Current Events > Unpopular games I liked #25: Unpopular Games I liked #25: Dave Mirra Freestyle B

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"Unpopular" can mean generally considered bad, forgotten, overlooked or even just not discussed enough. Some of these can even be considered good games but can still qualify if not enough people talk about them.

Previously on UGIL...

Unpopular Games I liked #1: Atari Climber (2600)
Unpopular Games I liked #2: Fatal Run (2600)
Unpopular Games I liked #3: Gravitar (2600)
Unpopular Games I liked #4: Save Mary! (2600)
Unpopular Games I liked #5: Star Strike (2600)
Unpopular Games I liked #6: Yar's Revenge (2600)
Unpopular Games I liked #7: David Crane's A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia (NES)
Unpopular Games I liked #8 and #9: Rad Racer and Rad Racer II (NES)
Unpopular Games I liked #10: Rescue: The Embassy Mission (NES)
Unpopular Games I liked #11: Mario is Missing! (SNES)
Unpopular Games I liked #12: Mickey Mania: The Timeless Adventures of Mickey Mouse (SNES)
Unpopular Games I liked #13: Road Runner's Death Valley Rally (SNES)
Unpopular Games I liked #14: Stunt Race FX (SNES)
Unpopular Games I liked #15: Tiny Toon Adventures: Buster Busts Loose! (SNES)
Unpopular Games I liked #16 and #17: Top Gear and Top Gear 2 (SNES)
Unpopular Games I liked #18: Sonic Labyrinth (GameGear)
Unpopular Games I liked #19: Gain Ground (Genesis)
Unpopular Games I liked #20: Phantasy Star III (Genesis)
Unpopular Games I liked #21: Zelda II: Adventure of Link (NES/GBA)
Unpopular Games I liked #22: Zone of the Enders: Fist of Mars (GBA)
Unpopular Games I liked #23: Muppet Racemania (PS1)
Unpopular Games I liked #24: Frogger (PS1)

And now...

Unpopular Games I liked #25: Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX 2 (PS2)

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Man, when you were like 12 years old, was there anything cooler than extreme sports? I got into it because of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater--like many a 90's kid--and I just soaked it all up. I even got my own skateboards--yes, plural--and spent hours on end in the driveway trying to ollie, before eventually making up my own tricks I could do without the ollie.

But despite skateboarding being the only extreme sport I had the equipment for, I was interested in all of it--snowboarding, BMX, Wakeboarding, you name it. So I looked for what I could play in those categories. While the Tony Hawk games ruled the Skateboarding video game scene, well... Matt Hoffman, made by the same guys... uh... kinda wasn't great.

So that left Dave Mirra Freestyle BMX. 2 was my first and last entry in the series, and despite being decisively not Tony Hawk (I had to google how to move; turns out you use the D-pad or left stick), it really worked pretty well.

The cool thing about Dave Mirra was that your tricks could all be tweaked on the fly. Don't just do a Cancan, do an X-up Cancan. Don't just do a backflip, do an Indian Barspin Superman Backflip. Shoot, I even managed to do an Indian Superman Indian once... though... what?

Now it's clear they didn't put as much effort into the mechanics as Tony Hawk did (the balance meters in particular feel lazy), but in every other category, it's a fun game with lots of content. I loved pretty much every level and lots of the characters (especially the unlockable Amish and Slim Jim Guy), and the Punk Rock soundtrack covered lots of greats that Neversoft overlooked (the above "All My Fault" is "Superman"-tier).

Some of the challenges were super hard--which is both a good thing and a bad thing--and at least one is glitchy, which kinda sucks because it was one of the harder ones too, but overall it was a fun game if you were looking for an extreme sports game that was something a little different.

(Yep, I screwed up the title again lol)
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