In the world of PlayStation motocross racers, few stand out as uniquely different in the graphics department. Championship Motocross 2001 doesn't seem to break the mold either, although it does have some nice moments; the sights aren't too fuzzy and overall things are very clear, but there's just not much to look at on a standard mud track. The guys in charge of character portraits could have done a better job of cropping photos correctly instead of vertically crunching big pictures of peoples' heads into tiny frames, too, but maybe that was intentionally added for comical effect. Doubtful, though.

The bike noises and sound effects are a little sub-par on their own, but when set against a soundtrack full of mediocre punk bands, not an awful lot in this game becomes music to your ears. The bikes often sound more like overactive mosquitos than Kawasaki dirt monsters, and the awkward pauses of silence between song loops tend to take some of the excitement out of the race. Nevertheless, at least there's a decent variety of licensed music and the quality remains relatively constant throughout the game.

Replay value freaks won't exactly flip over this one, but there's plenty of features to keep a motocross fan occupied for about a week. Play modes include Championship, Career, 2P competition, and the trick-based Freestyle exhibition. In a single player game, there's really nothing to it: maintain speed, line things up for each turn, jump ramp, repeat. The tracks vary a bit with tougher inclines and demanding surfaces, but the action gets quite boring after the first 8 races or so. Freestyle mode's where you perform all the tricks you can muster in 2 minutes, but with a limited showoff vocabulary and the most difficult moves requiring only two button presses, even the most devoted Carey 'Hart Attack' Hart fans should fall asleep after an hour of goofing off with these stunts.

Since the bike controls are terribly simplistic and not much different from most other motocross games, CMX 2001's only real difficulty lies in the randomly impossible-to-beat CPU forerunner assignments. Don't be surprised if you play through a Championship track perfectly, making every turn and jump as flawlessly as possible and never crashing, yet still see the 1st place position going to one computer opponent who always seems to cross the finish line 40 seconds ahead of every other bike on the track. This phenomenon doesn't seem to keep up as the levels get harder -- it just kinda happens now and then, for no reason.

Okay, so there's something attractive about racers with really easy controls. CMX 2001 just seems too non-complex, though; once you learn how to powerslide into turns just right, there's not much of a challenge left. Bike handling aside, trick performance and combos could've been handled much more smoothly. Landing on your face and losing the title in Championship mode just because you decide to do a little hotdogging while you're in the lead (forgetting that it takes roughly 4 trillion years for your guy to simply kick a leg out to the side) is really no fun.

It's also no fun to watch your bike constantly clip through terrain, flags and solid walls during a race, but apparently that sort of thing's inevitable. All things considered, CMX 2001 probably isn't the best choice on the market for motocross madness, but give it a shot if you live for this sort of thing -- just don't expect the finest because Ricky Carmichael's still the cover boy this year.