advance wars conquered … for now

yes, i confess, i do let my obsessions get the better of me. i’d finished advance wars 2 and advance wars: dual strike back to back, but i couldn’t help trying out the next in the series, advance wars: days of ruin, the second advance wars game for DS. i was intrigued by the different direction that the game took in terms of its art style and presentation and was curious about how much the gameplay had changed.

i agree with the common response that in some ways the gameplay of days of ruin feels more like a step back than a step forward. the game lacks any of the new modes or features from dual strike and omits CO powers completely until about halfway through the campaign mode, and even then the CO powers are much less powerful. instead of the game-changers of previous games CO powers provide more-modest bonuses restricted to the region around the CO who “boards” a unit and retreats when that unit is destroyed. the game’s other main change is that rankings have been rehauled: the power score is now based on the effectiveness of your attacks (i.e. the fewer number of attacks the better) instead of the percentage of enemy units defeated during one turn (which always seemed rather pointless to me anyway), and the technique score is now based on the number of units you’ve used compared to the number your enemy has used, instead of the number of units you’ve lost as a percentage of your total (so churning out units hurts rather than helps that score). another small addition is that each individual unit can increase a level if it defeats an enemy unit. there are only two levels it can obtain (after defeating two enemy units), and the bonuses it receives are minor, but it does give some motivation to keep units intact.

all of these changes focus the gameplay on keeping units alive and thus force you to strategize a bit more in order to get S ranks. in some ways it feels like with these changes intelligent systems was looking to their other strategy franchise, the fire emblem series, for their inspiration for the gameplay of days of ruin. but IS borrowed from the fire emblem series more liberally for the presentation of this game: the music is distinctly reminiscent of the recent console fire emblem games, and the story, although set in a post-apocalyptic, contemporary world and not the fantasy world of the FE games, feels similar as well in its tale of a small band of do-gooders fighting against all odds to bring peace to the world. i was looking forward to the story, which the advance wars series thus far has been sorely lacking, but the story in days of ruin is trite: although it dwells on much heavier subject matter than the series has thus far, its exploration of such issues as survival, selfishness, and selflessness in extreme conditions is nothing we haven’t seen hundreds of times in other games or media.

in the end this was a game that i enjoyed playing through but isn’t my first pick for an advance wars game to replay anytime soon. it doesn’t contain a hard campaign mode, although it does include a slew of tougher “trial” maps, and it does have the advantage of enabling you to revisit any previous campaign map so you can try for a higher rating. when i think back on it i appreciate the new focus on strategy, but i still can’t help missing the fun of the previous games. although it took awhile and it hasn’t nearly supplanted my affections for fire emblem, in its four releases in the US advance wars has proven to be a series well worth playing in all of its iterations. i’m definitely looking forward to finding out where the series goes from here.

advance wars links … conquered!
- entry at wikipedia
- FAQ at gamefaqs, including a damage chart
- you can get a PDF of the manual at nintendo.com
- entry at strategywiki.org including regional differences
- you can get a the official site has a few wallpapers
- entry at metacritic.com

cat and mouse MANIA

although my first foray into the sega dreamcast library was fairly random, there were several dreamcast-exclusives that were high on my list of games to check out. among them was the party puzzler chuchu rocket!, created by none other than the sonic team. i’m not exactly sure where i first heard about the game, but it looked like a colorful, quirky sega game, and although it’s not that well known those who do talk about it give it positive reviews.

