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Wii Play

Posted March 9th 2007 by Ben Wood.

Nintendo's primary hope for the Wii is that it will make gamers out of the people who, for whatever reason, don't play games. In order to achieve that goal, part of their strategy is to create accessible games that don't need major time commitments and that are easily understood from the start without tutorials. The irony is that Wii Play, designed as a simple set of games that anyone can play, is essentially a tutorial for Wii gaming as a whole.

Wii Play consists of nine controller tech demos that can't really be described as minigames in the sense of Mario Party of Wario Ware fodder in the sense that they aren't particularly exciting, nor are they a smaller part of a greater whole. Winning and besting your high score aren't steps to ultimate victory. Sure, you get a medal if you do well, but even that feels underwhelming when compared to the satisfaction that accompanies the medal awards given in Wii Sports.

If the point to Wii Play is to introduce people to the Wii gaming experience, then it more or less succeeds. While Wii Sports is great at getting people off the couch and showing that the Wii controller can hand large, obnoxious gestures, Wii Play is much more focused on tiny, precise movements – which is equally important when trying to understand what Wii is all about.

At first, the only available game is Shooting Range, where over the course of a few rounds, you shoot at targets, floating cans, Duck Hunt-style ducks (and while it has random dog barking, there's no canine jumping around and laughing at you), and at UFO's that are trying to abduct frenetic Mii's running around in a field.

As you play each game, a new game is unlocked. Find Mii is a Where's Waldo-like race to find specific Mii's, or Mii's with specific behaviours. Table Tennis is the game which teaches all about subtle hand motions. Pose Mii is a lengthy and boring tutorial on twisting the Wii Remote, rotating Mii's to fit properly in a bubble. Laser hockey is air hockey whose controls show that it really belongs in a "DS Play" package. Fishing is just that. Charge! is a fun cow-racing game where you take out scarecrows littered all over the course (yeah, there's only one course). The other two games are Billiards and Tanks!

Billiards is to Wii Play as Bowling is to Wii Sports. Pool games have been around the gaming scene for years now, but this version, while just a simple game of 9-ball, is easily the closest thing to actually playing pool other than heading down to the local pool hall, or your basement if you happen to be insanely rich. You have great control over spin and power without any silly meters. Throwing in a few other modes and a freer camera system could easily turn Billiards into a full-fledged game of its own.

Tanks!, the only game where you have and lose lives, is a great arcade-style strategy game with a simple premise: one bullet destroys the enemy, one bullet destroys you. There's a fair amount of variety in the enemy tanks, their strategies, and the playing field obstacles. It's a rewarding game where there's a sense of progression and the feeling that you want to keep going.

Wii Play does a commendable job at bringing Mii's into something more than just the white nothingness that they call home. Find Mii is a particularly noteworthy instance where knowing your Mii's actually helps you out. When looking for two look-alike Mii's, you can quickly go, "Ok, it's not George, Chris, or Hitler."

For those Wii newcomers, Wii Play falls apart a bit at the seams. When playing Table Tennis, your gut instinct is to swing the paddle when all you can really do is point at the screen where you want the paddle to be. It's a counter-intuitive game that also brings up a flaw with the overall package. With the exception of Charge!, where the Wii Remote is held NES-style, all the games rely on pointing to play. While there are no problems with the pointing, Wii Play doesn't offer a great amount of variety from a gameplay standpoint.

For a seasoned gamer, there's no real point to play these games more than once, which can be done in 20 minutes. Many of the mechanics here that show you what you can do with the Remote have already been implemented in other games, such a Zelda, Red Steel, and Wario Ware. Playing with someone else certainly ups the fun, but after half an hour of aggressive target practice and Mii searching, it's time to move onto another game. The high points in replayability are Billiards and Tanks!

Wii Play does a great job at maintaining a clean, simple look while giving each game its own visual style. Fishing looks like it was drawn by a Japanese kid with crayons, Charge! is full of yarn in the knitted countryside, and Laser Hockey was ripped out of Neon-land. The textures are subtle, but surprisingly crisp and varied. There isn't much in the audio department, but the Remote speaker is used extremely well. Hearing the gunshot come from the Remote and then getting the echo from the TV, or having the sound of scoring on your opponent transition from the Remote to the TV is pretty satisfying.

Slight Pulse - Make sure you get the Wii Remote with this one.

Wii Play is a compelling deal if you're in the market for another Wii Remote, since it essentially prices the game itself at $10. Honestly, if Tanks! and Billiards were downloadable originals, they would be worth more than $5 a piece, even Find Mii and Charge! (with extra cows and tracks) would get a fair amount of attention for 500 points. Wii Ambassador has given me a chance to see non-gamers play these games, and Wii Play, along with Wii Sports is a great introduction to the system. But unlike the free sports pack, there's no real reason to go back to Wii Play after its point has been made. If you have no need another controller, then it's hard to recommend this package.

Posted in: Reviews