Reviews & Articles

On one of my two very brief outings to Barker Hanger during E3, I stumbled upon a developer with a Wii-mote in his hand moving a young boy back and forth across a log that crossed a crevasse. The boy was followed by this bird thing. Periodically, the dev would shake his Wii-mote and the bird-thing would spin in circles and sound like a bell. When I asked what it was he was doing he said, "Looking for treasure." Huh.

How difficult could this be? You play a young angler sitting on a riverbank with his faithful dog by his side. In the river, you could see fish swimming back and forth. With your Wii-mote, you hold your line by pressing the trigger and release as you cast. Once the fish strikes your lure, you set your hook and then you reel it in with your Wii-Nunchuk, playing it by reeling, releasing a little tension by lowering your rod - er ... Wii-mote when you got a screamer - I mean ... no, you don't actually set tension on your reel, so it doesn't actually scream ...

This is the game that did me in. When I was a child, sealed puzzle games with a little metal ball you had to manipulate through a puzzle were quite the rage. Ophelea is of an age with me and knew this. Dewy's Adventure is exactly that puzzle game with fun colorful graphics that will appeal to young children. It is the life of a pure drop of dew, and your mission is to wash and clean the world, freeing your friends along the way and rescuing them from the evil Don Hedron and his nasty minions, Black Water.

I love the Pirates of the Caribbean movies and adore Captain Jack Sparrow, so I couldn't wait to get the chance to jump into this world on the Wii. My first time through, I started with Story mode. Eventually, I got the option to start in Challenge mode or Dueling mode, but for starters, it's Story time. The game starts out promising enough. It's the music I like, and Jack happens to be in jail - so that's about par for him. A mysterious stranger gives him a sword and tells him to fight his way out - transportation is waiting and then the stranger leaves us to get on with it.

Each summer of children's movies seem to start earlier every year. One of the first this year was Meet the Robinsons in March; and for each movie, a video game seems to just have to be made. Most games are an adventure where you're playing through the movie. When Avalance Software designed Meet the Robinsons for the Nintendo Wii, they broke out of this mold and created a game experience that doesn't follow the storyline of the movie, but stays true to the flavor and feel of the movie. It is a game that our whole family has truly enjoyed playing. It fits the old adage, "easy to learn, hard to master".

Electronic Arts Inc. has announced their new Harry Potter game titled, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is scheduled to be released two weeks prior to the opening of the movie.

In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry is back for his fifth year at Hogwarts but soon realizes that a majority of the wizard community does not know the truth about Harry’s latest encounter with Lord Voldemort. Cornelius Fudge, the Minister for Magic believes that the Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore is lying about Voldemort’s return to undermine his power. He hires a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher to keep an eye out on Dumbledore and the students at Hogwarts.

The Sims 2: Pets for the Nintendo Wii allows you to build your own township and play with your pets. Similar to the PC game, it’s an open ended game where you can play a family that already exists, or start from scratch and create your own character and pet. You can also build your house from the ground up, and by looking at the map, depending on where you build your house, it could come with a nice view.

I am a long time desk jockey. I do tech support for a software company all day and play games (online and desktop) for my leisure time, in between life’s regular little chores and caring for my daughter. I obviously need more exercise, but the idea of doing an exercise video watching perky people in spandex talk about how much fun they’re having, well, isn’t my idea of fun. A kernel of an idea entered my mind at the end of last year. The Wii is a platform designed to get you up off of the couch while still playing computer games. My brain likes computer games. It sends me those happy chemicals that your more typical exerciser claims to get while running on the treadmill and lifting weights.

Kororinpa: Marble Mania doesn’t really have a lot of marbles, instead it comes with a variety of circular-and not so circular-objects that you can use in place of marbles, to roll through a maze-like floating contraption using the Wii-remote. If you’ve played any of the Super Monkey Ball games, this will seem very familiar, but Marble Mania keeps things interesting by having the ability to switch marbles which can provide more (or less) of a challenge.

One day, I'll manage to work the perennial pirate-ninja question into one of my articles. It's a little goal of mine. Fortunately for you, dear reader, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End doesn't actually appear to feature ninjas, thus denying me the opportunity. For shame…

That said, At World's End has plenty to offer. A tie-in with the third film in Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean film trilogy, it features high-seas, swashbuckling combat and the inimitable Captain Jack Sparrow, along with additional content from the second film, Dead Man's Chest.

