer to land on the left side if possible. Proceed along the path, until you get to the hairpin turn thingy. Instead of going through the turn, jump off the track to the right just before the tower. Chances are you'll smack into the tower, roll through the powder a little, then right yourself, cutting out the turn. 11) There's a jump in front of you. Take it slowly to avoid being launched into the air. Take the right hand path at the split. Go through the little cave, and when you come out take the center, or the left path. Just get through this as quickly as possible. at the end there will be a slight right turn, you want to go up over the bank. 12) Keep going straight. There's a small hill ahead, again make sure not to get a lot of air. Then you enter the caves, with yet another hill that you want to make sure not to get a lot of air on. 13) I have no particularly good advice on how to get through the ice caves. 14) At the big fan chute thing, there are two things you can do. you can hit select right when you leave the edge, which should save you a few seconds. Or, you can jump too early, turn upside down, hit your head on the floor of the chute, have your limp body drag along the body for awhile, then be magically righted when you get to the top, and boost down to the end. This is harder to do, and I do not know how to do it consistently. That's it. Most times with this route should be under 4:20. A perfect run should be around 4 minutes even. Good luck. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3. SHOWOFF - HIGHEST SCORING ROUTES 3a. GARIBALDI - Showoff ----------------------- AUTHOR: ElysiumKaori -------------------- 1. Out of the gate, ride the rail through the blocks, do some spins and flips to build up boost. Don't turbo at all, jump off the very end and do two ubers (paddle wheel or faster works). You'll land at the top of the little hill, jump immediately and do another quick uber. That's 3 ubers to start with. (should have 100K points easily by here) 2. When you go through the blue glass sign, jump off the embankment before it and do an uber through/over it. Go through the blue glass, turn left and do a flip and uber through the yellow flake. Then, after doing the uber through the yellow flake, do another uber on the way to the rail with the 3x flake off the little embankment. Ride the rail in front of you and do big uber off through the orange flake. If you do it right, you can hit the red flake off of this rail. How to get the red flake: Get on the pipe at the start. turn sideways. Gun turbo, but jump about 3/4 of a board width (freestyle board) before the end of the pipe, maybe a bit sooner. If executed right, you can pull pirouette grind and paddle wheel, landing through the red flake for more than 220K points. (prewind for back flips) 3. Cut hard right to the other side of the main path, turn forward, and uber through the 3x there off the jump (two ubers). You can actually do an uber through the yellow flake on the left side, turn around, come back down the right, and do an uber through the orange flake. If you time that one right, you can even drop onto the pipe in the middle and do another uber off the end of it. You'll still have plenty of time for the next checkpoint. 4. Uber twice through the 2x off the jump, I don't turbo here since I want to make... 5. ...the red glass here. Ride the rail, turbo as you get to the end slope, jump off and do a quick uber through the red flake to the far side of the course. You could turbo through the jump straight ahead and sometimes hit the red flake (any trick to making this consistent?), but I instead hit select immediately and ride the pipe to hit the same red flake. Two ubers through this flake (three is possible if you take off right). 6. Ride the cable on the right fork through the 3x flakes and over the signs, do a quick uber off the last sign. 7. Okay, here's the split. I'm still working on this. If I try the pipe to the 3x flake, I always go too high. Instead, I turbo hard through the jump to the 2x flake and get 3 ubers before landing. Go through both crossings, getting the 3x flakes with at least one character uber (sometimes two smaller ubers). 8. Boost through the jump (2x flake) and do 2 ubers. I never manage to hit this rail, I need to work more on getting centered. If you hit the rail I think you can only do one uber (or maybe two quick ones), doing pirouette grind and paddle wheel with Kaori just barely lands on the ground. 9. If you miss the rail, uber through the left yellow flake, ride the rail to the orange, and line up for the ramp ahead with the orange flake. Gun your turbo. Really gun it, and hit a character uber and a quick uber. You need a ton of speed and a well-timed jump to get them both off, otherwise do two small ubers. 10. I go to the left, avoiding the stone structure and doing 2 ubers over the jump. 11. There's a rail to the right over the corner. Get on it and gun turbo, jump just in time to hit the 3x flake and do a character uber. If timed right, you'll drop and feel like you're going to hit the ground which is dropping away below you but you'll manage to land it. Big rush the first couple of times. 12. Line up for the ramp ahead. Do a couple of character ubers or 2 quick and one character uber through the yellow flake. Line up for the left ramp ahead. Do 2 quick ubers through the yellow flake. 13. Turn hard left and drop down to the icy path below; turn around and back up if you need more running room. Uber through the 3x flake ahead. 