Games for Lunch: We Ski
In a nutshell: On balance, a decent skiing game.
10/3/2008 6:02 PM | 0 Comments | Page 1 of 3
Developer: Namco Bandai
Publisher: Namco Bandai
Release Date: May 13, 2008
System: Wii
ESRB Rating: E
Official Web site
0:00 I picked this one up mainly to see if it could improve on the overly touchy performance of the "Slalom" mini-game in
Wii Fit. I'm hopeful that it can ... after all, Namco's
Alpine Racer arcade series is one of my all-time favorites.
0:05 This first five minutes spent getting my Wii Balance Board out of its box, inserting the batteries, and struggling to get it synced to my system. My
Wii Fit regimen has, er, lapsed a little bit.
0:09 The game requires 81 blocks of space for save data? What is it using all that space for? Anyway, this means I have to copy
Strong Bad to my SD card and delete it, which takes a surprisingly long time.
0:10 Finally ready to go. A snowy title screen comes in with some winter bells and a children's chorus screaming "WE SKI!"
0:11 "Lean your body to the left and right to turn." Doesn't get much simpler than that.
0:12 The menu background music is a bit too wacky for me. It's like a kids' version of Phillip Glass.
0:13 Ski School says it covers the Wii remote/Nunchuk-based controls, which I guess means Balance Board users don't need it? I'll just go straight in to Ski Race. Here's hoping it's as simple as it seems.
0:14 The game asks me to plug in the Nunchuk, even though I'll be using the Balance Board. Hmmm...
0:16 Wow ... that was almost stupidly simple. Just leaning slightly on a mostly straight course. It's very slow-paced -- I have trouble speeding up or slowing down independent of the mountain hills. The laning c ontrols seem responsive enough, though, and less touchy than those in
Wii Fit. Only one racing opponent? Kind of dull so far...
0:18 Level 2 is a little more interesting, with a few gently sloping curves, but for the most part it's about simply staying straight to keep my speed up. Bleh.
0:21 Jumping ahead to Racing Level 10 (of 20). This one's much more exciting, with some tight turns that require real steep leaning. I lose all my speed on a small uphill section, though, and I'm seemingly powerless to fix it. I finish a few seconds back from my opponent. Let's try that again...
0:24 A stroke of inspiration! When I see my opponent using his ski poles to accelerate, I instinctively swing my arms to do the same. Surprisingly, my on-screen character reacts, pushing forward with a small burst of speed. Now I understand why I was going so slowly. The revelation comes too late to help me in this race, but I'll do better next time...
0:27 I'm finally able to catch up and pass my opponent, thanks mostly to constant ski pole pushing in the back stretch. This is getting tiring! The constant pushing isn't really fun, either...
0:28 The ski pole revelation/fiasco has convinced me to go back to Ski School, to see what else I might be missing.
0:31 So far it's only telling me what I already know ... how to turn and how to use the ski poles to "skate." At least the tutorial moves quickly.