the entry at wikipedia gives a good run-down of the space-mice-guiding, space-cat-avoiding gameplay (according to the manual chuchus are not mice; they’re space mice). i enjoyed the frantic pace of the multiplayer mode at first and definitely appreciated the style, well within the usual flashy-but-fun sega aesthetic, but i lost interest once i realized the game doesn’t require very much strategy: the outcome changes so quickly that winning involves more luck than skill. there are two other modes, stage mode in which you place arrows in real time to direct the space mice to their rocket, and puzzle mode where you’re given a limited number of arrows to position before setting the space mice and space cats loose on their fixed paths, rather like setting a rube goldberg contraption in motion. the former gets prohibitively difficult without another player to help out, but fortunately the puzzle mode is worthwhile enough that it makes up for the deficiencies of the other two modes. beating the stages in puzzle mode oftentimes ends up being a matter of trial and error, particularly for stages that are highly dependent on the movement speed of each space mouse or cat, but many of the stages are so ingenuous that the entertainment comes as much from finding the solution as just the act of setting the chuchu machine in motion and watching it chug along. the game apparently includes 100 of these puzzles and allowed users to submit levels online; apparently 2500 of them were included in the game boy advance release of the game. although i enjoyed beating a fair number of the puzzles in the dreamcast version, 2500 more seems like overkill. still, once i get through the dreamcast puzzles i’ll know where to head to next.

chuchu! make way for a rocket-full of space mice links!
- if you’re looking for wallpapers, the game disc actually includes some. rad!
- FAQ at gamefaqs
- list of unlockables at gamespy.com
- a review of the GBA game (apparently a launch title) at nintendojo.com

wars advanced … again!

just when i thought i was safe from my fire emblem obsession, somehow i got sucked into an entry in its sister series, advance wars, in particular advance wars: dual strike for DS. i had just finished advance wars 2 for GBA, and although i had to force myself to finish that game i had dual strike on hand so i thought i’d just dip into it, as is my wont.

and before i knew it i was hooked! the situation was somewhat similar to my experience when i immediately followed up the somewhat dull and tedious metroid prime 2 with metroid prime: hunters: dual strike turned out to be different enough from AW2 that the experience felt much more refreshing than its predecessor. although the core mechanics are still the same, the game has a host of additions even within the main campaign mode. the main addition is the new tag-team mechanic where you can switch between COs during battle. this change doesn’t seem like it should be nearly as fun as it is, but it’s satisfying to unleash a “dual strike” attack when both of your COs’ attack meters are completely full. the dual strike mechanic is a bit broken in that you get two consecutive, CO-powered turns and it’s easy to completely overwhelm your opponent, but bracing yourself for your enemies’ impending dual strike attack fits fairly well into the overall strategy. the new units are all fun and worthwhile, and the new COs (both enemy and ally) are entertaining as well. the game also adds “dual front” battles where two distinct maps are presented simultaneously on each screen (although most of the time the computer’s AI handles the top-screen battle and you just have to provide support in the form of units you send to the top screen), as well as CO levelling which provides bonuses in battle that are minor but another nice distraction (and you can choose to ignore them if for some reason you don’t want to use them).

beyond all of these gameplay additions are a host of new modes as well. the most straightforward of these are three survival modes (money, turns, and time) that turn out to be a lot of fun. a new real-time “combat” mode provides an occasional diversion, although it isn’t deep enough to be worth spending much time with. one of the most compelling additions for all the obsessive completists out there (such as myself) is the history feature, which tracks such useless stats as number of turns used and number of enemy units of each type destroyed. each stat has 3 “medals” you can earn, and although earning them is much more a matter of gameplay time than skill, it’s still fun to watch your medal count go up as you progress.

looking back on the game it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what made this iteration of the series (the 3rd for the US) so compelling. being able to level up your COs somehow makes one more attached to them, and i appreciated the fact that the later maps in the campaign mode aren’t the long, drawn-out affairs that its predecessor has. and although the additions seem relatively minor, they add up and give the game quite a unique feel, especially after the sameness of AW2. the series ended up going in a different direction for the next installment, taking on an entirely new cast, so for now the game has become the third of the “advance wars” trilogy begun with the original advance wars for GBA. it’s a fitting conclusion to the trio, with a host of new features that easily propels this to the top of my list of not only favorite advance wars games, but favorite games ever. now what about that fourth advance wars game? well, any guesses as to when i’ll get around to playing that one? … hmmm? … …