14. Come around the corner for the final jump. Aim for the white between the two red stripes on the jump, gunning turbo and jumping just as you get to the very top of the jump--prewind for backflips. If all goes well you'll hit the red flake, doing 3 ubers through it for 250K points! Believe it or not, after practicing for a while you'll go from always hitting the yellow to often going over the red flake. AUTHOR: Smartypantz711 ---------------------- 1) Start off and do not get the rails. Go off the big jump doing a quad misty/rodeo with an unethical experimental. If your character does not have great trick stats, do 3 flips and grab at the end. 2)After landing, head left through the blue sign. Hit the rail. Boost and jump, and do a double uber off the end. 3) Land, hit a SHARP left to hit the smaller ramp with the 3x multiplier. Double uber. 4) Sharp right to the ramp, 3x double uber. Middle ramp, 2x double uber. 5) Take the next turn sharp in order to nail the rail. Boost off and jump, 5x double uber. Get on the cable for extra points here. 6) On the next jump, it's kind of hard to get the 3x flake. Hit the left jump at full speed heading a little bit to the left. If you had enough speed, you'll get a 3x flake. 7) Go up the next jump, single uber, 3x. Same with the next jump. On the next jump, single uber, 2x. 8) Head to the left path, don't jump, and get on the rail. Boost and jump off the end, and uber. Next jump, 2x uber. 9) Now, the hard part. Head for the left jump (it's easier for me) and hit it heading slightly right going REALLY fast. The idea is to get enough air for a signature uber while still landing (on your feet) on the rail. 10) Once on the rail, boost and jump at the end and do a short uber through the 5x flake. After the first jump onto the rail and the small uber through the 5x, you need to cut right and catch the rail that goes over the hill. Fly off the end and uber through the flake. 11) Go through the turns and boost up the next jump while prewinding. Double uber, 2x flake. Next jump, double uber, 2x flake. 12) Once again, take the left jump, fly a little crooked to the right at full speed, signature uber, land on the rail, boost jump, small uber, and the 5x. 13) Finally, the last jump. Boost the whole way and jump at the very end. Make sure you're centered. Double uber, 5x. AUTHOR: DDRKirby ---------------- Note: If you manage to execute this run perfectly, you'll be able to nag a score of about 2.1 million! If not, you'll probably end up getting somewhere around 1.7 million. I use Mac for this run, so if you're using someone else (don't see why you would, but...), adjust accordingly. 1. Right from the start, make a hard right and do a misty/rodeo with a tweaked grab, then turn left and do a misty/rodeo with a tweaked grab. Repeat until your boost is full. 2. Do a quad misty/rodeo with two Walking the Dogs off of the first jump. 3. Jump off of the embankment before the blue SSX sign and do a double misty/rodeo with a Hand in Hand. 4. Get on the rail (you might have to backtrack) and jump and do a triple misty/rodeo with a Sad Sack to a Walking the Dog. 5. Jump off the left-hand kicker and do a triple misty/rodeo with a scooter to a hand in hand through the orange snowflake. 6. Okay, if I go to the right here, I always overshoot the Orange Snowflake (maybe not using the kicker could help?), so take the jump on the left and do a quad misty/rodeo with two sad sacks and a hand in hand through the yellow snowflake. 7. Next, line up for the center kicker and do a triple misty Sad Sack to Walking the Dog through the Yellow Snowflake. 8. Make a hard right and go through the Red SSX sign. Get on the rail but don't boost on it. Jump off and do a misty with a scooter through the red snowflake. 9. Immediately after landing, hit select to get back to the main track. Line up for the next rail and brake right before it to make sure you hit it. 10. Jump off of the rail and do a Triple misty/rodeo with a Hand in Hand to a Walking the Dog through the Red Snowflake (HUGE points). 11. Try and get on the cable and ride it, grabbing the orange snowflake in the middle. Jump off at the end and do a misty with a Sad Sack, landing on the fence for a combo bonus. 12. I can't do this consistently, but try and do a misty sad sack off of the right-hand wall (sorta wall-ride) to get a few points. 13. Line up with the left-hand kicker and do a quad misty/rodeo with a sad sack and two hand in hands through the yellow snowflake. If you can, try replacing one of the hand in hands with a walking the dog. 14. If you land on the rail (very hard to do), jump off and do a trick through the orange. 15. For the next two jumps, do a triple misty/rodeo with a sad sack to a hand in hand through the orange snowflake. 16. Line up with the kicker and do a double misty/rodeo sad sack to a hand in hand through the (yellow?) snowflake, landing on the rail. (if you miss the rail, you can try jumping back on) 17. Do a double misty hand in hand through the orange snowflake here, then turn left and do a misty/rodeo with a tweaked grab through the other orange snowflake. 18. Jump off of the left hand kicker and do a triple misty with a sad sack to a walking the dog through the orange snowflake. 19. I can't figure out how to get on the rails here, so I take the left hand jump and do a quad misty/rodeo with a hand in hand to a walking the dog here. 20. When you land, you'll see a rail with an orange snowflake in front of you. Grind it. 21. This is tricky. Boost on the rail, and right before you hit the orange snowflake, jump and do a double misty/rodeo with a walking the dog through the snowflake. If you do it right, you can land back on the rail and do a misty/rodeo with a sad sack off of it. 22. Turn right and do another misty/rodeo sad sack off of the banked turn. 23. Line up with the kicker and do a quad misty/rodeo with two walking the dogs through the yellow snowflake. 