Surf's Up only loosely follows the plot of the movie, instead taking the surfing premise and building around that. Playing as one of the movie's characters, you travel around the frosty coast of Shiverpool and sunny Pen Gu Island competing in the Penguin World Surfing Championship. Yes, a few non-Penguins do compete, but we will look past that...
The overall presentation, which is a take on ESPN, is fun and ties into the game's premise really well. I would be lying if I said I did not find some of these segments entertaining and kind of funny. Older gamers may skip through them, but a younger audience should enjoy them. Besides, sometimes you just have to turn your brain off and just have fun.
The goal of each course is to earn a set number of points before reaching the end. Along the way, you can also complete side goals to earn shells or collect Surf Idols, which unlocks bonus content such as the Legendary Wave course.
A number of Surf's Up's problems could be easily resolved if the game could only decide whether it wants to be a competent surfing game or an SSX clone, because the two don't mix nearly as well as you would think. On the SSX side, you have a number of intricately planned course moments involving rail grinds, barriers to steer around and rings to pass through. At the same time, you have a massive wave that you trick off of, earning major points. Knowing when to run the course and when to ride a wave is a big part of gameplay, though the bigger problem is when the two literally run into each other.
The timing of wave crashes and appearance of course obstacles is out of sync, so you can end up in a situation where the only thing you can do is crash and lose out on any points you may have earned. Some areas leave little room for error and feel like they are unfairly punishing players, especially some of the more congested ones where there is too much happening.
Single-player races can also be played in four player split-screen, though the loss of screen space makes congested areas feel downright claustrophobic. But hey, your opponents are dealing with the same thing, so it isn't so bad.
Two neat aspects are the surfer and board edit tools. By completing goals in levels, you can unlock accessories to dress your characters up. You can also choose the style and color of your board. Nothing about the changes make any difference in-game (though board types affect character stats), but it does lend a little personalization to everything.
By completing the main game, you can unlock a Leaf Sliding mini-game where you ride a leaf through a slippery, and dangerous, volcano course. There is not much to the game other than knowing when to brake, but it does provide a few shells and Surf Idols to collect.