more links advancing to the battlefield!
- entry at wikipedia
- complete script at gamefaqs, especially useful if you’re wondering what the outcomes are of the two choices you’re presented with after the last battle of the campaign mode
- list of unlockables, detailed CO FAQ (including tag affinities), and detailed attack and defense stats FAQ at gamefaqs. (i still don’t understand why the game doesn’t give explicit defense stats, but ah well.) you can also find a damage chart here at advancewarsnet.com.
- you can get a PDF of the manual at nintendo.com
- guide at IGN

somewhat iconic ico

the word “innovative” is among the most attention-grabbing adjectives for a video game to me, and that word often gets used when discussing the PS2 adventure game ico. although it didn’t make much of an impact when it was released in september 2001 (despite great reviews), it has gone on to achieve a significant amount of attention since then from critics, gamers, as well as designers.

i came to the game pretty much completely fresh, and the first thing one notices (aside from the great visuals) is the fact the game has minimized all of the usual trappings such as a prologue, tutorial, dialogue, NPCs, story, and even background music and the character’s status and inventory. the title character and the girl, yorda, he soon meets and who accompanies him for the rest of the game have no life bar, and ico only only uses three different sword-like weapons throughout the game. the game only ends when ico falls from a great height or if he fails to rescue his companion from being abducted by the small variety of shadowy creatures that serve as the game’s only enemies.

given the lack of flashy game elements, the game gets boiled down to such a degree that almost all the focus is on the “puzzles” and the “action”. much of the game’s attention seems to come from this stripping away to the barest essentials, and although i definitely appreciate that school of design it certainly wasn’t enough to bowl me over. the game certainly has a unique feel, but i was initially disappointed that the game’s core mechanics felt very much like prince of persia: the sands of time, which i played a couple of years ago. that game had followed ico by a couple of years, so some of its uniqueness may have originated with this game (although much of it can probably be traced further back to the original prince of persia games); but as with sands of times i got a bit bored by the fact that in ico the “puzzles” don’t really require much thought and oftentimes they reveal themselves pretty straightforwardly once you survey the area and take note of where the levers, crates, ledges, and ropes are for you to push, pull, and climb up on. likewise after the first few fights the rest are pretty much equally forgettable.

once i realized my attention wasn’t going to be focused much on the gameplay, i ended up noticing and then admiring the world of the game instead. the character design is fantastic: the boyish gawkiness of the main character is reflected in all of his movements, and makes a great contrast to the quiet presence of his ethereal companion. the game’s central gameplay mechanic, having ico grab yorda’s hand to lead her to safety, is simple but so pervasive that it becomes more and more poignant through repetition and the passing of time, as the further they travel in their attempts to escape the castle that imprisons them. the castle itself also feels like a real place and provides a memorable backdrop.

all of this was still not convincing me that this was a good game, let alone a great one, however. it wasn’t until the last third of the game that i suddenly began to truly enjoy the game. part of it may have just been the accumulated appreciation of all of the game’s tiny details that made the whole experience more than the sum of its parts. but part of it is that despite the game’s minimal amounts of character and story there are some beautifully memorable moments later in the game (most of which unfold through cutscenes) and a fantastic ending.

despite a memorable ending, after having finished the game i’m still not entirely convinced that the game deserves all the superlatives it’s been given. but it’s still an enjoyable experience, particularly if you haven’t played any of the more-recent prince of persia games. i had a taster of its “spiritual sequel”, shadow of the colossus, which gets similarly praised. i definitely enjoyed my experience with that game so far, and it may prove to be the more truly “innovative” game. the search for innovation continues …

some ico-nic links:
- entry at wikipedia which includes the far-superior european boxart
- guide at IGN
- the PAL release had several extra features including this special ending. this FAQ at gamefaqs mentions and alludes to some of the other changes. it also includes all of the game script.
- gamespite.net recently included this game in their top games of all-time review. their article is pretty typical of the kind of lavish praise the game gets, although i’m still not quite convinced. time may tell.

