Wii Titles: Staff Picks

Our staff picks of five Wii titles.

The Wii has just been released in the States, and very soon it’ll be landing on these shores. But what titles are you going to be picking up when it’s launched on December 7? If you’re not careful, you could find yourself unable to decide as you purchase the console, and from there it’s a slippery slope down to alcoholism, drug abuse, and complete insanity.

Sounds pretty grim, eh? But fear not – we here at NZGamer have randomly picked chosen with great care five titles that are worth looking into when the Wii is released.

1) Zelda: Twilight Princess

We’ll get the obvious one out of the way first. Twilight Princess has been getting stellar reviews overseas, and looks to definitely be worth your while if you consider yourself a gamer. With 70+ hours of content, and Wii controls that don’t suck, you’d be a fool to pass up on this one.

The game essentially builds on the gameplay found in Ocarina of Time for the N64 and Wind Waker for the GameCube, as well as adding in a bunch of new features. Once again, Link must save the world of Hyrule from an evil force – only this time, the world is being overrun by the Twilight realm. When Link enters these areas, he is turned into a wolf, and gains a bunch of new abilities that should keep things fresh.

2) Rayman Raving Rabbids

Rayman, who traditionally stars in platform games, has switched genre in Raving Rabbids, offering up over 70 mini-games that all use the Wiimote, either alone or in conjunction with the Nunchuck attachment. In this game, Rayman has been captured by a horde of dimwitted (and pretty hilarious) rabbits, who force him to undergo a series of challenges. While the story won’t win any awards, it’s always nice to have something that holds together an otherwise disparate collection of mini-games.

While we’ll no doubt be seeing far too many mini-game collections appear for the Wii, it’s encouraging to see how much effort has obviously gone into this one. Some of the games look really fun, and based on early reviews, we can’t wait to get our hands on Rayman Raving Rabbids this December.

3) Trauma Center: Second Opinion

Trauma Center: Second Opinion is a remake of a surprisingly fun DS game that was released last year. You play as a young doctor who must perform all manner of surgery on patients. The Wiimote is used as whatever tool you currently have selected to cut people open, and you must carefully balance care and precision with an ever decreasing time limit.

We’re looking forward to this one because it highlights what the Wii is all about – namely, providing new forms of gameplay over flashy graphics. This, coupled with what appears to be a surprisingly engaging storyline, is what makes this game worth checking out.

4) Red Steel

Red Steel has to be the second-most hyped game coming out for the Wii. Unfortunately, unlike Zelda, early reviews have indicated that this first-person shooter set in modern Japan completely fails to live up to the hype. This is a shame, as it has been touted as the game to illustrate how the Wii can do first person shooters.

Still, reactions have been mixed, with some people speaking out against the reviews, so it could still be worth taking a look at it – but maybe try to take a peak before buying this game.

5) Madden 07

A memo sent to me from NZG head mouse Aaron Scott read something like this: “If you don’t include Madden on your list, you’re fired.”

So, here we go: Madden on the Wii is looking like one of the freshest versions of the franchise to come out for some time. The control system is obviously the biggest change to other versions; it makes full use of the motion sensing abilities of the Wiimote and Nunchuck, meaning to pass you just need to jerk the controller in the direction you want the ball to go. Among other such intuitive controls, when you score a touchdown, you can punch the controller repeatedly into the air and watch as your jubilant onscreen character does the same thing. Good times.