FuzzyCo

I've finished the story mode on Shaun White Snowboarding: Road Trip (which is what lets me add it to the list here) but I'm still playing back through the levels trying to finish every single challenge because it's just that fun. I've never played any of the Shaun White games before, but the basic game play is familiar from any number of Tony Hawk or similar "extreme sports" games—string together tricks to unlock new courses and characters with varying abilities. What makes it so fun is that I'm playing on the Wii and using the balance board as the controller—there's an incredibly visceral feeling to leaning forward to go faster down a hill or wildly hopping trying to get over an obstacle. There could be a few more songs in the in-game jukebox, but that's a quibble.

FuzzyCo grade: A

Far Cry: Vengeance has a certain "let's rush out a game to get it on the new platform" feel about it -- the main character has these "feral" powers that are never really explained, and is he supposed to know this Semeru guy? Anyway, whatever. The real question here is, how are First Person Shooters on the Wii? And based on this one, I think the answer is going to be "pretty good". I'm a FPS fan from way back, and having been raised on mouse-and-keyboard controls, I was never really able to make the leap to the less-accurate controllers of console FPSs. But the Wiimote feels very natural to point around the screen and KAPOW. And hey, this game is cheap. (And I've got a copy if you want to borrow it.)

Rayman Raving Rabbids is an engaging series of mini-games that utilize the innovative Wii controls in a variety of ways. The design and style of the game is delightful, with the grotesque "Rabbids" filling all sorts of roles, along with pigs, cows, and sheep. There's a slight, but reasonably satisfying framing device that ties all the mini-games together, and it ends with one of the most unsatisfying and frustrating FMVs I've ever experienced in a video game. It's all "our princess is in another castle" with no "just kidding". Seriously, after Erica and I had had a great time playing through the entire game (the story mode is single player, but we'd switch off playing the games and cheering each other on) and having a great time, I wanted to throw a controller out in the window in frustration at that ending. Jerks.

FuzzyCo grade: A- (and the minus is solely from the ending.)

Wii Play has just 9 mini-games and it's a good thing that it comes with a free Wiimote, because you'd be really mad if you'd spent $50 and only got this wafer-thin hint of a game. As it is, you're really getting the second Wiimote you need anyway and getting the game for $10 -- which still might be a bit much. Though Erica did get lost in the Mii-matching/finding game (38 levels is her current record).

You're never going to buy Wii Sports, because it comes with every Wii. Bowling, Tennis, and Golf are pretty fun, but it might be nice if there was more to Baseball than pitching and hitting and I've never met anyone who could actually control Boxing -- everyone just flails around and whoever flails the most wins.

A friend of mine wrote a review of the new Bust-A-Move Bash! for the Nintendo Wii and emailed it out to a few of us. For a variety of reasons, he doesn't want his name attached to it, but I think it's a great review and I wanted to share it. Also, there's tons of swearing in the review, so it's after the jump...

If you'd like to be our Wii friend, we're 7826-9314-1734-1853. Which is to say, we got a Wii!

It's just two grown men playing Wii Boxing, at our company holiday party, and looking as ridiculous as one does. (Sorry, Jason and Kyle -- I'm not making fun, I'm just making. fun.)

Nearly everyone who stopped by asked if we'd seen that site with the pictures of TVs broken by accidentally thrown Wiimotes. And I can attest that within the first 2 minutes I had one in my hand I knocked the coffee out of someone's hands who was standing too close. But despite the danger, I want one of these things as soon as I have a spare $250.