 Review By: Siou Choy |
Developer: | Namco Bandai |
| Publisher: | Namco Bandai | |
| Genre: | Extreme Sports | |
| ESRB: | Everyone | |
| # Of Players: | 1 | |
| Online Play: | No | |
| Accessories: | Wii Balance Board, Nunchuk, Mii | |
| Buy Now: |   |
Shocking opener of the century: We Ski & Snowboarding represents Namco’s latest entry in the We Ski series (no, really?), and as the title suggests, this time around you can snowboard as well.
Yes, folks, you know there’s just not much to say when ye author has to resort to such a pathetic, clichéd and intrinsically redundant opening line as that. Nevertheless, here we go – everybody set? Make sure you have your Wii Fit Balance Board in hand…ready? Geronimo!
We Ski & Snowboarding puts the gamer in the role of a casual skier or snowboarder at a resort. You can choose which trails to tackle or just explore the resort and mountain on your own. There are various people scattered around the locale who may ask small favors of you, Animal Crossing style (note to all prospective developers: please, please stop utilizing motifs from that game. Was it really that damn good, that every game with the slightest inclination towards RPG, freeform or no, pastoral in inclination or no, finds it necessary to swipe from this one particular game engine and/or paradigm? Enough already!!!!!). By completing these tasks you can earn items and sundries such as new clothing. Unfortunately, what you don’t earn or unlock are anything practical - no new trails or anything of any true significance whatsoever. It seems like developers en masse have developed a creative block in regards to what to reward gamers with upon successful completion of a given mission – the new norm appears to be “give ‘em a new outfit and/or accessories!” Apologies for the rant, but this is just lazy and doesn’t motivate gamers to take on these tasks in any way, shape or form. Do I really give a damn about doing some lame errand just so I can get a different color jacket? Uh, sorry, but no.
There’s really no point to We Ski & Snowboarding without making use of the Balance Board, which acts as your skis or snowboard. You do get some approximation of skiing here, since you will have to lean and shift your weight to complete various courses. Naturally, to snowboard, the balance board must be turned perpendicular to the TV while skiing requires the balance board to be parallel. The Wii Remote and Nunchuk act as ski poles, which strangely also get used when snowboarding, as they couldn’t come up with a better way to move around prior to actually hitting a slope.
One of the main problems with the control design is how when you bend down and then quickly raise yourself to a standing position, rather than interpreting this as a ski jump (as with the better designed Wii Fit skiing mini-games), We Ski & Snowboarding’s game engine gets the impression that you’ve jumped off the board, causing the action to pause. This unexpected (and quite ridiculous) interruption in gameplay can really throw you off in races or in mid-execution of moves. This is particularly notable when traversing chasms in mountain runs, as you’re effectively forced into virtual “death”, with a loss of control when needed most and when every second counts. Similarly, the ski pole simulation isn’t very well designed, as I found myself flapping my arms wildly, the cord between the two remotes flailing madly while my onscreen avatar…walked or trudged slowly. Umm…yeah. Great job, there.
Playing We Ski & Snowboarding with friends, as claimed possible on the packaging, could pose a bit of a problem as well, since the game doesn’t allow everyone to have their own balance board. The end result is that everyone has to fight over who gets to use the balance board vs. who gets stuck with the junk, i.e. using the Wii Remote and Nunchuk. Yeah, those friends will be sure to come back and say, hey, let’s pull out the We Ski & Snowboarding again! That was fun!
One plus about the game, as with most or all Wii software, is that you are able to import your Mii for a more personal touch. The caveat here (you knew there had to be one, seeing how this has been going thus far) is that the game doesn’t allow headgear such as hats or goggles to be worn when choosing the Mii option. Would it have been that tough to let you accessorize a bit?
Bottom Line:
Gamers who always wanted to try skiing or snowboarding but didn’t want to risk broken limbs might want to give We Ski & Snowboarding a try. For all its myriad faults, particularly in comparison with the related but superior Wii Fit skiing mini-games, the game does provide a fair approximation of actual (if basic) skiing (and presumably snowboarding as well). The real problem here, beyond faults in the basic game engine and design, is that there are no real set goals in the game whatsoever. While it seemed refreshing a few years back to be allowed some degree of latitude outside of a hard and fast, predetermined storyline and actions, the pendulum appears to have swung in the opposite direction, to nobody’s benefit. A few definite goals and associated rewards or unlockables would have been most welcome, just for a sense of accomplishment, if nothing else. If there’s no real point, nothing is truly achieved, and everything becomes a meandering waste of time.
Existential philosophizing aside, this makes for a very sorry game design, and as usual, the blame seems to fall fairly square on the shoulders of Animal Crossing and its incomprehensibly pervasive influence over the entire world of gaming since its initial release (yes, you could bring up similarly freeform, ostensibly “goalless” games as Fable or Harvest Moon as well, but both, at least in their first incarnations, were very good games and their influence and relation to the sort of nonsense and failings being discussed herein seems spurious at best, and falls apart under any thoughtful analysis). It should say something to even the most casual reader that the skiing modules in Wii Fit were far more entertaining and well designed than an entire game built around the same motif. While passable in some respects, that alone justifies the game’s well deserved low marks.
| Pros: | Cons: | Final Score: |
|---|---|---|
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| 6.0 |
Posted: 2009-11-10 17:42:29 PST