Ubisoft signs Shaun White for exclusive snowboarding game

French software publisher Ubisoft has announced its entrance into the extreme sports genre with the signing of an exclusive deal to develop videogames based around the exploits of Winter Olympics gold medallist Shaun White.

In order to accurately recreate Shaun White's world-famous snowboarding style and differentiate from rival titles such as EA's SSX series and Microsoft's Amp'd games, Ubisoft's forthcoming snowboarding game will focus heavily on the half-pipe, as opposed to the traditional downhill slopestyle.

At just 19 years old, White is the only snowboarder to win the Winter X Games gold medal in both half-pipe and slopestyle, and his Gold Medal winning performance at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino featured back-to-back 1080 rotations while grabbing the board. White has won the Winter X Games championships six times, and is considered one of the best professional snowboarders in the world.

"I'm stoked to be working with Ubisoft to develop a video game that captures the thrill of snowboarding like no game has done before," White commented. "I'm a huge fan of Ubisoft games like Prince of Persia, so I'm excited to be able to combine what I love about snowboarding and gaming into an experience for everyone to enjoy."

"Ubisoft is thrilled to be working on a video game inspired by and created with one of the top athletes in action sports today," added Christian Salomon, Ubisoft's director of worldwide licensing. "As the sport continues to grow in popularity, Ubisoft is looking forward to bringing the groundbreaking innovation and high-quality game play we are famous for in other genres to snowboarding."

Ubisoft has stated that videogames based on the pro snowboarder's unique style will be developed for both current and next-generation platforms, and the publisher's extreme sports debut is slated for a release during 2007.