zelda two swords

i played oracle of seasons earlier this year, but i was hankering for some more zelda. i’ve finally found me a gaming buddy, and so instead of hitting up oracle of ages i decided to take advantage of the situation and instead try out the original zelda four swords which was included with the GBA remake of the SNES classic a link to the past.

four swords is intriguing in that the game modifies the layout of the levels depending on how many people are playing (i.e. 2, 3, or 4) as well as within each set configuration. it’s still unclear to me how much the levels change within those constraints, although from my limited 2-player experience it seemed that levels do repeat and can be pretty much the same aside from the locations of items, etc. from what i gather from reading online it seems that the bosses are exactly the same each time through, although i haven’t verified that for myself. there were some surprises in the game, including a couple of great new items and some new enemies, including the new main baddie vaati who apparently has gone on to appear in several other games in the series.

not too much to say about the particulars. the game definitely succeeds as a multiplayer romp with a good mix of cooperation and competition (and in a way foreshadows new super mario bros., including its ability to pick up your companions and throw them into a bottomless pit), and although there isn’t much in the way of a true zelda experience in terms of the game’s progression, it’s still fun to play through at least once. playing it through at least twice more is required to “finish” the game, but although there seems to be some variety between the levels it feels like it would get to be a bit tedious because the levels themselves are generally too repetitive. the chance that i’ll be able to coerce someone else to play through the game twice more with me is somewhat slim, but one of these days … in the meantime i’ll have to just play through the one-player version of the gamecube follow-up four swords adventure.

link’s double-edged links:
- the official site for the game includes basic info and screenshots
- nice entry on the game at zeldawiki.org including the story that i assume is from the instruction manual, and info on the bosses, items, etc.
- entry at wikipedia
- zeldauniverse.net also has a nice entry on the game, including a transcript of the in-game prologue and a FAQ that details the requirements to complete the game. the site also mentions this regarding the game’s level generation: “Also note that the layout of each level changes, but it changes in two ways. First off, there’s the setting–which is the outer rim or overall layout of the stage. Then there’s the part–which is the area in the middle. So sometimes you’ll come to a level where the setting is the same, but the part in the middle is changed–or vice versa.” i’m surprised that no one’s tried to generally catalog all the possible level parts or types of level parts because from my limited experience the number of parts doesn’t seem to be anywhere near infinite, but it doesn’t seem that many people have played the game anyway.

advancing wars

i’ve been playing advance wars 2: black hole rising for GBA off and on for ages, but i finally finished the normal campaign mode a couple of weeks ago. i’d been playing it for so long that i’ve forgotten what the game added compared to the original advance wars, which i’d played a while back. this review at cubed3.com has served as a good reminder; the main additions to the sequel were: super CO powers, a handful of new COs (each with their own unique powers), some new weapons including neotanks and missile silos, and some new enemy hazards including cannons and lasers. in terms of the structure the game has quite a different feel from the first game because instead of three COs that you use for the majority of the game, in the sequel you’re required to use a new group of COs after every few maps. i actually prefer a bit more continuity, but this change does mix things up a bit.

in some ways i enjoyed this game more than the original, partly because i knew more about what to expect so i wasn’t as fixated on the lack of a story or characterization (esp. as compared to my beloved fire emblem series), and partly because i didn’t have to go through all the work of learning how to play the game so this time i could just enjoy the game and its undiluted tactics from the very beginning. but although the changes weren’t insignificant, somehow all in all it just felt too similar. this makes the second sequel i’ve played recently that was more disappointing than not due to its lack of innovation (the other being metroid prime 2). i was starting to get worried that my interest in the advance wars series as a whole was on the decline, but i started the DS games and luckily they both look like they’re different enough to make them worth checking out. early intel indicates that we may receive reports on that sooner than later …

advance! links against links on the battlefield!
- entry at wikipedia
- PDF of the manual at replacementdocs.com
- good FAQ at gamefaqs
- S-rank FAQ, also at gamefaqs
- guide at IGN

metroid prime hunters: last hunt

this is gonna be a short ‘un. for the most part i try to play games in a series in order, but it don’t always work out that way. case in point: i played through metroid prime hunters even though i hadn’t played the demo of the game that preceded it by more than a year. but i got my mitts on the demo soon after that, so i thought i would take it for a spin even though i was going about it all backwards.

