Wii Sports Resort Review

Playing with friends is advised

Lots of people will be looking to Table Tennis as a direct replacement for Wii Sports Tennis, but it doesn't quite live up to its predecessor. The controls are certainly tighter, but the core game doesn’t have the excitement of a full game of tennis. It's good fun, especially against a friend, but a MotionPlus version of lawn tennis would have been preferable. And that brings us to the two games returning from the original: Golf and Bowling. Golf feels much improved with MotionPlus, eclipsing the hit and miss controls found in the original by some way, but Bowling doesn't feel all that different. The biggest change is the new 100 pin challenge, which puts 100 pins on the lane instead of the usual 10.

It's a nod to Nintendo classic Wave Race next, with Power Cruising seeing you zooming around on a jet ski. The controls take some getting used to here, with the Wii Remote and Nunchuck needing to be held as if they were handlebars, the bike steering left and right as you spin the virtual bar. It works, and there's an easy to use boost system in place, but it doesn't feel nearly exciting enough. Canoeing might sound duller, but the combination of a fun control scheme (imagine holding the Wii Remote vertically with both hands as if it were a paddle) and a good physical workout make it one of the most enjoyable games in the whole package.

If Canoeing gets the heart going, Cycling will get you sweating. With a Wii Remote in one hand and a Nunchuck in the other the two become pedals and your hands become feet. By alternately moving each up then down you pedal your virtual bike, with the faster the action the quicker your guy will pedal. You have a stamina meter to worry about, so it's important to pace yourself over the course of each race, take rests to recharge and slipstream where possible to save energy, then power it at full pelt over the finishing straight. The courses are pretty long and take you all around the island, making this a game that could easily have appeared in WiiFit.

Finally there's a collection of games designed around being in the air. Skydiving sees you performing tricks with other sky divers, using the Wii Remote to spin and dive. It's pretty simple stuff, but a nice way to spend a few minutes. The games that see you piloting a plane are more fun, but Island Flyover is essentially a treasure hunt (you need to find all the points of interest on the map), and Dog Fight isn't playable alone. The flight controls work well (hold the Remote as if you were holding a toy plane), but none of the air mini-games have much of a competitive edge to them.

Some of the games really show off MotionPlus

As with the games in Wii Sports, you'll rank up (or down) after each game, and your AI opponent will put up a challenge designed to compete against that skill level. Initially you'll face a string of easy challengers, but soon enough you'll have to work hard for victory in all the game modes. There's still no online functionality at all, which is a shame, but the social nature of the game means it's not missed too much.

There's plenty here to do alone, but as with the original Wii Sports, Resort is far better when played with a friend. The games generally take a bit more working out than those included in the console pack-in, so Nintendo's latest isn't quite as pick up and play friendly, but it shouldn't take much to get gran and granddad up to speed. All in all there's plenty here to keep gamers happy, the MotionPlus support is extremely good and the game is packed full with the usual Nintendo charm. We're not sure if it'll have the same impact as the original, but it's more or less a dead cert that many Wiis will be coming out of the cupboard for this one.