Cabela's Sportsman's Challenge
Manufacturer: Diversions Software / Headgames / Activision (1999)
Price: $19.99
Genre: Shotgun Sports
System Requirements: Pentium 200 or faster, Windows 95 or above, 16 MB RAM (32 recommended), 100 MB HDD space (for minimum install), CD-ROM, DirectX compatible soundcard.  

  ... DESCRIPTION: Cabela's Sportmans Challenge is the second game of its kind by Diversions Software, the first being Sporting Clays, published by WizardWorks. This game adds trap and skeet shooting to the sporting clays as well as adding a couple of new features to the sporting clays range. The biggest addition to the sporting clays is that the game will create a new and different sporting clays course each and every week. The gameplay is quite basic, you select your desired type of shooting, proceed to the range where you call your targets and shoot them when launched.

    THE GOOD: I thought that the original Sporting Clays was a fantastic title that no one seemed to pick up on. And it was a shame. This title will suffer a similar fate, I'm afraid, since it doesn't involve "hunting." I love to shoot sporting clays and 5 stand as practice for the real hunting season and this game does a great job of simulating it. While I can't pick out specific details of this game that make it great, it just simulates something that I enjoy. If you enjoy shooting, as well as hunting, think about this title.

... .THE BAD: Sportman's Challenge has very few knocks against it. The biggest, I suppose would be the flat, 2D graphics. In todays age of high tech 3D accelerators, it seems everyone is expecting (or demanding) 3D titles. This game still uses the flat background with an image of a clay pigeon flying by. It works for what it does, but will not draw much press attention. The other bad point of the game is that the multi-player is done only by hotseat, or several people taking turns on the same computer. It would be nice to link up with someone on the Internet, but it doesn't really take away from the game. Lastly, unlike Sporting Clays, there is no course designer in this game, which I do miss from the original.

    THE VERDICT: Sportsman's Challenge is truly a fun title, but as mentioned, it will get highly overlooked. If you're looking for a fun way to spend 10 minutes at a time without having to wade into a full fledged hunting title, give this game a look. I don't think you would regret it.




Reviewed by Tom Shiflet
9-28-99