Well let's see, the presentation is pretty good, menus look good and the graphics actually aren't too bad. I got a bit excited at first. Then more and more flaccid as I tried each game.
First game I tried was cricket, and without really knowing what I was doing, swinging randomly I hit a 6 on every single ball thrown at me, effectively scoring the maximum possible points and winning the game straight up. I haven't been able to do that since then but it does seem pretty random where you hit the ball. Timing seems to mean nothing, and you can't move your player. You can actually choose whether or not to run which is nice and something Wii Baseball could have implemented. Press A to run and B to cancel it. Bowling has lots of options but none of them seem to do anything. You can aim left or right, by bowling left or right of the screen, and add spin by twisting, but it just doesn't matter. There's nothing the batter can do either way since his only option is hit the ball. I suspect some form of strategy could lie in the timing of hitting each type of ball, but i've had no success determining which as all hits seem completely random and go wherever they want.
Random just about describes the other games as well. Soccer consists of just randomly passing and swinging the remote hoping for a goal. You can do amazing shots and the goalie somehow stops them while the ball could just roll in the goal by accident. It's a giant mess. As for American Football I don't know the rules to the actual sport so I don't know what i'm doing when I play that, but it could be alright.
Volleyball is a game that would be good if you could move your player. You can press a direction on the dpad to go into one of four formations, but they don't matter since you can hit the ball from pretty much anywhere either way. Considering you can't aim the ball, the rallies can go on forever as long as both players are swinging the controller at the right time, I had one go for ten minutes that I just ended up losing on purpose.
Disc Golf is competent. Apart from the fact that all 18 "holes" are almost identical, apart from maybe one tree or a rock put in the way, and that there's no explanation on how the power meter works. I'll swing real hard and get it up just a bit, and do a deep fast swing and still not get max power, while just a random flick will do it when i'm trying to sink the disc from closeup with the "putter". Yes it calls the 3 optional discs Driver, Mid, and Putter. Even though they are discs. Thankfully even with a full powered shot right next to the "hole" it will slam straight down into it. Wait, that's not a good thing at all.
Beach Boules is about the only game that seems to function properly, but it's Boules. This was the last game I played, and when I breathed a sigh of relief that this game was playable, I knew I had just wasted $40. I'm not dissing Boules, but I could have just grabbed some marbles if I wanted to play it. If you're unfamiliar with it you basically see who can throw their balls closer to the main ball, with the option to knock the other players balls out of the wall and muscle your own balls into it with skillful rebounds and spin.
The game is amusing at points, in the way that videogames are amusing just for being videogames. Overall though it's just a very bad product. It can be "fun" just hitting things sometimes, but it hardly feels like a game at all. I haven't given up on looking for some kind of depth, but so far it's a big joke. Haven't tried the DS connectivity yet, maybe some entertainment could be had in creating four players with really bored faces and having them play the games.
Topic: Big Beach Sports (Read 4714 times)