needless to say there wasn’t much that the demo experience offered me, having played the actual game. playing through the three single-player modes was entertaining enough, and it was interesting to me that the modes were focused on getting score multipliers through continuous enemy kills. since you need two copies of the demo to play the three multiplayer stages (alas, there’s no vs computer mode like in the main release) i didn’t get to try them out, but one of these days i will. the game includes a control option where you tap the screen to shoot (apparently the original control scheme), but nothing else much worth noting. by this point hand cramps were definitely not a problem, though: either my hand muscles have strengthened from playing through metroid prime hunters or i’ve just adjusted the way i hold my DS when playing. either way it was fun to have to have this little closer to my metroid prime hunters experience. i doubt the big N’s planning a sequel to that game anytime soon, but i’d definitely be up for one. one can only hope and keep the flame alive.

roundin’ up the last of the first hunt links:
- thorough description of the demo at eurogamer.net
- entry at metroid.wikia.com
- PDF of the manual at replacementdocs.com
- a FAQ at IGN

goin’ down the alleyway

i rather enjoy game boy games in all their greeny grayscale glory, but since i never had one growing up there are so many that i’ve never played. i took a step back to the white plastic brick’s earliest days with alleyway which was actually one of the launch titles, way back in 1989. (that reminds me, a lot of places commemorated the game boy’s 20th anniversary with retrospectives. you can find gamespite’s series of articles here.)

alleyway seems to get universally panned and dismissed as a decidedly inferior clone of arkanoid which came out in the arcades in 1986 and on the NES a year later. in many ways this game seems like a huge step back as it doesn’t feature any powerups whatsoever, or even much level variety: each level repeats 3 times (with variations due to moving blocks). there are eight of these trios of levels, and each group is followed by a bonus board featuring a mario character, ending in a showdown against the king of the koopas, bowser himself. the game does get somewhat harder since the ball travels noticeably faster in later stages, but for the most part there’s not a whole lot to keep your attention. the sprites are small and undistinguished (much like its fellow launch title super mario land which i reviewed last year). even the physics seem a little stiff: according to wikipedia “the ball will only travel at 15°, 30° or 45° angles”. this leads to some extremely repetitive patterns, although “the ball cannot be locked in an infinite loop of ricochets. … the ball will travel at a slightly raised or lowered angle depending on its current trajectory, and will break out of the loop.” the game also includes different speeds for your paddle (faster if you hold the A button and slower if you hold the B button).

despite all of these shortcomings (i seem to say that phrase a lot), eventually i rewound my mind to the game boy’s early days and began to enjoy the game for what it is instead of what it isn’t. as a launch title it definitely had major limitations, but it provides enough entertainment and challenge to make it worth playing, and the mario cameos and variations within each set of levels provide just enough personality to distinguish it from similar games. i found it interesting to compare this not to arkanoid, but to atari’s arcade classic breakout from 1976 (which in turn was directly influenced by that granddaddy of them all pong from 1972). this video of the atari 2600 version of breakout made me think of alleyway as coming before arkanoid instead of after, which it didn’t, but given the technical limitations of games for the game boy at launch the comparison to breakout seems a bit fairer. in any case i’m looking forward to trying out more old-skool game boy games sooner than later.

