Although the name seems to indicate that a previous version of Line Rider was available for various platforms, it was in fact a free flash game online.  Now Line Rider appears on the DS with an actual story and other features that utilize the handheld in basic ways.

Line Rider 2: Unbound does indeed have a story, but it’s so extremely thin, accentuated with basic animated cut scenes that one wonders why they even bothered.  The basic premise is Bosh is sledding down the slopes minding his own business when the black suited baddy Chaz tries to set traps on the way down.  These traps seem to always backfire and Bosh moves past as if nothing happened.  Later on you’ll encounter a female rider by the name of Bailey who Bosh seems to have an interest in.  All of the story however has no effect on the way the game plays.

To get Bosh to one point or the other, drawing lines where he’ll ride is necessary.  Many tools are at your disposal that allow you to manipulate the way you draw your track.  When a line is drawn, it’s easy to edit it by pulling at the points the line consists of.  The problem however is that the game fails to notify you that drawing in a certain direction will lead to Bosh being able to slide across the line or fall right through.  This is due to the fact the track is two sided, one side is a black surface Bosh can hop on, the other allows him to pass right through the line.  Drawing from right to left will result in the black side being on top with the blue strip on bottom.  This can make it difficult while trying to make a track going in a different direction as my tendency was to draw from left to right anytime I made a line.

Although it wasn’t clear how drawing the lines functioned, the speed lines were.  Three types of lines are presented for play besides the standard line: fast, slow and break apart.  The speed up and slow down lines are used exactly in the same way as the regular blue line with the two sided mechanism.  They come in handy when you need to boost Bosh up a hill or slow him down after flying from a cliff.  They are also able to be reversed with a few simple taps.  The break apart line is handy when you want Bosh to do a half loop and not run into the track as the line he rides on vanishes after riding over it.