I play Wii Play!

When the Wii came out, everyone got a real kick out of the Mii characters you could make. Unfortunately, the only things your poor little Miis could do was play Wii Sports. They were a blast, but your Miis can't drive your excite truck, beat face with Link, or perform surgery.

"There's no such thing as an arrow through your dreams." That lyric must have been written on the board at every meeting SEGA held while working on Sonic and the Secret Rings. It's in the main theme song. Sonic says it when you finish a level. The developers must have clung to the notion that the dream of a good 3D Sonic hasn't died yet.

As a follow up to Wii Sports, Wii Play is a bundle of nine short mini games that seems to be geared towards honing your Wii-remote skills rather than making you break out into a sweat. The game comes with a Wii-remote, which is probably the best reason to buy the package, though there are some memorable games like the cow race where you get to ride a cow and take out scarecrows.

Before my oceanography professor showed us an episode of SpongeBob in class, I always thought this yellow guy was a yellow brick of cheese. It made a lot more sense when I found out that he was a sponge - with square pants. SpongeBob SquarePants: Creature from the Krusty makes its debut on the Wii, using a variety of the Wii-motes functions creating a game that is so incredibly bizarre, it makes me wonder how kids manage to understand what is going on. Or am I just getting too old?

I’ve been finding myself wanting to play platform games lately for some reason. Maybe because they are a throwback to the simpler gaming days where I didn’t have to worry about stuff to my sides as I moved around in a 2-D world. Or maybe it’s just that I like brainless exploding stuff sometimes after a long day at work. Either way, Metal Slug Anthology for the Nintendo Wii fits the bill nicely.

Back when I first played the X-Men Legends games, I thought to myself, “Self, you know what would be REALLY cool? Being able to play as ALL the Marvel Super-Heroes!” Well, that, in a nutshell, is what Marvel: Ultimate Alliance is. An action RPG game that lets you make up your team from over twenty of Marvel’s greater heroes from Spider-Man to Thor to the ravenous Wolverine!

The Tony Hawk series of games have stayed more or less unchanged since Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater first debuted in the summer of 1999. That is, until now. Tony Hawk’s Downhill Jam changes the formula from a skate around the park or city performing tricks to a pure downhill racer! Gone are the precision combinations of tricks to rack up the points and in is the fast paced grinding down a mountainside to beat your fellow racers.

Slap on the sweatbands and bust out the carpel tunnel cream, Metal Slug is back!

Wait. Back? What the heck is Metal Slug? At least that what I’m picturing most people thinking when they read that first sentence. Well let’s flesh that out a little bit.

Most people who consider themselves gamers instinctively recognize the tune: the classic Zelda theme. Dating back almost 20 years, the original Legend of Zelda was released in 1987 for the NES, the theme hasn’t changed much. You could say that’s a lot like the series, too. Sure, the latest console versions have been in 3D and featured better graphics and had a richer sounding theme, but the gameplay has been extremely faithful to the original, even after all these years. As the old saying goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

One of the Nintendo Wii’s launch titles, Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz, utilizes the Wii’s innovative controls to revive this series. The original Gamecube game took gamers by surprise. It was a simple idea, where you control a monkey that rolls around in a ball and collects bananas. How much fun is that? They’re like hamsters in a hamster ball. It was a lot of fun because these monkeys could also play tennis, golf, and goof around in all sorts of great 4 player party games. The games did get old after awhile, and the series needed a fresh start. The Wii provides the perfect opportunity for you to control your monkey with the new Wii remote, using full arm motions instead of your left thumb controlling a little joystick.

Remember Operation? That weird board game with the fat guy who had all the ‘missing organ’ problems and a large, red nose that lit up if you put those organs back in the wrong way? Well say hello to Operation’s modern- day successor, Trauma Center: Second Opinion.

Pikmin from Nintendo, is one of those console games where being "all thumbs" can be advantageous — assuming they're all green thumbs. It's a strategy game about growing plants and herding them to different parts of the planet to find the missing parts of your broken spaceship so you can get home. No, really, it is.