Wii Sports Resort: Welcome To The Next 50,000 Hours of Your Life

At first glance, Wii Sports Resort (like it’s Wii Sports predecessor) just seems like a fun-enough little game, a decent enough distraction intended for the kiddies.  “Oh, hey, you can play table tennis?  How nice.”  And then you look up and four hours have passed and you’ve missed graduation.  Beware, novices and hard-core gamers alike:  this game is ludicrously fun and addictive, and if you find yourself lying awake at night thinking about new archery techniques you can at least take solace in the fact that you are not alone.

The source of the fun is the utilization of the new Wii Motion Plus accessory (already making waves on Grand Slam Tennis and Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10).  Basically, the already intuitive Wii controller has received a 360 degree upgrade, now responding to a full range of motion control.  That friend of yours that went on and on about how he’d be knocking down strikes all the time in Wii Bowling if only they let him put spin on the ball?  Well now they do, so let’s roll, Lebowski.

The Resort, set on the adorably picturesque Wuhu Island, features 12 games with different variations and challenges throughout (air sports includes skydiving, dogfighting and a flyover of the island; basketball can be three-point shooting or a pick-up game).  Games with four-player functionality pretty much dare you not to crumble into hysterical fits with your friends while you all try to row a canoe together. With the new fun comes new frustrations, however, as more realistic controls also allow for more realistic ways to screw up and, say, over-compensate the top-spin in a game of table tennis.  But learning this aspect is just part of the fun.

The only real issue, which remains from the initial release, is the cutesy graphics falling short of contemporary games, but this is really a minor quibble.  Your swordfighting opponent may look precious, but once the cruel blows start raining down on you there really isn’t much time to gripe about the lack of verisimillitude.  Just move all the breakables out of the way and keep swinging and giggling until the sun comes up. Again.

Wii Sports Resort officially drops July 26, 2009 and will be bundled with the Wii Motion Plus Accesory.