24. Get on the two rails on the right and do small spins in between them (for a combo bonus) 25. Jump off of the right-hand kicker here and do a double misty sad sack to a hand in hand through the (orange?) snowflake here. 26. Get on the rail on the right and do a double misty scooter to hand in hand off of it. 27. Do a misty/rodeo sad sack off of the embankment on the right-hand side. 28. Line up dead-center for the final jump and do a triple misty/rodeo with a hand in hand to a walking the dog through the red snowflake. 29. Do mistys and rodeos before the finish line until you start running out of time, at which point you cross the finish line. 3b. SNOWDREAM - Showoff ----------------------- AUTHOR: gondee & dcxbond007 --------------------------- 1) Okay, right off the bat, get on the right rail. Prewind (and do an UNETHICAL EXPIREMENTAL)catching the yellow snowflake to get ~7000 points and a full boost bar....and of course after doing a simple unethical, you will land right back onto the rail, so) Prewind again and do a quick uber off the rail and catch the yellow snowflake. 2) Go around a few quick turns and do two quick Ubers off the middle of (the left ramp...definitely use the left because it is a guaranteed X2 snowflake, ramps and catch another yellow snowflake. You can try to land on the rail, but it's pretty difficult. 3) (Directly after the ramp which you did the ubers off of, go straight up and use the blue-hill like embankment as a ramp to do a character Uber...you will find that 8 times out of 10 you will achieve more than enough air for a character Uber) after landing, you should see a gate with a X3 snowflake near the end of the gate, and right after that is a ramp with a X3 on it...prewind now, and a little before the gate ends, jump off the embankment and do a quick Uber, you should hit the X3 snowflake and land and IMMEDIATELY after this boost the little time you can and jump off the ramp and do an uber...this is quite difficult because after landing the Uber from the X3 at the end of the gate you rarely get enough time to boost off the ramp, but it is possible). The key to getting the snowflake is to jump in the MIDDLE of the ramp, if you do it at the top, you will fly over the snowflake. 4) Land and immediately boost for the narrow ramp (and do a character Uber off this ramp) which enables you to get the Orange snowflake that is over a hill. Again, boost and jump off the middle of the ramp. 5) (You should land a little after a ramp which has a X2 on it, so immediately after landing, go backwards using your boost, once you're back far enough, go forwards again using boost and do an uber off the ramp) (after this,) there are two more successive jumps with an Orange and a Yellow snowflake. Nothing difficult here. Just make sure to do Ubers off of the ramps. By now you should have your TRICKY meter filled up. 6) After boosting off the next narrow ramp and flying quite a ways to get a yellow snowflake, land and immediately cut over to your right. You want to skip the yellow snowflakes that are in front of you, instead opting to cut to the right for the orange snowflake on the side. Turn around if you need to and get a good run at the ramp, cutting to the left side of the ramp and doing a quick Uber to get the Orange snowflake for around 50,000 points. This can be difficult. 7) Directly after this, bust through the blue SSX sign and ride the rail. IGNORE the Orange snowflake on the rail ahead and instead boost and jump off the at the end (there will be a snowblower here). If you've caught enough air, you can pull an character-specific Uber and catch the RED snow flake at the end of the gate. 8) After this is a narrow ramp with a red and orange snowflake. The red is best, but catching either with a pair of Ubers can lead to HUGE points. 9) After landing, cut to the right on the ice path and bust a long Uber off the ramp for the yellow snowflake. If you get enough air you can do two, but it's really hard. 10) There should be an Orange and a yellow ahead, but if you find them difficult to get, skip them, and instead head past this area, and fly off the huge jump near the end for the Red snowflake. Do a pair of Ubers for this. 11) After this there is one more yellow snowflake off a ramp on the bridge near the end of the race. Doing a long character specific Uber can put you over the top here, busting your score to over a million! Good luck! 3c. ELYSIUM ALPS - Showoff -------------------------- AUTHOR: gondee -------------- 1. From the beginning, get on the middle rail. Prewind and do a triple misty/rodeo onto the rail below grabbing the orange snowflake. Land on the rail and boost off it, prewind and do two Ubers and fly through the orange snowflake off the rotating ramps. 2. Go around the corner and do a Misty Double Uber off the next ramp, grabbing the orange. You have to skip the rail to do two, otherwise just to a character Uber. 3. After landing, you can use the orange ramp ahead to jump onto the billboard ahead and get on the rail above the track. There's an orange at the end of this rail, but it's difficult to get onto it. After this, do a quick Uber off the ramp ahead and grab the yellow. 4. Skip the shortcut to the right - there's only one yellow snowflake on it. Instead ski past the next turn and catch the red/white rail and prewind. Boost like mad off the end of it and jump at the VERY end. You'll catch a red snowflake here with enough time to do two character Ubers. BIG points. 