Over the past few years, it seems like ATV's have become second only cars in terms of the number of racing games on the market. Now Sony's ATV Offroad series is hitting the PSP thanks to ATV Offroad Fury: Blazin' Trails. Unfortunately, Blazin' Trails is one game that should have gotten a serious tune-up before its release.

Like many launch titles on the PSP, Blazin' Trails is a port of an earlier PS2 title. In this case, it's a port of ATV Offroad Fury 3. Climax Studios, the developer of both games, managed to retain a lot of the features found in Blazin' Trails' bigger brother. It even added a couple of unique extras for those gamers looking to add a little something new to the experience. And while these extras are appreciated, it doesn't quite do enough to make up for the game's glaring faults.

The graphics in Blazin' Trails are the first letdown in the game. It ran at a decent framerate most of the time, but whenever I took a hard turn or took a spill off the ATV, things slowed down dramatically. I could almost forgive the drop in performance if the game's visuals were sharper hi-res textures taxing to the PSP's graphics capabilities. Sadly, the truth of the matter is that the graphics in Blazin' Trails look more like they were lifted from the earlier days of the PSOne instead of being ported from the PS2. Everything in the game looks blocky, pixilated, and at least two steps behind everything else that's come out for the PSP to date.


Things aren't any better when it comes to the audio. Like other games in the franchise, Sony managed to get an eclectic collection of licensed music for Blazin' Trails. The soundtrack as a whole is actually pretty good … but only when you can actually hear it. The single most prominent sound in the game is the shrill whine of the ATV engines. That constant buzz overwhelms every other sound the game might have to offer. I tried playing with my headphones plugged in and only managed to give myself a headache in the process. I tried to turn down the effects volume to a manageable level, but discovered that short of muting it completely, there simply IS no manageable level.

Even with these two strikes against it, Blazin' Trails could still be entertaining if only its controls were simple enough for players to jump right into and start playing. Unfortunately, the controls are the biggest problem in the game. On the PS2, controlling the ATV was somewhat straightforward and simple, while pulling off the more advanced maneuvers required a little extra work and skill. By trying to copy that same control scheme to the PSP, Blazin' Trails instead devolves into a frustratingly painful mess. The controls are extremely sensitive, and most races you can expect to fly off the track at least once. And while the simpler tricks aren't too difficult to manage, anything beyond the basics are near impossible to manage on the smaller PSP controls.