But... There's a problem. A horrible, game-breaking problem that we very much hope and expect to be resolved before the final version of Banana Blitz ships this October. The jump action can be performed in two different ways. You can use the WiiMote's trigger or just flip the controller's tip upwards.
This doesn't sound like much of a problem, and as you tentatively feel your way into Wii Monkey Ball, it's not. Because you only use the button. You see, Monkey Ball is about balancing. Always has been, always will be, so throwing in a mechanic requiring you to lose your current point of balance in order to hop to another platform level, landing upon which then maintaining balance is of the utmost import, just isn't going to work, especially when there's a better alternative.
But it gets worse. As anyone playing previous Monkey Balls knows, to take the game to anywhere near completion, you must become comfortable with the game, confident in the controls and be able to throw the level around violently at times, delicately at others. The flip-jump means that when you quickly tilt backwards, essential in some parts of the game, you jump accidentally, a complete disaster every time it happens.
Unless everyone at Sega and AV and subsequent QA departments plays the game very differently to everyone at SPOnG and everyone else we've spoken to, we can't imagine this feature to remain in place. It simply can't if the game is to work as it should. SPOnG expects the use of flip-jump to be switchable at the very least...
And that concludes our only gripe with the main game, a gripe we're sure will have evaporated come review time.
So. Minigames. Ah yes, minigames. Delicious, sweet and savoury, life-sapping, playable when drunk (Monkey Ball maingame is one of the games you most certainly cannot play when the brewers in) happy, joyous, gleeful, girl-entertaining minigames. There's a lot in Banana Blitz, a total of 12 in our version.
1. Whack-a-Mole: It's Whack-a-Mole using a WiiMote as a hammer. It's one of those games which feels a bit weird as it's controlled in a '3D box' so to speak. Works well enough though.
2. Ring toss. It's ring toss. Toss rings. Onto poles.
3. Jump rope. A skipping roped rotates around Ai-Ai getting increasingly faster. You flick the controller to make him hop over it.
4. Darts. More 3D box action. Hold the controller as if it were a chubby dart, aim and don't throw. SPOnG was dead impressed with Darts as it was highly accurate and had a lot of options.
5. High-wire Act. Continuing the circus theme, HWA sees you asked to clear an increasingly difficult succession of tightropes, using the controller to move forwards and back and the Nunchuck to balance.
6. Fruit Basket. A descending action puzzler. A variety of fruits are unleashed from the heavens. Simply bounce them into the appropriate basket using the controller to manipulate a trampoline. Simple. A bit rubbish said some. So why couldn't we stop playing?
7. Hammer Throw. Spin the WiiMote as fast as possible. Release. Get score. Try again. A bit rubbish. We stopped playing.
8. Fish Catcher. Living the dream! Spear-fishing from the comfort of your living room. Imagine how it would work. That's exactly how it works.
9. Hovercraft Race. A gem if not the gem of the demo. Use the WiiMote and Nunchuck to power a twin-engined hovercraft. Imagine the motion-sensing apparatus in each unit is a throttle peddle and you're away, a beautiful little racer with massive potential.
10. Flag Panic. Point stick at flags before timer runs out. A bit rubbish.
11. Alien Attack. Very similar to the Hovercraft Race with the added fun of fighting aliens rather than racing.
12. Hurdle Race. Quickly motion up and down on both the Wii-mote and nunchuck to make that little monkey run! A Button jumps, with a time penalty for mistimed efforts.
13. Monkey Baseball. Swing the bat in the playing field afforded by the WiiMote's voodoo magic to hit home runs. Not as precise as we'd like, though it is suspected that there's something we're missing...
Yes. We know. No Monkey Target. Our friends at Sega are keeping quiet as to whether it will be included in the final game, though it will be a terrible oversight if a paper airplane control method were not applied to what was SPOnG's favourite original minigame.
It's also worth noting that much of this bonus content does serve more as Wii tech demo than substantial gaming, though as mentioned, a lot more party and minigames are expected in the final cut.
Super Monkey Ball, a Wii exclusive is likely available at Wii launch. Stay tuned for further news of the game as October and November draw close.
But it gets worse. As anyone playing previous Monkey Balls knows, to take the game to anywhere near completion, you must become comfortable with the game, confident in the controls and be able to throw the level around violently at times, delicately at others. The flip-jump means that when you quickly tilt backwards, essential in some parts of the game, you jump accidentally, a complete disaster every time it happens.
Unless everyone at Sega and AV and subsequent QA departments plays the game very differently to everyone at SPOnG and everyone else we've spoken to, we can't imagine this feature to remain in place. It simply can't if the game is to work as it should. SPOnG expects the use of flip-jump to be switchable at the very least...
And that concludes our only gripe with the main game, a gripe we're sure will have evaporated come review time.
So. Minigames. Ah yes, minigames. Delicious, sweet and savoury, life-sapping, playable when drunk (Monkey Ball maingame is one of the games you most certainly cannot play when the brewers in) happy, joyous, gleeful, girl-entertaining minigames. There's a lot in Banana Blitz, a total of 12 in our version.
1. Whack-a-Mole: It's Whack-a-Mole using a WiiMote as a hammer. It's one of those games which feels a bit weird as it's controlled in a '3D box' so to speak. Works well enough though.
2. Ring toss. It's ring toss. Toss rings. Onto poles.
3. Jump rope. A skipping roped rotates around Ai-Ai getting increasingly faster. You flick the controller to make him hop over it.
4. Darts. More 3D box action. Hold the controller as if it were a chubby dart, aim and don't throw. SPOnG was dead impressed with Darts as it was highly accurate and had a lot of options.
5. High-wire Act. Continuing the circus theme, HWA sees you asked to clear an increasingly difficult succession of tightropes, using the controller to move forwards and back and the Nunchuck to balance.
6. Fruit Basket. A descending action puzzler. A variety of fruits are unleashed from the heavens. Simply bounce them into the appropriate basket using the controller to manipulate a trampoline. Simple. A bit rubbish said some. So why couldn't we stop playing?
7. Hammer Throw. Spin the WiiMote as fast as possible. Release. Get score. Try again. A bit rubbish. We stopped playing.
8. Fish Catcher. Living the dream! Spear-fishing from the comfort of your living room. Imagine how it would work. That's exactly how it works.
9. Hovercraft Race. A gem if not the gem of the demo. Use the WiiMote and Nunchuck to power a twin-engined hovercraft. Imagine the motion-sensing apparatus in each unit is a throttle peddle and you're away, a beautiful little racer with massive potential.
10. Flag Panic. Point stick at flags before timer runs out. A bit rubbish.
11. Alien Attack. Very similar to the Hovercraft Race with the added fun of fighting aliens rather than racing.
12. Hurdle Race. Quickly motion up and down on both the Wii-mote and nunchuck to make that little monkey run! A Button jumps, with a time penalty for mistimed efforts.
13. Monkey Baseball. Swing the bat in the playing field afforded by the WiiMote's voodoo magic to hit home runs. Not as precise as we'd like, though it is suspected that there's something we're missing...
It's also worth noting that much of this bonus content does serve more as Wii tech demo than substantial gaming, though as mentioned, a lot more party and minigames are expected in the final cut.
Super Monkey Ball, a Wii exclusive is likely available at Wii launch. Stay tuned for further news of the game as October and November draw close.
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Comments
theflc 6 Jul 2006 12:27
1/1
What is with the jaggies? I mean come off it, are they just releasing GC1.5 or something? Please give us some AA loving.