5. Over the next section, you should try and do Ubers off the steep embankments. Catch the super-long rail if you can. Somehow I always manage to do this part different every time, but you get the idea, I'm sure. After this you come to the turn with the large billboards. You can grab a yellow above a billboard if you ski off the embankment right, but it's not easy. Good luck. Over the next few turns manage flips if you can. 6. Now you are at the big ramp area. I usually skip the yellow snowflake before this to get enough speed to catch the red on top of this ramp. However, before this area is a rail off to the right before the ramps that you can catch and ride the crowd stands to another red snowflake. It's your choice. 7. Now you have a choice: cut through the sign to the right or go through the cave. The shortcut leads to the series of three jumps with yellow snowflakes. The cave leads to a long rail with a yellow and back on the normal track. If you take the cave, do jumps off the rail and large jump afterward, and then cut to the left and grind branches sticking out of the ground to get to the path the red sign shortcut leads to. However, I recommend taking the red sign shortcut. Why? Because it saves you time that you can use on the high-scoring halfpipe later in the course! :) Do Ubers over all the jumps once you are on the triple jump. 8. Once you reach the very last jump, you can either grind the two parallel branches and boost off the end for an orange or jump off the cliff for a yellow. If you opt for the yellow, grind the rail on the right to ride the crowd stands and get a red snowflake. If you take the branches, get the orange off the yellow ramp on the normal track. 9. Cut through the red sign and boost to the very end of the shortcut and catch the red snowflake. Once you are there, if you continue on the main course, there is a orange snowflake off a bank. Instead, go down the shortcut and hit the real scoring point of this race, the halfpipe. The halfpipe consists of 4 red, 6 orange and 4 yellow snowflakes that you can get by going back and forth on the halfpipe doing 2 ubers each jump! There are three yellows down a rail in the center, but if you opt for that you are crazy! ;) Go back and forth boosting, but NOT jumping off the halfpipe and you'll get crazy air and rack up serious points. You must exit the halfpipe with at least 45 seconds to be able to finish the race in time. 10. There is a red snowflake on the edge of the horizontal loop-de-loop, good luck in getting it, it's difficult. Do an Uber off the end at the jump, and boost your way to the end. If you are good (unlike me) you can get 2 million on this course! 3d. MESABLANCA - Showoff ------------------------ AUTHOR: SiCo ------------ 2 Million! (Use Mac. If possible try to throw mistys/rodeos into all jumps.) 1. At start do a misty/rodeo grab off first hill, take center rail, wind up for a double misty/rodeo combo grab into the x3. 2. Follow the path around the s-curve, This next part is tricky, You want to hit the x5, do a R1+R2 uber followed by R1 or R2 uber in air, with enough practice you can land in the woods and set up for the next x5. My strategy is to slow down after landing the first step, stay as close as you can to the wall on the right on the first corner, and go full speed straight at the x5, it takes some practice. 3. Do a R1 uber followed by R2 uber over the sign and into the x5. 4. Stay to the left do an R1 or R2 uber into x2, then take next jump into x3 doing R1 then R2 uber combo. 5. Get on the rail on the right, keep the board straight and hold turbo. Don't jump, you should land on the billboard bar, wind up for a misty/rodeo L2 uber - after landing that I usually have about 700,000 - 720,000. 6. [Thanks to happymachines for this part] - There's a slight turn to the left and a banked hill where it turns back to the right again. You can go up the hill, do an uber into the x2, land on the mine rails, and do a double misty experimental off the rails. Finally, ahead of you is a split in the path, with a 5x multiplier on the left hand path. Go slowly, go up on the median a bit, then turn sharply across the path, up the bank on the left hand side, and jump while doing an R1 uber. You will either: a) go up and come down fine. b) go up, bounce off the billboard, then land on the ground fine c) smack your head on the bottom of the pipe and die d) go up, bounce off the billboard, then land on the metal walkway at the bottom of the billboard. If this happens, don't panic! You'll probably be bouncing, and slowly moving forward. Tilt your board so that you're bouncing at a 45 degree angle, and eventually it should bounce you onto the ground. It is only if you stop bouncing that it will auto-reset you. And you can usually do spins while it's bouncing you for extra points. That red multiplier is usually good for an extra 80k. and if you're lucky, you can do a R1 uber through the 2x multiplier before you head into the tunnel. 7. Hit the mines, stay on left track do a misty/rodeo R1+R2 uber combo into the x5, uber over the river into the x2, around the corner hit the rail and do whatever into the x2. 8. I skip the next x2 and head for the x5 - get some speed and jump last second off the little hill on the left before the x5, after landing set up for the next x5. 9. Do a small jump double misty with L1 uber into next x5, right to the left after the previous x5. Continue on to the next x5 doing a R1+R2 uber. 10. Do a quick uber into the next x2, with enough speed you can do an R1 uber followed by R2 uber through the second x2. 