Welcome to California. Home of the most radical sports in the world. Rad, bad and aggro. You're about to hit the beaches, parks and streets of the Golden State to go for trophies in everything from surfing to bike racing. California Games gives you the hottest sports. And the most aggro competition. You even have to pick your own sponsor.

So pull on those knee pads. You're about to get into the most fun you've ever had since Mom hid your skateboard. California Games is going to take you from surf to the turf. From the pipe to the parks. Are you gonna love it, or what?

Review

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 by Dion Guy

California knows how to party.

The fifth game in Epyx’s highly respected multi-event sports game series, California Games offered just 6 events, as opposed to the 7 or 8 of previous instalments. That’s not to say it suffers as a result, because some of the new events arguably have..

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User Comments

1. KhaoShar 11 Apr 2008, 00:47 BST

I sure loved the hackysack-game back then, even so I was horrible at it. But hey, I was about six back than! And the frisbee callenge- I had to figure it all out by myself (oh, you have to catch it in order to score!) for we had one of those... uhm, 'free' versions, so no manual and the game beeing all in english was a problem to us back then, when not even our dad could translate it for us...

Still, to everyone out there: if you want to try anything for C64 at all, try this, and if you are allready into this system, get it anyway!

2. Tony 11 Apr 2008, 00:49 BST

Europe is so lucky! I love California games. I hope the US gets the Sega Genesis version.
I have only played CG for the NES and Genesis. CG on the Genesis really had impressive visuals. But I think it was missing the frisbee event (I could be wrong though).

I would not mind if the VC released all versions of this game for Genesis, NES and C64

3. Kawaiipikachu 11 Apr 2008, 01:50 BST

While this is also one of the games released on the C64DTV plug,n,play thing & i find many of those games on it extremely tough but i find this this one being one the better games on it .

4. Jesse_Blue 11 Apr 2008, 07:24 BST

Played it on C-64 back then and I have to say it is a very good title. Good to play with friends as well, although there is no simultaneous mode afair.

5. Tomus85 11 Apr 2008, 09:18 BST

I can remember playing the game on the Master System, didn't know C-64 had it, might have to download it lol

When I was a kid I spent hours playing this game, its just awesome.

6. deggs 11 Apr 2008, 14:16 BST

i had this and i loved it as a kid... i remember hooking up my c64 again sometime in the early 90s and being not so impressed though after playing nes for a few years...

7. Dazza 11 Apr 2008, 15:06 BST

Great review Dion - welcome to the VC:R reviewing team

I played this game to death myself on the Master System. From the sounds of it things aren't much different in the C64 version (except the original probably had ghastly multiload from tape!) - events like frisbee are quite shallow (three for three: way to be) but BMX and Footbag (Hacky Sack) had a lot more depth and those were my favourites.

The game really shone in multiplayer as you say in the review. It is the perfect game for playing with some mates as one person would usually be better at a certain event so across the 6 games you would never be sure who would come out on top.

Who was your favourite sponsor? For me it was all about Ocean Pacific (cos it was the only brand I had heard of at the time!!)

8. Dion 11 Apr 2008, 15:35 BST

Thanks Dazza. We share the same favourite events, although I was always better at Foot Bag than BMX (I invariably had that one SERIOUS crash!).

As to sponsor, I'm afraid I just picked one at random - it didn't mean the same to me as the countries from previous instalments.

9. Herandar 11 Apr 2008, 17:08 BST

Wow, Demon 212 is pretty bad at the half-pipe.

10. Mirokunite 11 Apr 2008, 17:10 BST

I remember being able to cheat in the BMX game. I think if you are the second player you can just jump up, and down. And rack points up.

11. maka 11 Apr 2008, 17:54 BST

I used to play this game a lot as a kid. Another Epix classic they should release is Chamonix Challenge (Final Assault), the great climbing game. It was one of my favorite games as a kid on the PC and later on the Amiga...

12. DarrenSW 11 Apr 2008, 21:49 BST

Epyx's Winter Games was even better. I hope that comes to the VC soon...

13. 100xp 12 Apr 2008, 09:20 BST

I have this for my Atari Lynx, not sure if I want to see these graphics on a big TV or anything larger than the avg 17 - 19inch monitor. As much fun as it was during it's time on a small screen, I think it loses a lot of replay value after a few plays. It seems mainly for nostalgia and for 300 more points one could get a game that would be hours and hours of fun.

Serious, some games should be in the 100 - 200 wii point range. I'll be surprised when Vetrex games start showing up for 200 wii pts.

14. Adamant 12 Apr 2008, 11:58 BST

Honestly, I never cared much for this game. I played the Amiga version as a kid, and never felt it could really stand up to the other Epyx sports games. Too much focus on score-chaining events where it's unclear exactly what gives you the best sores to my liking.

I hope Epyx will bring us more of their "Games" games ((), though - they had some great collections there.

15. That Guy from Faxanadu 14 Apr 2008, 21:54 BST

This game is totally BIONIC! For me Callifonia Games is the only multi-sportgame that can compete with Track and Field II. Even if there are "only" 6 sports they play very differently, and I guess everyone has their favourites. Foot Bag is hillarous and stupid, that´s why I love it. Flying Disk is another great game, It´s fun to try catching the frisbie you just threw with another character. The C-64 version also has a few more eastereggs than the Master System version (But i won´t spoil them!). Callifonia Games is very enjoyable when competing against some friends, and I´d reccomend it to anyone who likes sports- or minigames. This is my favourite Epyx game, but I´ve only played World Games other than this.

16. Mario maniac 15 Apr 2008, 05:13 BST

If Commodore 64 games are ever going to be released here, methinks I'll be downloading this. It looks pretty fun... but it also looks kinda repetitive.

17. DEMON212 17 Apr 2008, 11:48 BST

Herrander. I'd never played it before. I picked an event at random hoping it has music.

Plus having a camera obscuring your view doesn't help.

Now that I've had some practice with it... I think I've gotten worse, lol.

18. nintendoduffin 23 Apr 2008, 02:55 BST

Ace

19. martyn2001 23 May 2008, 23:44 BST

I don't remember Chamonix Challenge. One Epyx game that I would love to see on VC, which stands head and shoulders above most other C64 titles, is Summer Games 2, which was far superior to the original Summer Games.

20. samman 28 May 2008, 17:21 BST

how do you play this in one player. it keeps wanting me to use 8.

21. Tannman42 02 Jun 2008, 13:43 BST

Good game to play for the odd 20 minutes.

22. CJ 24 Jun 2008, 22:43 BST

Foot Bag for 2 minutes here n there works for me.

23. Tony 26 Jun 2008, 19:34 BST

If you need a good surfing game, try picking up Kelly Slater's Pro surfer for the Gamecube. ITs a fun game

24. Terranigma 09 Jul 2008, 15:05 BST

Something confuses me. why have Europe got this first and more to the point, why haven't the US got it at all yet? Surely, this game would be ideal for the US VC library and would make more sense