Wii Fit Plus (Hands-On) (Wii) Preview

Adam Riley, Senior Editor:

The original Wii Fit had the fun Tight Rope mode that had players walking on the Balance Board to make their Mii tentatively wander along a rope. To add variety if your knees were bent and then straightened swiftly it made the Mii jump to avoid upcoming obstacles. Now Nintendo has taken that mode, revamped it to look something like a scene out of the Super Mario world, and turned it into Obstacle Course. Therefore, the same mechanic as before has now been transplanted into Wii Fit Plus with gentle walking on the spot making your Mii edge further into a stage, then the jumping technique required to cross gaps. A quicker pace is required to make your Mii start trotting along in order to dodge what appear to be large cannonballs attached to string that swing backwards and forwards across each stage.

For those that enjoyed walking the tight rope in the first game, this will definitely prove to be extremely pleasing. The vastly increased difficulty definitely helps to make the experience more enjoyable as well. Certainly one to watch?

Metroid Prime 3: Corruption showed that the Wii motion controls work superbly well in the First-Person shooter format and Snowball Fight takes one aspect of that, strafing, and builds upon it. In fact it could also be likened to shooting sections of Disaster: Day of Crisis, where Ray Bryce must duck behind objects for safety and then pop his head out every now-and-then to blast away at the enemies raining fire down upon his location. Ditching the brutal nature of killing people, Nintendo has done what Hudson did with Water Warfare on WiiWare in changing the setting to something more family-friendly: chucking snowballs at people.

Your Mii character hides behind cover until players lean left or right on the Balance Board, at which point they pop their head out in the appropriate direction, ready to launch their snowballs. This is where the Wii Remote pointer controls come into play, as whilst repeatedly popping your head out and then ducking for cover to avoid incoming fire, users move the on-screen cursor by simply pointing and shooting to knock other Mii characters over with their own balls of fury. Rather than just having one-hit knockouts, though, bowling little old Grannies over at times, there are also Mii characters covered in snow that require more than one whack, which adds a slight bit more challenge. It will be interesting to see if this mode is expanded upon more in the final game as it has stacks of potential.

For anyone that thinks they are good at co-ordinating their movements, Tilt City is the perfect test. When the stage loads up there are three different coloured pipes at the bottom of the screen, with two tilting platforms slightly above and another one at the top. Once a level commences, ball of varying colour start to roll from the top-right, across left and then fall downwards. The aim is to use the Wii Remote on its side to tilt the first platform in the appropriate direction to keep the coloured ball heading towards the corresponding pipe. Once that challenge is out of the way it comes down to a matter of tilting left or right to control the lower two platforms to help the ball reach the desired location.

At first it seems like a complete walk in the park, with one ball slowly dropping down, giving plenty of time to move the Wii Remote, then lean either way. However, when more than one colour is rolling along one-after-the-other and players are forced to quickly flip the Wii Remote around as well as sorting out the way they are leaning, all sorts of fun ensues.

Karn Bianco, Previews Editor:

Segway Circuit places you on one of the titular, Dean Kamen-invented personal transport vehicles and tasks you with channelling your inner Gob as work your way round a beach location, popping balloons and avoiding moles that pop up along the way. Steering is accomplished by holding the Wii Remote on its side and turning it while leaning from side to side on the Wii Balance Board, and acceleration is controlled by the degree to which you are leaning forward. The results are extremely responsive and plenty enjoyable to boot. Some additional modes, obstacles, and goals would be more than welcome to keep the game's final version from losing its appeal too quickly, though.

Mike Mason, Reviews Editor:

Cycling fills the role that jogging did in the original Wii Fit; it's the calorie burner of the piece. You've got to stand on the Balance Board and 'pedal' while steering with the controller. You don't quite get the pedalling thing going down by standing on a plastic board, though, so it basically equates to being jogging with the addition of direction. The aim is to collect flags in the quickest time possible, and it took me four minutes or so to find them all. It's knackering.

The stand out for me was Rhythm Parade. You take on the mantle of a marching band leader, marching in time to the beat and moving your nunchuk or remote skyward when prompted. It comes off being a bit like the music stages from Rayman Raving Rabbids only with added stomping, and the better you do the more people will join your band. The sound was quite difficult to hear, so unfortunately I can't tell you whether or not it adds extra layers to the music as you gain more followers in a similar way to Space Channel 5...

Rhythm Kung-Fu is what happens when you mix up yoga and the original title's boxing and stepping sections. You imitate the other would-be martial artists, making sure to keep in time, copying their punches and stances. It was pretty fun, but there was difficulty getting it to register some of the punches. Putting the base of your foot to your other leg, though, was no issue at all.

James Temperton, Features Editor:

Maths, yay! Bums, yay! Wii Fit, yay! Good fun stuff from Nintendo here. 10 Plus places you in the middle of four big balls, one in-front of you, one behind, one to your left and one to your right. The challenge is simple, thrust, wiggle and poke your bum out in order to make the numbers add up to ten. Each ball has a number on it, work out the maths and wiggle and thrust your way to make ten. So if you're faced with a 6, 2, 3 and 4 you want the hit the 6 and the 4. Geddit? Hopefully...

It certainly is good fun and is a great way to laugh at people who go over the top with their thrusting and wiggling. Admittedly it lacks any lasting appeal, after all, how much fun can you have adding numbers up to ten with your arse? Indeed. Still, this is a nice little offering that highlights once again that 'exercising' can be really good fun.

Everyone likes pretending to be a giant chicken, no? Well, even if you don't, this mini-game offering in Wii Fit Plus is great fun. Bird's Eye Bulls Eye, like most the other mini-games, has a very simple premise. You = chicken, aim = flap and land on targets to get points. Whilst a lot of people playing this game seem to think that furiously flapping is the key to success, it is actually a lot easier to glide along (like a real bird) with slow and forceful flaps of your 'wings'. To land on a target simply slow down as you come towards it and shorten your flaps to manoeuvre your chicken-ey self to the ground. After a while, the targets have different values depending on how you land (like an archery target, hence the 'bulls eye' in the name), landing on the highest points is more tricky so expert flapping is required. All in all, one of the strongest and quirkiest offerings on show.