11. Around corner jump up and bounce off the sign to the right and do an uber. 12. Hit right ramp do an uber through x2. Come from the right and you can jump and bounce off the next sign on the left, aim for the bottom right corner of the sign, and do an uber into the x2. 13. Race down to the rails. The trickiest parts awaits. You want to have about 1.5 million here. Take the right path, you want to get on the rail on the right but coming from the opposite direction. Easiest way to do that is at first bridge you go under you can easily turn around and hop on the rail. With practice you can go backwards on the rail hop to the red and white rail wind up and do a misty/rodeo uber combo into the x5 AND x3,- you've got time to do 2 ubers easily. On my 2 million run on first pass up the rail I did 2 ubers through the x5, then did it again, but this time did a R1+R2 uber through the x3. 14. Now take the left path, jump over the rail to the left through the x2 and do an uber, you should land in the other path, do the same for the next x2. I usually have about 1 minute and a half to go back and forth on the rails jumping off here and there. There are a few places to get ubers off after the rails too. 15. Hit the rail on the right at the end through the x2 and if you're quick and hold turbo you can get a R1 uber through the x3 off the last jump. Good Luck! AUTHOR: TypeZero ---------------- 1. Right at the start, turn over to the left or right and pull of a couple rodeo/misty experimentals (unethical if you're fast) to fill your boost and light the bell. 2. Take the very first jump so that you'll hit the Yellow flake and do an uber (depending on your character, do a signature if you can) 3. After the S curve, you'll see a turn with a rail and a Yellow flake over it. Ignore them and head straight into the woods (less risky than jumping off, hitting a tree and losing your boost.) Follow the path behind the trees and take the jump over the billboard into the Red flake carefully, doing a signature (character-specific) uber. 4. You should land on the left side of the rails that divide the path. Follow the path until the next jump, with a Yellow flake over it, comes up and do another signature (or sig) uber. 5. Stay to the left and do a signature uber into the Orange flake, and be careful about landing on the rails...you may just fly off them, negating the whole jump (and run.) 6. Break through the sign on the left immediately after that jump, and do an uber (Paddle Wheel is fast, so do that if you can.) 7. Take the rail behind the SSX sign if you like...there is a Yellow flake on it. If you do take it, be sure to get off in time to get into the mineshaft, which has a Yellow flake over it. Go into the mineshaft, stay on the LEFT rail, and make it over to the broken rail carefully, staying on the upper level. 8. Pre-wind and do a sig uber right out of the tunnel, hitting the Red flake. 9. The second you land, line up and pre-wind again and pull an sig uber (if you can) over the gap with the yellow flake. 10. After the choice of going in the cave or the rail on the right (which has a Yellow flake at the end of it), there comes another set of turns. The first has 2 red signs over it and a Yellow flake a little off center. Ride the embankment and do an uber (you can usually get enough height for a signature.) If you are lucky enough and didn't have a lot of forward movement, then you should be able to line up for the next embankment, and jump off that into a Red flake. I don't recommend it, since not only is it not needed for a million points, but it usually throws you off kilter for the next jump. 11. At the checkpoint gap, aim off to the left and do a soft jump, enough to get an uber off and hit the Red Flake there. 12. You'll land at an awkward position in the gap...just turn off to the right as hard as you can, once you straighten out and start going forward, you shouldn't have to move much for the next jump, which you should be able to pull off a sig uber into the Red flake. 13. Depending on where you land, you may be able to take the first jump in the ravine with the Yellow flake. Pull of an uber into it. 14. Use the sign ahead to line up your next jump. Aim for the middle of it. This allows you to avoid the walls but hit the Yellow flake almost every time. Be sure to pull of a sig uber. 15. The next jump has 2 Yellow flakes over it. Ignore the one on the left, and take the one on the right. Jump off the ramp (but not too fast) doing an uber. 16. In the likely event that you miss the rail (I've yet to hit it) turn hard right and ride the embankment up, jumping into the Yellow flake near the sign while doing an Uber. 17. The better thing to do now is just follow the path off into the over/under segment. From here you can either to the left and the ride the rail the whole way (hitting a Yellow flake) or take the path to the right and do a soft uber jump, getting the Yellow flake there. Either way, you get roughly the same amount of points. 18. Right after you exit that area the normal path leads into some twists & turns. The first dip you'll see has a red sign over it. Go hard right to get behind the sign and on the rail next to it. Take the rail-jump very carefully; you gotta watch out for the sign to the right and the light posts ahead. Pull of a quick uber into the Orange star from the rail. 19. Take the last gap, but don't get enticed by the Orange flake to do an uber: the jump is more of a hop. Don't expect to pull anything off higher than a Rodeo/Misty with a grab, otherwise, you'll be eating snow. Hopefully, after completing this, you will have over a million points. Mesablanca is nothing to scoff at; it is definitely a hard course. AUTHOR: Erick's Living Room (the couches, chairs, TV and everything!) