Parkour, the art of movement, is less a sport and more a way of life. Its participants, known as Free Runners or Traceurs, view the environment and its obstacles, urban or natural, as a series of challenges to be overcome. To the Traceurs, parkour has a philosophical appeal: they feel transformed by the experience, free from the grind of city life. Since its inception in Paris during the mid-1980s, it has spread across the globe and now has an international army of exponents and enthusiasts.Free Running, or Le Parkour as it is know in France where it originated in the late 1990’s, is the latest extreme sport. It involves running, jumping and performing death defying tricks through/over urban environments. ‘Parkour’ translates into ‘Obstacle Race’, and some have described the sport as an army obstacle race meets a ballet stage.
Peter Rezon, Reef Entertainment Managing Director said, “Following the success of Free Running across Europe, we’ve wanted to expand the game’s formats, and at the same time, play to each formats strengths. So with the Wii version for example, similar to our recent release Rogue Trooper: Quartz Zone Massacre, we’ve utilised the Wii controllers to great effect, making the Free Running experience unique to Wii. We now have physical interface which works brilliantly with the extreme sport which is Free Running!”
In addition, both the NDS and PC version have been given an overhaul in terms of gameplay, graphical look and feel.
Peter concludes, “We’ve refreshed the overall brand messaging with these versions. We wanted to get to closer to the players who are doing the sport for real, so we’re also talking to existing Free Running teams and organisations to help with our current and long-term strategies for the franchise. We’ve focused very closely on maintaining the exciting pace, graphical looks, atmosphere and attitude that made the original games so popular and we’re very much looking forward to building on our Wii, PC and NDS portfolio with another innovative and original title.”
Features
- MORE THAN 60 CHALLENGES SPREAD OVER 10 DIFFERENT LEVELS IN 3 DISTINCT ZONES, EACH WITH ITS OWN STYLE OF GAMEPLAY.
- 9 DIFFERENT SINGLE AND MULTIPLAYER MODES INCLUDING ‘RACE’, ‘TRICK’ AND ‘TARGET COLLECT’ MODES.
- UNLOCK NEW CHARACTERS, CLOTHES, TRICKS, VIDEOS AND MUSIC.
- GUEST STARS SEBASTIEN FOUCAN, STAR OF ‘CASINO ROYALE’ AND CO-FOUNDER OF FREE RUNNING AND EZ, BAM AND BLUE DEVIL FROM URBAN FREEFLOW.
- RECREATE YOUR FAVOURITE PARKOUR/FREE RUNNING MOVES AND TECHNIQUES.
- FULL SCREEN EFFECTS INCLUDING BLOOM, SUN GLARE AND FOCAL BLUR.
- FULLY IMMERSIVE ENVIRONMENTS.
- FREE ROAMING GAMEPLAY.
In addition to featuring characters based on the leading free runners in Europe, Free Running has been developed with the help of the sports brand specialist Adidas. Their Free Running apparel and high fashion training shoes all feature in-game.
Originally released for PS2/PSP in 2007, Reef Entertainment is bringing it to NDS, Wii and PC in Q2 2009.
More articles about Free Running