psst. want some cheap alleyway links?
- gamefaqs has GIFs of all the levels
- text of the manual at world-of-nintendo.com
- this fan review at retrogamer.net will make you want to play the game. this review at meanmachinesmag.co.uk will do just the opposite.
- video of the less-than-thrilling ending
- yup, this is another one from nintendo R&D1
- the game had a cursory mention in nintendo’s game boy player’s guide, receiving scores of: graphics and sound: 3.3, play control: 3.9, challenge: 3.3, and theme and fun: 3.2. i’ve archived the scan here.
- the game also got a brief mention in nintendo power #9. scan archived here.
- the official nintendo page (in japanese) doesn’t have much info, but here’s the google translation if you’re interested.
- bit of trivia, also according to wikipedia: “Years later, the game’s designer Gunpei Yokoi would reuse much of Alleyway’s source code (such as paddle behavior and adapted physics engine) for the Game Boy game Kirby’s Block Ball while working with Shigeru Miyamoto’s team.”

hunting down the metroid prime hunters

oftentimes when i finish a game if i have the next in the series lying around i’ll try it out just to get a taster for how the series progresses. so even though i’d just finished playing metroid prime: echoes, i tried out the next in line, metroid prime: hunters for DS … and found myself totally hooked.

the first thing you notice is how great the game looks; it’s impossible not to be amazed at how much of the gamecube metroid prime games’ design they managed to fit onto the DS. the game includes movie cut-scenes that also look pretty good. the game does a pretty good job of making the most of the hardware and masking its limitations, except for a fair amount of enemy reuse (including the bosses, of which there are only two main ones that are repeated four times each, with variations) and too many places where rooms are overly symmetric or the room designs are reused too closely. the latter becomes apparent even from the first section of the game where there are three rooms in a row that are pretty much identical, making it too easy to get confused which room you’re in and which door you’re heading towards.

i definitely enjoyed the single-player “adventure” mode, although as people have noted the game is fairly linear. it’s divided into nine sections, two on each of 4 worlds and a final stage, although after all the backtracking of MP2 i found the rigid pacing (and warp portals) to be for the most part refreshing. there’s a clear emphasis on action over exploration, and the game highlights one-on-one battles with 6 spankin’-new rival “hunters”. the rival bounty hunters are pretty well designed and their unique abilities make the multiplayer mode entertaining (although i couldn’t really get into it; just not into FPS games enough i guess). the one drawback to the “formula” is that each of the 8 main sections of the game require you to “escape the planet” in a race against the clock, and having to deal with forced timed battles is just annoying. luckily, automatic temporary save points are fairly numerous. all these differences give the game quite a different feel from the usual metroid game, which is why i found that i wanted to continue playing (and ultimately finish) the game even though i’d just finished MP2.

another thing that people complain about often is the control scheme. the stylus mode is really the only viable option since the buttons-only mode doesn’t give nearly enough fine control, but the problem with that mode is that your hand gets cramped easily. however, i did find that after i’d played for a while i got used to it and my hand didn’t feel cramped so much. i’m really curious about trying the game out with a “thumb stylus”, which you can read about here and also here. the latter link is from a post at IGN about the original DS which came with an early demo version of MP:H, which i’m also curious about trying out.

among my other, more-minor complaints, are that the morph ball mechanics are less forgiving than the other prime games and that there are rather too many insta-death situations, both of which cause some really tedious sections of the game. the story is yet another rehash of the first prime story, and i beat the game without realizing that there’s something you’re supposed to do to get the actual ending which was also quite annoying.