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Read the walkthrough for Mesablanca from TypeZero. It says to ignore the 2x (this is step 3). Well, we don't do that, because there's a fiver to the right. We grab that fiver and then immediately turn left hard into the woods. This can be done with enough room left to get the second fiver over the billboard. We have done this even if we didn't take the rail at the beginning that goes up on top and has a great angle on the fiver.... we just come to an almost complete stop, turn around, and jump up there and grab the fiver doing a short uber. 3e. MERQURY CITY MELTDOWN - Showoff ----------------------------------- AUTHOR: FishEye --------------- Using this run I was able to hit just over 2 million. And I didn't even do everything properly. It should be noted that when you are getting on or off a rail you should be doing a trick (even a little one) to give you the combo bonuses. And while you are pulling off an uber you should also be doing mistys and rodeos with it as these will add to the total points gained from the uber. Ok, here we go - 1 - Right out of the gate head for one of rails, either the right or left, it doesn't really matter. Follow the rail around the bend and head for the orange star. Do a trick off the rail and through the orange star but make sure you land back on the rail. Don't fall off. Continue down the rail until you are dumped off in front of a dropoff with a yellow star at the end. Do an uber off the dropoff and through the yellow star. You should be able to pull of a character or at least a long uber if you hit the jump right. Follow the bend of the course down to the intersection. 2 - At the intersection take the path that you're currently facing. Whichever way you choose you can pull an uber off the intersection (sometimes two). If you can land the uber on one of the rails then great, if not, it's not a big deal. If you managed to hit one of the rails, follow it to the end. It should drop you off in front of a small bump (left path) or an even smaller bump (right path). You should be able to get at least a short uber off the bump and through the orange star right in front of you. If you didn't take the rail you can till hit the bump through the orange star if you took the left path. If you took the right path it's a little more difficult. Rather than try to uber off the bump on the right path you're going to try something a little ... Trickier. So you took the right path - see that "OPEN" sign? That's where you're headed. Jump and uber off the side of the slope in front of the "OPEN" sign. This will take you right through the "OPEN" sign (causing it to break - don't worry, 8 times out of 10 you won't crash) and, if done right, you should come down right on top of the orange star. You can probably pull off two ubers even, rather than just one if you took any of the other ways. 3 - After you get the orange star, head for the red and white rail in the middle. Take that straight jump off and do an uber through the red star. After you land head straight up the slope and do another uber (two if you can) off of it. From here you want to take the short red and white rail with the yellow star at the end of it on the left side. Jump and do a short uber off the rail through the yellow flake. Follow the path on the left side. Anyway, head down the left path. See that red and white rail? Don't get on it. Instead jump and uber off the jump that's under the stoplights. If you do it correctly it should take you through the orange star. Watch your landing though. That Ice Cream sign doesn't break like the "OPEN" sign did earlier. Follow the path around the corner. You can get a short uber off through that yellow star ahead right in front of the checkpoint. Continue around the corner and either take the rail, ubering off through the orange star, or just hit the jump that the rail starts on and uber through the orange star. 4 - At this point you've come to a series of 3 intersections. Criss-cross through the intersections, hitting short ubers in the middle of each intersection. Don't worry, the course drops after each intersection so there's enough room to pull it off. Alternatively, for the last intersection you can take the rails if you like those better. Just make sure you trick on and off the rails, that should make up for the point loss of that last short uber. The paths meet again near the bottom. You can get a short uber off through that yellow star if you time your jump right. 5 - Follow the slope down and around the corner. Don't take that rail that goes underneath the Seeiah billboard. You want to take the rail that STARTS next to the billboard. Take that rail down but uber off before it ends so you can hit that yellow star on the way down. Continue straight up the slope in front of you and jump with another uber off it. Continue down the slope but stay towards the right side. You want to get on that red and white rail over there and follow it around the corner. Jump and uber off the end of it through the orange star. You should be able to get two ubers off here easy. Watch where you jump off the rail though. If you do it wrong you'll be eating that stoplight. And stay out of that parking garage, that's for racing. Once you've landed, head for that short red and white rail. Pull a short uber off the end through the orange star. In front of you they'll be an orange star on either side at the end of a rail. Don't take the rails. Jump