This may be overdue, but I felt I needed all the facts before writing this review. No – I did not already beat the game, but we (ptb and I) are close. Overall, the NSMB Wii is awesome. Some great throwbacks to older Nintendo and Super Nintendo gaming.  And seriously – finally some great multiplayer options on a Mario side-scrolling adventure.  And not just two player….up to four players!  Play as Toads!!!  Sorry girls – you cannot play as Peach, you are trying to SAVE Peach.  You can’t save yourself.

MultiPlayer Game
Truly a new challenge in a Mario game.  Not only do you have to make sure you don’t die, you have to coordinate to make sure your partner does not die or worse yet, go so far ahead of you that you get pushed off a ledge and die.  This can be a challenge all on its own.  With four players however, this was kind of humorous.  There are 20 total lives among the four of you.  Really – does it matter if someone dies?

Back to two player.  Player One, you must be Mario.  Player Two, you have the choice of Luigi, Yellow Toad, or Blue Toad.  I personally think the Toads are the cutest, and once the Blue Toad has a propellorhead on, he kind of looks like me.  But alas, I am Player One in our game.  This game mode is a challenge to our marriage.  Coordinating jumps to achieve a common goal however, makes me think we are going to make it  🙂

The maps in the Worlds – AWESOME.  What was it SMB3?  Those maps were my favorite.  Trying to get the best of the map to find warp zones, even better.  In our first hour of playing, we were able to warp to World 5.  After that, we didn’t manage to successfully find a warp until a week later.  And we have played non-stop for the past week….so it has been a lot of time.

The Mushroom Houses – PRIZES!  LOVE!  Enough said.  Starting a level at the halfway point with a Penguin suit….even better!

The Outfits – Yes – A Penguin Suit.  Walking perfectly on ice.  Swimming without tapping ‘2’.  Oh and spitting ice!  It’s like the fireball of Captain Cold.  There is also an Iceman Mario that results from a blue flower.  You can use frozen enemies to attack more enemies, reach higher places, or just to ground pound a nasty enemy you wouldn’t be able to touch otherwise.  The Penguin is really an upgraded Iceman, but the little penguin suit that comes out of the ? block is so cute!  It even waddles!

Lastly – “BUBBLE!!!”  Fall off?  Your buddy is still safe?  Hit ‘A’ and you go into a bubble, shake and go towards your mate, and they can save you.  Both of you desperate?  If everyone bubbles, you exit the level…..and the music slows down to make you feel bad.

I am sure I have left out a TON but moving on…..

Free-For-All
This is pretty awesome.  You can select any level from a world you have beaten, or there is a selection of recommended levels.  The recommended levels can give you a fun sneak peek to worlds you may not have seen.  At first you just think this is going through a single level with no commitment, but don’t help your brother or toad comrade just yet.  You are competing!  WaHoooooo!

Coin Battle
Same as free for all, but there are also some special coin battle levels.  And you are only competing for coin points, not overall points.  This includes the giant star coins.  A little competition never hurt anyone.

Overall
I say this game is super.   We are going to play through it way too fast, but we also have 3 save files.  One that we play together, and one for each of us alone.  With so many things to explore, I am sure we will be playing beyond just trying to get to World 8-Castle.  We like things to be complete.  We are also really excited about the prospect of playing with our friends.  Once everyone gets used to having Nintendo Thumb again, there should be some fun nights.

Final Points

• side-scrolling rules
  
• I <3 Mario
• I look like a Toad wearing a propellor hat
• Way better than Mario Party 8
• Still totally looking forward to Galaxy 2
• When will we have Double Dash style racing again?
• I could talk about this game all day and it wouldn’t resemble anything near a review

Angie and I have spent a bit of time playing the new Wii Sports Resort lately and really have fun with it.  Since Angie’s post, we’ve noticed a lot of searches coming in from people trying to find the “vacation house” or “vacation home.”  We were intrigued since this was something we hadn’t seen in the game, and we don’t normally look up these kinds of things online (unless we’re really stuck).

So when we discovered the location of this mysterious “vacation home,” we figured the least we could do is share the information.  If you don’t want to hear about our Wahu Island getaway, go back to your spreadsheets and other documents now.

