Wii Warm Up: Mario & Sonic at the thing that is happening right now
by JC Fletcher 
{ Aug 11th 2008 at 8:00AM }
Are you developing a sudden craving for mascot sports due to the rush of Olympic fever? Has the worldwide mania for athletic competition made you consider buying a game about big-headed animal-things and human caricatures taking part in simulated competition? If you already had Mario & Sonic, have you broken it out since the for-real Games started?
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
iMeh @ Aug 11th 2008 8:27AM
I have an urge to WIN A FREE COPY of this game. :) Why aren't y'all giving this gamea away?
Synch @ Aug 11th 2008 8:35AM
Never bothered to play it because I'm not into buying a mini-game. It's fine if you want to have Mario and Sonic duke it out on a floor mat or a soccer field, but I'll take the other road...it's a bit Brawlier. ;)
Ray Ray @ Aug 11th 2008 8:37AM
I tried playing it when it first came out and the games a little slow, so I haven't played it since. I do have SOME interest in playing the game again, but I'm really turned off by how slow the game is.
samfish @ Aug 11th 2008 9:14AM
Hell no, this game sucks!
Hamster @ Aug 11th 2008 9:32AM
I played it at my cousin's house last Christmas and really didn't enjoy it. Another shallow, gimmicky party-game, as if the Wii needed any more. It wouldn't be so bad if there wasn't so much gratuitous waggle, in fact it would probably be great fun, but unfortunately most of the controls just involve furiously waggling, which is both incredibly tiresome and irritating. Swimming, for example, was probably the worst, having to frantically waggle both the remote and nunchuk solidly for a number of minutes was probably the least fun I've ever had with a game. I actually stopped half way through the race because my soul had died. I kind of felt embarrassed for gaming, I wanted to go around to all the non-gamers in the room and tell them that "there's better than this, honest". Also, some of the controls for the events are surprisingly fiddly, which is odd for a game that aims squarely for the lowest common denominator. This game gave me a bit of an unfortunate realisation about the Wii and the party-game epidemic; people were laughing, which could be mistaken for "having fun", but really they were only laughing because it's so ridiculous, not because they actually think it's a great game. It seemed that developers were mistaking "fun" with "silliness", which is a real shame.
Also, on a side note, you have to feel a bit sorry for Sonic, as cool a character as he is, his supporting cast just can't match up to Mario's, so while Nintendo have more than enough popular and world-famous characters to fill their side of the roster, SEGA have to include the likes of Vector the Crocodile....
Luckily, later on in the day my cousin put in Super Mario Galaxy, so at least the non-gamers got to see a genuinely great game.
PS. It will be interesting to see how well Mario & Sonic sells once The Olympic Games have been and gone and are but a distant memory.
PPS. Speaking of The Olympics, does anyone else feel that when The Olympics are coming you're like "Ooh, The Olympics!!!" and then you're watching show-jumping, badminton and javelin on TV and you're like "Oh yeah, The Olympics......."
Mr Khan @ Aug 11th 2008 12:17PM
On your last note, i agree with you. International relations is my greatest interest outside of games (and my leading academic interest entirely), so i naturally feel a little excited going in
But, really, between the fact that NBC follows the US athletes for the most part, and the fact that few of the olympic sports are good spectator sports (Basketball, the Marathon, table-tennis, Beach Volleyball, Judo, and boxing being the few exceptions), make for quite a boring affair
SoshiKitai @ Aug 11th 2008 10:03AM
Er...... I liked it. It's a fun party game. :P I still play it when company is over. One of the few Wii games that can get everyone dead-tired before trying another game.
Joie @ Aug 11th 2008 10:19AM
you know, when I see this game on the shelves I think what a lot of others think: "oh great, another crappy mini-game collection that drags my favorite game heroes' reputations through the mud."
BUT....
Olympic Fever has been in full swing..... I would never buy this game, but the thought HAS popped into my head a few times this past weekend.... so good question to start this article!
Russ Carroll @ Aug 11th 2008 12:09PM
I've been watching and enjoying the Olympics a ton myself and have been looking for an Olympic game to play. I rented Sonic & Mario for about a month from GameFly when it first came out. Hated parts of it, loved parts of it, certainly it has the atmosphere right.
Actually, I've been thinking of picking up World Sport Competition on the Virtual Console. I have the game on my TG-16 and that game, and it's alright. It's a servicable 5-player Olympic-like game set-up much more like the Olmpics (multiple days of events leading to a ceremony) than Mario and Sonic (single events or 4 events). Certainly something to check out if you are in the mood for Olympic-like gaming...and it's $6, which makes it not much more than renting a game.
Honestly I think Nintendo made a mistake by not holding onto the game and releasing it now, I'm sure everyone has forgotten all about it...
Youtube video of gameplay: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N223D0TJtS4
(I'd just play it on the Turbo...but I can't live without wireless controllers anymore ;)
Mr Khan @ Aug 11th 2008 12:18PM
I'm a sucker for crossovers, but not for party games, so i passed on this long ago, but i've looked back on that decision a few times. If only because its a crossover
Peter @ Aug 11th 2008 1:34PM
I completely forgot this game existed.
I rented this game last year, then, when I discovered that it uses locked save files and featured only gimmicky mini-games, barely played it for the remainder of the five-day rental.
I'm not anti-mini-game in the least; I've recently been enjoying Rhythm Tengoku Gold. I'm not even anti-flailing; I enjoyed the running mini-game in Rayman: Raving Rabbids. Good for the heart.
But Mario & Sonic at the Olympics just felt like a highly-polished medicore rehash of a game we'd seen a thousand times before.
Nigeria @ Aug 11th 2008 1:46PM
It's okay, I suppose. I didn't buy it, though, I did have fun with the game, I think. I don't know, it didn't really leave a distinct impression on me. It would have been grander, if that's the right word to use, if the first collaboration between these two characters was a straight up platformer.
And as for the Olympics itself, I hope this nationalist pissing contest atrophies on whatever steroid they're now secretly using leaving the event even less relevant than it is today.
Also: Nigeria 2: Japan 1. Bring on the USA!
zchry @ Aug 11th 2008 5:55PM
Have you noticed that all of the gymnasts look like twelve year old girls, yet they have bigger thighs than most grown men?
zchry @ Aug 11th 2008 5:50PM
I enjoy this game in a group. By myself, I have no interest at all. I'd rather play Zack & Wiki (I'm totally on the blog/review site's bandwagon on that one--it's amazing) or Super Paper Mario.
I own this game, but even at parties it gets overshadowed by Guitar Hero III (or Aerosmith) and even Wii Sports.