and do an uber through the orange star off the jump that the rails start at. 6 - Go through the tunnel and take the left path at the split. You can uber off the slope directly in front of you, but it usually gives me a bad placing for the next jump so I don't. Take the course around the corner and jump with an uber through the yellow star. After you land you should be heading for the side of a half pipe. Head up the side at an angle that'll put you through the orange star with an uber. Sometimes you come off this jump with a great line towards another orange star, sometimes not. At this point you're on your own. There are 4 orange stars and 2 red stars (near the end) in this area. You can stay in here and get as many stars as you can until the counter hits about 40 seconds. Make sure you at least get those 2 red stars before you leave. 7 - Racing out of the half pipe section you should get on that silver rail. Follow it around the corner, jump and uber through the entrance to the park. Get on one of those rails to either side of the statue in the middle. Follow the rail to the end and aim for the yellow ramp on the bridge. If you took the left rail it will drop you in front of the ramp, if you took the right rail just head towards that yellow ramp. You'll need to jump off the ramp about halfway up in order to uber through that red star. Try to land on one of those rails on the way down. If you manage this you can do a short uber off the end through a red star. If you didn't you'll have to improvise. =) 8 - It's time for some bridge fun. Head straight down the middle of the bridge. That's right, I said the middle. Jump and pull off an uber about halfway up the slope. You'll probably break that pretty gargoyle, but you'll also hit that orange star. After you come down from this you may be facing backwards (because you'll probably bounce off the bridge support) so hit that reset button to get you facing the right way. After you go under the first supports again (uber if you'd like) head down the slope and go either right or left (doesn't matter) underneath the second bridge support. Now there'll be a orange star underneath a red star. Try to take this jump so you only hit one of them. After you finish your uber and land, pull sharp towards the middle of the bridge. Head back down the middle of the bridge backwards and follow that rail to the beginning of the bridge again. Repeat this until you've hit all 4 star or until the counter reaches around 1:45. 9 - Head down the end of the bridge to the glass ramp. Don't take the ramp directly down the middle, otherwise you'll wind up with your face connecting with that pipe "shortcut" (yeah, some shortcut). If you take the glass ramp a little to the right or left of the middle though you should be able to pull off an uber and just clip that orange star. After you land you can take those rails if you land on 'em, or not. Uber off the next glass ramp. You might be able to cut your jump short and clip that orange or red star on the way down. Just make sure you stay on top, you don't want to be on the ground. Jump off the final glass ramp and uber through that red star. Continue down the slope and jump where the course raises directly below that red star. If you get enough air and pull off the right uber you should be able to clip it easy. 10 - If you manage to land on one of those rails on the way down, congratulations. You can follow the rail around the corner and jump off through the orange star. If you hit the jump right you should be able to hit another rail and follow that rail to a red star, but I'm not sure if you can get an uber off through it. If you didn't take the rail then just follow the track around the corner. Jump and uber through the yellow star off the jump in front of you. If you managed to get enough air you could probably clip that orange star above the yellow. I rarely do though. After you land, follow the path around the corner and head straight. Don't take that subway shortcut. Instead take the path to the left. Head straight up the slope in front of you. Jump at the top and pull off one (probably at least two with the air you'll get) ubers through the yellow star. Continue through this twisty path doing the same thing at each slope (though you'll probably only get one uber off on the others), through each yellow star. You may be tempted to angle that first jump through the red star to your far left but you miss about 3 yellow stars this way. The way I figure it, 3 yellow stars essentially equals x6, where as that red star is only x5. 11 - Ok, home stretch. Head straight down the hill. Jump underneath that first stoplight and pull an uber through the yellow star. You can pull another short uber off on that last dropoff before the finish line. If you happen to have any extra time you can do mistys and rodeos with grabs in front of the finish line to net you a few thousand more points. Just make sure you cross that finish line before your counter reaches zero and you'll be ok. Congratulations. AUTHOR: Smartypantz711 ---------------------- In case you didn't notice, there's a really easy to exploit trick for Merqury City Showoff. Down the final stretch to the finish line, there are two jumps. Jump a little early off the first one so that you will barely have enough time to squeeze in an uber about the length of a "Hand-in-Hand". RIGHT WHEN YOU LAND, hit select to reset. It will reset you back in the last of the quarterpipe things, allowing you to do the same jump again. And again. And again. It's pretty cheap, allowing for much higher scores. Note that there are two flakes: a 2x and a 