Extreme Sports (Innerloop)

Sports titles dealing with golf, boxing, football and hockey were ten-a-penny on every home games console, but on October 27th 2000, game studio/developers Innerloop released Extreme Sports, bringing a more adventurous and niche (not to mention dangerous) sports to the joypad.
The player had the choice of guiding one of four characters to the top of a bunch of 'sports' that has given participants more broken bones than medals; Nina the Swedish fox, Noel, a gobby Brit, Cath the hip American and Raga, a cool unflappable Jamaican. Each looked good, no blockiness or mashed faces, which plagued character designs on other sporting titles.
In all there were 6 events to compete in: ATV (All Terrain Vehicle) racing, Snowboarding, Mountain Biking, Sky Surfing, Speed Gliding, and the ever cool but all too short, Bungee Jumping. Probably the most boring of the bunch was Speed Gliding, where you were pulled through the sky on a handglider by a ropey looking seaplane, and it felt more luck than skill if you reached 1st position in this event.
The others were cooler, those mountain bikes certainly got up to a dangerous speed, and the mountains on which you flung your onscreen sportsman from were both lush to ride on and in parts almost lethally steep. It boasted a pretty varied assortment of locations to race in, from snowy mountains to volcanic wastes and eventhough there was 'pop up' issues with some backgrounds it never impeded much on gameplay.
All the usual suspects regarding modes were available: Championship (where you competed against computer controlled opponents on several tracks consecutively to unlock harder levels), Single Track, Time Trial and Practice.
Whilst not being a fantastic game, Extreme Sports was ....well extremely playable and a breath of fresh air amongst the smog of other, more popular sports on offer. Ive seen this go for 99p on certain sites. Absolute bargain for such a playable title!

Check it out.