It has been years since I’ve gotten to don the snow gear and strap on a snowboard and carve up the mountain slopes. Now, thanks to FoamPunch’s self-published Shredders: The Full Ride Edition, it is time to shred down the mountain once more and see whether this game slides in for the win or falls flat on its face.

You play as two hapless snowboarding content creators who unwittingly break into the snowboarding event of the year, hoping to score a wildcard entry to an exclusive invitational event. Together, they must prove they’re up to the challenge to master the art of park riding, buttering, rails, and massive kickers and earn their place in the world of snowboarding.

On your journey through the campaign story, you will meet a wide variety of personalities who will challenge you at every turn and help you to become the best snowboarder that you can be.

The characters you meet along the way not only push the story forward but also seamlessly segue into the game’s core loop, presenting challenges that help players progress. The story itself is well-written and does a decent job of keeping players engaged enough to keep the hype vibes alive, and delivers a wonderful love letter to the sport of snowboarding. From the moment that I started to play, I couldn’t help but reminisce about many fond memories shredding the crap out of ‘Coolboarders’ just to unlock the snowman.

The tutorial teaches the core movement mechanics very well, as you learn to carve, jump, and perform basic spins. After learning the basics, I felt that all too familiar false sense of security, that “Oh, this is going to be easy,” feeling quickly faded away as I began to learn more complicated combinations of button presses and toggle flicks to pull off more advanced tricks.

While pulling off a double-backflip melon grab might seem like a simple enough example of just one of many possible trick combinations, successfully landing it is a whole different story. Pulling off just this one trick took me forever to get it right, even just once.

While I found it very easy to rotate horizontally and to rip a 1080 pretty much on demand, rotating vertically is incredibly challenging. Easy to pick up and play, hard-to-master mechanics are very much an understatement in this title. Let’s just say that you’re going to fall flat on your face often, but when you finally pull it off, you’ll go from Argh to Yeeewww in a heartbeat, and I’m all for it.

Players must complete one primary objective to progress through each mission. Most of these primary objectives are simple enough to achieve, like following a fellow snowboarder’s line, placing in the top 3 in a race, and performing specific trick sets, just to name a few.

For the achievement hunters, there are 2-3 additional objectives that can be completed. These side objectives are usually a little more complicated to achieve, but they tie in very well with the easy-to-play, hard-to-master mechanics.

For players who need to don the sweetest-looking threads and shred on the coolest of boards, Shredders offers a ton of sick character customisation options that can be unlocked by completing story missions and beating specific challenges.

Meet fellow Shredders online and carve up the slopes in seamless multiplayer. A literal press of a button and boom, you’re following a player’s shred line or competing against each other’s time in a time trial. While I thoroughly enjoyed sliding into an unsuspecting player’s game and hearing the “duuude that was sick,” as I flew over the top of one player, I almost wish we could have done more, like a competition playlist.

The general gameplay experience is fast, fluid, and extremely expressive. However, it is not without some infuriating annoyances. Sometimes you will crash headfirst into an object that you’re trying to trick over, and as you get back up onto your board, you’ll find yourself in a slam cycle that will just have you falling over and over again.

This can be solved using the reshred button, holding down square; however, if you’ve got an objective that you can’t use this feature on, you’re forced to restart the entire mission, which leads to annoyance, especially being mere metres away from finishing the level.

Powdered snow particles kick up into the air as you carve hard into a tight corner. Lasting impressions left behind as you land hard into deeper snow. Feel the flow as your character bends and twists with each glorious jump.

These visual effects are sure to have you absorbed by the stunning graphics. Each park biome has been lovingly crafted, and every location feels unique and flows beautifully as you shred down the mountain. Sadly, these gorgeous visuals are slightly let down by occasional visual performance stutters that tend to occur when sliding through more complexly designed areas.

The soundscape delivered simply shreds. The in-game audio is incredibly realistic. If you’ve ever been snowboarding before, you’ll understand where I’m coming from. The almighty thud as you face-plant into the snow is sure to bring back some traumatic memories.

Every sound is on point and is paired with a solid blend of lo-fi tracks. While the backing soundtrack is very solid overall, I felt some of the music didn’t fit well with the more physically intense missions.

‘Shredders: The Full Ride Edition’ is a visually stunning love letter to the sport of snowboarding. Easy-to-play, hard-to-master mechanics flow seamlessly into the game’s missions, challenges, and progression, paired beautifully with the stunning park designs.

Unleash your competitive streak in seamless multiplayer and shred for hours with your mates. ‘Shredders’ delivers a solid performance for the most part, but sadly pulls a few 180s with some visual stuttering and fall looping when your player gets stuck on an object.

Written by: Gary Nielsen