3x. The first time you take the jump, you want to go through the 2x flake. The LAST time you do the jump (when time is running down) you want to go through the 3x. 3f. TOKYO MEGAPLEX - Showoff ---------------------------- AUTHOR: FishEye --------------- To start things off, I'd like to say that the Megaplex is probably the messiest Showoff course in the circuit. There are many, many different ways you can do it. I'm just going to detail the methods I used to achieved my 2.2 million run. It's certainly not the definitive route though. Improvise as you see fit. * The ground fans blow you in the direction that you're headed (i.e., if you're facing backwards, it'll blow you backwards). The faster you're going and the later you release your jump once you hit the fan, the farther forward (or whatever direction you're facing) the jump will carry you. This is very important to note so you know how to angle your jumps on the fans to collect any nearby flakes. * You have way more time then you need to finish this course. Therefore I won't be listing at what point you should be leaving what area. I will only be able to mention what areas of the course are good places to use this extra time to collect more flakes. There is only ONE checkpoint per lap. I will list where that checkpoint is though. * You get to run through this course three times, if you don't get that red flake on the first time through, you've got two more chances. * Stay off of those rails. Well, that's not entirely true. If you land on the rails, great, extra combo points for you. But as you'll read below, I did most of my run on the ground. I just found it easier to hit those high scores while on the ground. * You can get two long ubers off of every ground fan with a jump. In the walkthrough below, any time I mention hitting the ground fans that means you should be pulling off those two ubers. * Be careful when you hit the ground fans. There are many flakes clustered above in some areas of the course. Try not to hit more than one flake per jump. On to the walkthrough - 1. Head out of the starting gate down the slope. Set up a jump and prewind a trick for that first bump that puts you on to the main course. If you time your last jump right (off the bump) you can get enough air to do a trick that will fill up your Tricky meter. There are two red flakes within reach, so use those two ground fans in front of you to get them. If you don't hit them heading down then you can go back and get them by turning around. Watch your time. Start heading out of this area when your time counter falls below 1 minute. 2. On the "Tube Fan Express" you can pull off two long ubers. Kaori can get two character ubers off, some characters might have to settle for less. You'll land on one of those metal tray thingies. and try to let yourself fall off. Pull a long uber on the way down. 3. This little area has a bunch of "pop-up poles" with buttons. Run over the buttons to drop the set of poles directly in front. Angle your rider up the sides of this area and pull off short ubers through the yellow flakes. Don't spend extra time here, and make sure you hit that last set of buttons heading out of this area, that'll raise the ramp that will be in front of you. 4. Head up the ramp, but jump about halfway up it. Pull off a long uber through that red flake. As soon as you touch the ground hit reset. This will put you back outside the tunnel. Every time I do this I'm headed for the "bumper", from the left side. Head towards that row of four fans in front of the bumper. **The checkpoint is located here, right in front of the row of fans** There are two red flakes and two orange flakes that are within reach (one red and one orange on either side of the row of fans). The best way to hit these fans in order to get the two orange flakes is from the right or left. Don't be going too fast though. The track has split into three paths (with fences in between). If you land on either the right or left path, reset yourself back to the middle one. If you find yourself past the fans after your first jump, turn around and head back for them. 5. After you've had your fun, head down the middle path. You'll come to another area with buttons and poles. Again, don't spend any extra time here. 6. Continue down the middle of the path towards the ground fan. There are two red flakes that are easy to get and an orange and another red flake that require a little more skill to get here. The red flakes are *very* close to each other. Remember, do not hit them both in one jump, you don't want to waste an easy red flake. The best way to do the jump to avoid collecting both at the same time is to hit the ground fan on the right side of it first. The other red flake can be collected by jumping off more towards the middle of the fan. The orange and third red flake are further down the course. Pick up speed earlier and jump late off the ground fan to carry the rider further down the course and through the orange flake (one time) and the red flake (the next time). You can turn around easy enough in this area if you want. 7. Continue down the middle of the course towards that hill in front of you. Run over one of those buttons in the middle to open the hill entrance that takes you through the center of it. On your way out, jump out of the exit of the hill. If you can time your jump right, pull off a long uber through that red flake that's further down the middle of the course. 8. There doesn't seem to be much to do in this next area. After you land from that last jump, run over one of the buttons to open the door in front of you. Head through the door and PAST