Don't call it Wii Sports 2. Well… okay, you can call it that. http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/impressionsArt.cfm?artid=16423 Nintendo calls the game Wii Sports Resort, but the best way to frame this game in the proper context is to imagine it as Wii Sports 2. Nintendo had three different "sports" for attendees to try out at E3, each recalling memories of similar experiences from other Nintendo games.
The simplest one was Disc Dog, a game of Frisbee with a canine friend that elicited memories of the DS Nintendogs game. Throw a Frisbee and your dog will run it down. If your dog catches it, you get awarded points based on how close the catch was to a displayed marker. Then the dog fetches the disc back to you, and you can recover it by pointing at it and pressing the A button. However, Disc Dog was also a demonstration of the additional capabilities that the Wii MotionPlus add-on brought to the table. Not only did the game track whether my arm was in front of me, to my left, or to my right, but the booth attendant also encouraged me to witness the game tilting the Frisbee at a ratio equivalent to how I turned my own wrist.
Throwing the Frisbee was also surprising: you don't press and release a button to do so as Wii Sports Bowling had you do. Instead, the game automatically chooses the moment at which you'd actually release the disc in real life. I didn't have an extended period of time with the demo, but this mechanism felt natural and responsive for the duration of my session.
The swordplay demo was also a showcase for the benefits of the Wii MotionPlus. Nintendo claimed one-to-one controls, and this was it. Players hold the Wii Remote in front of them (the Wii MotionPlus extends the Wii Remote long enough for a two-handed grip if someone has small enough hands), point the cursor at the center of the screen to calibrate, and they're good to go!
The demo started off with explaining the controls, much like Wii Boxing explains the controls for first time players. The sword follows the player's movements and the tilting or twisting of the Wii Remote and Wii MotionPlus. It even knows when the sword is being held upside down! But merely moving it around isn't an attack; the player must swing it hard and fast to elicit a real slash. This slash can be in any direction: left, right, up, or down. Unfortunately, it doesn't appear as if the game supports thrusting. However, players can block by holding down the B button and positioning the sword to realistically intercept incoming blows. The game lets players practice all of this by offering wooden logs and giant pencils which are sliced into pieces and fall apart depending on the exact location and direction of the sword slash.
But once the real match starts between the two duelists, it gets exhausting; much more tiring than Wii Sports Boxing and just as frenzied. Situated on a circular platform high above the water, two opponents fight three rounds and try to knock the other off of the platform with a flurry of attacks and strategic blocking. Overhead slashes were clearly the strongest and knocked opponents back the furthest, but this may be because swinging in that direction naturally yields the most force. Players trying out the game seemed to periodically choose to attack in a series of frenzied blows, quickly hitting opponents again and again in quick succession. This made blocking attacks important not only to throw the opponent off-balance, but to nullify these attacks before the player gets knocked into the drink. However, each round ends in a tie if no one gets knocked off within the time limit. If a fourth tie-breaker round is necessary, the stage shrinks to a size barely enough to hold the combatants, and whoever gets knocked off loses the entire match.
The third section from Wii Sports Resort that Nintendo had on display recalled the Nintendo 64 classic Wave Race 64 (or its GameCube sequel Wave Race: Blue Storm). The player's Mii stands on a watercraft and players hold the Wii Remote and Nunchuk as if they are holding the handlebars themselves. Players can tilt the imaginary handlebars left or right to turn their vehicle. They can tilt back slightly, tilt forward slightly, activate a boost by twisting the Wii Remote as if revving an engine, and hold A to accelerate.
The controls were really responsive, and I adapted to them immediately. The point of this demo was to steer through a series of alternating red and blue gates for the highest score possible. As soon as I passed one gate, the next gate would start counting down from ten on a giant electronic board attached to its top. Pass through the gate with seven seconds left, and you get seven points. Eventually, the waves started getting choppier, and my watercraft actually caught some air, but unfortunately, I was not able to dive under the surface of the water as I remember doing in the Wave Race series. The course was longer than I anticipated, and by the end, my arms were actually tired from suspending the Wii Remote and Nunchuk in front of me for the entire session.
Is Wii Sports Resort worthy of being referred to as Wii Sports 2? From these three games, the additional control possibilities that the Wii MotionPlus offered, and the promise of more when the game releases in early 2009, the answer seems to be yes.
Topic: IMPRESSIONS: Wii Sports Resort (Read 2724 times)
