Wii Sports

Written by Chris Reiter  on September 14, 2006

First Impressions: The dream is always the same. Babe Ruth just hit a homer into Tiger Woods' head, who stumbles backwards knocking down a naked Anna Kournikova into my lap. Rrreow!

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In Nintendo's desperate attempt to draw uncultured crowds into the gaming picture while driving away the hardcore, they're establishing the Wii as the primo choice for extremely apparent gameplay. This probably shows best in their coming sports title Wii Sports, in that it will offer players of any age the chance to smack a ball like it couldn't be simulated before in virtual space. Wii Sports is the answer for how to play baseball, golf, and tennis merely by moving your wrist(s). Wii Sports is stacking these three genres together for one simplified roundup in time for the Wii launch.

And that's not all. Thanks to Nintendo's latest Wii announcement, we now know that Wii Sports will also come complete with bowling and boxing as well. So get out your bowling shoes and your boxing gloves because these wee sports will offer the most natural Wii motions. Boxing will even allow players to put their dukes up for a simulated stretch in the squared circle.

If following the strides of annual big name sports titles that rely on depth and realism is your thing, then Wii Sports isn't what you're looking for. Wii Sports is baseball. It's tennis. It's golf. It's all three sports at their most primitive level. Wii Sports won't even allow you to control the movement of the characters onscreen, it's so basic. Everything but your guidance of their arms will be automatic. But then, Wii Sports isn't all about building an impressively accurate take on any of the sporting modes. What this game will do instead is focus squarely on the player's own ability to relate their swing to the character while realistically mocking them inside the game.

You swing. They swing. We all swing for ice cream. Concentrating on motions alone, the Wii's remote will have the game's onscreen character mimicking the positions in which the controller is moved. In tennis for example, all kinds of distinct expressions will be read, from lobs, to forehands, backhands, and even the applied forcefulness within each stroke. One interesting note to know about is that each sport will center solely on tracking the Wii remote, so no button usage is required. Sadly, and oddly enough, online connectivity isn't a planned measurement for Wii Sports. All that is known at this point is offline multiplayer options will be available in both tennis and baseball, doing an upwards of four people in tennis and just two in baseball. Golf players are destined to feel the chilly breeze alone. Brr!

Making their slogan "Playing = Believing" a reality, Nintendo's doing everything in their power to show people they're not kidding. Wii Sports will not be blowing anyone's hair back this fall with its elementary visual approach. Rudimentary blocks and circles are set to define the figures who'll control your every motion-sensing action in the game. Trailing from a vastness of a two-shaded green golf courses to an abandoned baseball field that'll house the larval human(s) and a stadium background, don't expect to go bragging to your fiends about the graphical awesomeness of Wii Sports. The fact of the matter is, the game isn't shaping up badly, it's just shaping out wrongly if you want to impress.