at first as i played hunters i kept feeling like i really understood how mario fans must have felt when they first got to play super mario land: that having a portable mario game made up for any shortcomings. but in the end overall i found this game to be quite enjoyable, so much so that i’d actually give it the edge over MP2, which for me just dragged on. as i mentioned, i didn’t spend that much time with the multiplayer modes which was enjoyable enough against the computer but felt fairly repetitive, but i’ll come back to them at some point. meanwhile, i’m seriously itching to try out metroid prime 3. let’s see if i get sucked into that one as well …

huntin’ for bounty-ful links:
- the official site has a lot of video clips and wallpapers for each of the hunters
- if anyone’s interested, nintendo power’s coverage of the game included a preview of the multiplayer mode (march 2006, v. 201), a cover feature and a poster of the hunters (april 2006, v. 202), a review (may 2006, v. 203), and a guide to beating the final boss (june 2006, v. 204).
- great game site at metroid.retropixel.net
- the entry at strategywiki.org includes a lot of info on multiplayer strategy
- entry at metroid.wikia.com, which includes screenshots of the brawl trophies for all the hunters
- video of the ending
- a good FAQ at gamefaqs
- guide at IGN
- entry at wikipedia.org
- entry at metacritic.com

goin’ for wii gold

i must be the only video game blogger who hasn’t yet reviewed the original wii sports. there are a few reasons i’ve put it off for so long. the main reason is that i wanted to delve into at least one area in some depth. but since i’m not into sports games that much in general, even though i’ve played the five games off and on since i first got it, it took me a while to get motivated to actually spend more concentrated amounts of time with it. similarly, even when i did think about playing it, when i get home from work i’m oftentimes just too lazy to be waving my arms around like a mad man, no matter how much fun it may be.

i finally got my 3rd gold in wii tennis recently, so i feel like now is a good time to reflect. without a doubt wii sports is a historical game that will long be remembered for revolutionizing the way video games are viewed (and played) all over the world. by now everyone’s heard hundreds of stories about how the wii has brought people into gaming for the first time, as well as bringing people back into gaming who hadn’t played since the NES days. as someone who’s experienced this phenomenon directly himself with his own family, it’s a great, amazing, fantastic thing that would be hard to overstate.

has it really already been 3 years since the wii was released? i remember the buzz that had been building about it, and, as a nintendo fanboy, being really worried about how people would react to it. that anticipation will be forever linked in my mind with wii sports, and more specifically wii sports as depicted in the first set of “wii experience” videos (put online before the wii was actually released). i found myself watching some of these videos over and over again, amazed at not only how magical playing wii looked, but also how real the reactions were. the videos feature an international cast including both genders and a range of ages, and oftentimes the immediate smiles of the players’ first reactions are soon followed by the furrowed brows of concentration.

so it was, and so it has continued in scores of wii games that have followed. but getting back to the point at hand, i ended up spending most of my time playing the tennis game. that game, as well as the whole package, runs a fine line between simplicity plus accessibility and a true, “hardcore” challenge, something that nintendo has and continues to openly struggle with. tennis seems to balance the two admirably well, perhaps the best balanced in those terms of the games in this collection, based on what i’ve played so far. getting gold medals in the tennis training mode was reasonably challenging, although i’m somewhat disheartened at even attempting to get the platinum medals. and although i became a wii tennis “pro” without too much trouble, maintaining my ranking and even improving it has definitely required more effort. also, as for how much the games mimic real life i can definitely say that with both tennis and bowling when i started off playing, real-life tendencies were accurately reflected in the games. now that i’ve improved i can’t help but wonder if my real-world game has improved as well, although i haven’t tested that yet.

despite not having much interest in sports games in general, i certainly enjoyed this collection. i’m definitely going to come back to tennis, and although i spent some time with baseball i became too bored with the pitching. so i may turn my attention to boxing next, although being the most physically demanding of all the wii sports games it’ll probably take even more motivation for me to get to it. either way i’m deeply grateful to nintendo for coming up with such a great console with a perfect pack-in.

gold-medal links:
- review at videogamecritic.net
- the entry at strategywiki.org includes the training mode medal requirements
- FAQ at gamefaqs. this one also includes info on the easter eggs.
- iwata asks feature. part 4 is particularly entertaining.
- according to one user, nintendo added some slight updates to the game when they added the update to show the wii remote jacket