Wii Sports Resort has a section called Air Sports that features such games as Skydiving, Dogfight and our personal favorite (today, anyway) Island Flyover.  In the flyover, you can tour all the areas of the island where the other games take place.  It’s really something to see, and a fun bit of programming on the part of the developers.  Aside from sightseeing, you can spend your time shooting balloons out of peoples’ hands or finding points of interest (80 in all) with options of flying during the day, evening or night.  Once you’ve found all the points of  interest, you’ll be rewarded with your own Wahu Island dwelling.  The house is located on the private island where the information block happens to point out that “a house here would have an amazing view.”  For the completist, the fun doesn’t end there, as you’ll also be rewarded for shooting all white balloons (held by the island’s Miis) and finding every point of interest during all three day parts.

Good luck finding your own island paradise!  Don’t forget to write.

Those little Miis are back!  And they’re just as adorable as ever in Wii Sports Resort.  This time you get to see your Nintendo-ified self in vacation gear as part of 12 sports with sub-games featured for each (the full list of sports is below).

Wii Sports Resort is one of the Wii games featuring/requiring the new Wii MotionPlus technology (Tiger Woods is another notable).  While the idea is neat, it can be incredibly frustrating when the sensor won’t calibrate between games and it’s clearly been losing its signal at times.  Another downside is that the accessory costs $20 separately, although one is included with the game for $50 (a far cry from the Wii Play bundled with the Wii Remote, but this is a far superior game).  You still need to spend the money on a second one if you want to take advantage of most of the multiplayer games.

At first the game didn’t seem as physically intense (we play for keeps) as Wii Sports, but after two nights I’m pretty sore.  Pete and I both really like the 3-point Shoot Out in Basketball and Archery, but we’ve easily spent the most time on the Swordplay game Speed Slice and Wakeboarding.  We also took a few Cycling tours around the island.  Much like a real bike ride around a volcanic island, it’s exhausting.

I do not like any of the Frisbee® games or the Aerial Dog Fight (much as she hated the Super Monkey Ball version, Monkey Dog Fight).  I really just hate them because I’m terrible at them (but my feelings may change once my shoulder recovers).  I think this may have lead to Pete enjoying them more.  I did enjoy the Swordplay Duel even though I did not perform well.  This has also not diminished my desire to be a contestant on American Gladiators.

The Bowling is essentially the same as the Wii Sports version, and I imagine the Golf is too.  A one-hundred pin, 10-frame game has been added though so it’s not a total rehash.  The Archery and Table Tennis have been pulled from Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games, but the Wii MotionPlus adds a new element to the gameplay making it a bit more fun and challenging.

The box has a disclaimer regarding the ratings for online interactions, but it’s unclear if there’s an online component to the game from what we’ve played.  The game compels me to enjoy a cocktail while playing Table Tennis and I want our next vacation to be somewhere we can learn to Wakeboard.

Wii Sports Resort features:

Swordplay
Wake Boarding
Frisbee®
Archery
Basketball
Table Tennis
Golf
Bowling
Power Cruising (wave runner)
Canoeing
Cycling
Air Sports (aerial combat!)

While I’m thrilled to see this, I am genuinely shocked by the availability of a trio of Ministry songs for play in Rock Band 2.  Three relatively recent tracks: Lies Lies Lies, The Great Satan, and Cuz U R Next from the Rio Grande Blood album and the Wicked Lake Soundtrack respectively, are available from the Rock Band store today for the XBox360 and May 28th for the Playstation 3.  I’m really looking forward to pretending to play these songs.

Angie and I picked up the revamped PunchOut!! for Wii on Tuesday, and I’ve finally had an opportunity to try it out.  It’s fun, but after playing the Wii Sports Boxing for so long I think the controls leave a lot to be desired.  Punches require button presses, and there’s a turn based component to the timing that I don’t care for.  Granted, this makes the gameplay more like the original, but it seems like a real limitation to me. One extra that might help keep my interest is the fact that the Wii Fit balance board can be added to the mix for dodging and ducking (as well as dipping, diving and dodging).  This has proven very difficult to effectively utilize so far, but that has everything to do with my ineptness.

I’m sure I’ll be saying “sayonara” to Piston Hondo soon enough.  That’s Japanese for goodbye.