Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games :: Wii Game Review

Courtesy of SEGA

As Vancouver gears up to host the 2010 Olympic Winter Games, you can get a head start on the excitement with [KWLINK 20156]Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games[/KWLINK]. Play as your favourite heroes and villains from both the worlds of Mario and Sonic in all the popular events and some special ones too!

Dream and Believe

The latest Mario & Sonic game does well to represent the variety of events featured during the Winter Olympics. Almost everything is here, including: downhill skiing, ski jumping, luge, bobsled, snowboarding, hockey, speed skating, figure skating, and curling. There are even some non Olympic games, like the very fun Snowball fight event.

Additionally, you can earn Star Points and Badges to unlock Dream events, where you can play the Olympic sports in Mario and Sonic-esque worlds with zero gravity or special power ups.

Balance board controls are great and you will be able to use it in different ways, such as lying down on it for the luge. The Wiimote controls, however, can be inaccurate and unreliable at times, as the game does not take advantage of the Wii Motion Plus accessory.

Cold or Gold?

Mario & Sonic has good graphics and is a great party game for family and friends. A lot of the good stuff is unlocked right at the start, so you can play the game right out of the box and unlock the Dream Events as you go.

There is no online mode, however, and some of the games are very boring, like figure skating, where you only have to follow the on screen instructions. Also, just like with the first Mario & Sonic game, it does not quite make that much sense that Mario can be as fast as Sonic. In the end still, as far as a mini-game collections go, it's Mario & Sonic! And it's great.

Rating: