Rank Up! - New Play Control!

Smell that in the air? No, it's not delicious body odor, it's the scent of a new Rank Up! in the air! Exactly one week ago I posted my review of the New Play Control! version of Pikmin 2. This version had all-new Wii-based controls and received a 9.0 out of 10. Since all of the NPC releases have been... uh... released (save for Chibi Robo, which is a JPN exclusive), now is the perfect time to strike while the iron is hot and rank this series of GameCube ports from least impressive to most impressive. But before we can engage in this activity, we must see what games will be ranked:

New Play Control! Pikmin (Wii)
New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis (Wii)
New Play Control! Donkey Kong Jungle Beat (Wii)
Metroid Prime (Wii)
Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (Wii)
Pikmin 2 (Wii)

The New Play Control! line of games was originally designed as a twofold proposition: 1) To hark back some classics from the GameCube library and retrofit them with enhanced Wii controls as well as other bonuses, and 2) To fill the gap in-between software releases. Whether the NPC line succeeded in either of these goals is entirely debatable. Nonetheless, for twenty dollars apiece, it was nice to revisit these titles once more.

6) New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis (Wii)

I really enjoyed the GameCube iteration of the Mario Tennis series, Mario Power Tennis. Its introduction of all-new gimmick courts, featuring obstacles and hazards like treadmills, Klaptraps, ghosts, and puddles of goop to give the sport of tennis some more Mushroom Kingdom flavor. The addition of power shots is something that arguably worked in the game's favor. It did slow down the pace of matches quite a bit, but they could be turned off if one wished. The cast of colorful characters consisted of the likes of standbys like Mario, Luigi, Peach, Daisy, Yoshi, and Bowser, and included atypical character choices such as Koopa Troopa, Paratroopa, Petey Piranha, Wiggler, and Fly Guy. The Wii version brings all of these aforementioned aspects to the fold, so it must be even better with Wii controls, right? Well, not exactly. The game hardly manages to read your ball-striking gestures, making you enter a den of relative frustration. By the time you're through trying to play a match, you'll have cursed as much as a classic John McEnroe match. You cannot be serious. Well, I am.

5) New Play Control! Pikmin (Wii)

Unlike New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis, the Wii version of the original Pikmin is not a bad game by any means. In fact, the brand-new controls work wonderfully with the game. The pointer is used to select targets and areas for your favorite fictional astronaut Captain Olimar to chuck his precious Pikmin army upon. His ship, the Dolphin, has crashed on a foreign planet (though it is remarkably similar to a certain planet you and I live on), and meeting the helpful Pikmin, the capable Captain Olimar search across five unique levels to find his missing ship parts. The reason Pikmin is listed as number five is the annoying (at least to me) time constraints. You have a limited number of days to succeed in Olimar's mission, and the constant pressure can get to a more timid player! Regardless of this, Pikmin is a modern classic that demands your attention, Wii or GameCube.

4) New Play Control! Donkey Kong Jungle Beat (Wii)

I adored the GameCube exclusive Donkey Kong Jungle Beat. This game came out around the era of Nintendo experimenting with their main monkey after they parted ways with Rare, the developer behind the Donkey Kong Country trilogy on the SNES/GBA, the Donkey Kong Land games on Game Boy, and the 3D platformer Donkey Kong 64 on the Nintendo 64. Nintendo made the criminally overlooked DK King of Swing for the GBA, but they also developed this ace of a title. The game had players bashing a bongo drum controller. Tapping the right drum would move DK right while tapping the left drum would-- you guessed it-- move him left. The faster you tapped, the faster the banana-craving monkey moved. After extended periods of play, one's hands would hurt considerably. Meet New Play Control! Donkey Kong Jungle Beat. Instead of tapping, you have a control stick on the Wii's nunchuk to move DK around. Jumping is assigned to the A button while smacking foes and nabbing 'nanas is the job of shaking both the Wii remote and nunchuk. At first glimpse, the game seems relatively short, deceptively so. Gunning for high banana totals earns you crests which unlock secret, more difficult kingdoms filled with new levels. It's a fantastic game, and one that the team would move on from to make a little-known classic called Super Mario Galaxy.

3) Pikmin 2 (Wii)

While the sequel still had time to worry about, you didn't have to be anxious regarding beating the game within so many number of game-time days. Olimar's employer, an intergalactic shipping company, has gone in mad debt, and Olimar's boss sends him and newcomer Louie to the planet that the Dolphin previously crashed on in order to salvage as much valuable treasure as possible. Getting out of debt is never easy, after all. The Pikmin quickly get reacquainted with Olimar, and vow to assist him on his adventure. There's even two new types to be found, Purple and White Pikmin. Purple Pikmin are heavy creatures who may be slow, but they can really whoop a baddie brutally. Meanwhile, White Pikmin are poisonous (great for wading through toxic areas) and can uncover buried treasure. Despite their being only four levels in this sequel, the levels present are large and well designed. They also feature various caves which are essentially levels of their own. Deeper and deeper you delve in search of loot and survival. The greatest horrors lie in these dark and dank sublevel of the caves. Pikmin 2 is very much an improvement on the original's formula, and the Wii iteration brings with it the same superb pointer controls of New Play Control! Pikmin.

2) Metroid Prime 2: Echoes (Wii)

There were a lot of changes going on as well as a ton of hype for the sequel to the highly successful-- both critical and commercial-- Metroid Prime. Retro Studios had a lot of work to do if they wanted to appease their fans, and they quite possibly crafted yet another masterpiece. The light and dark world mechanic, similar to what was found in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, allowed players to transport themselves between both worlds, solving environmental puzzles, earning new suit upgrades such as for the first time in 3D history, the Screw Attack, and overcoming obstacles. Yes, the near end fetch quest might have soured some opinions of the game, but when you have such tight controls (especially the Wii's version highly responsive point to aim controls) the fun outweighs the bad most definitely. Added to this game and perhaps a precursor to the Nintendo DS's Metroid Prime Hunters was a multiplayer mode for up to four combatants, all playing as different colored Samus Aran characters. The lack of bots made this mode nothing more than a novelty for me and others. That said, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes is another essential play for any self-described gamer. Note: The Wii version can only be found outside of Japan in the Metroid Prime Trilogy collection.

1) Metroid Prime (Wii)

After multiple gos at transitioning Metroid from a 2D side-scroller to a fully 3D game, Shigeru Miyamoto stepped in and suggested that the wet behind the ears team at Retro Studios turn the game from a third-person action game into a first-person adventure. A crazy idea, but it would turn into be an extremely successful and novel one. From the moment you step foot on the planet of Tallon IV and have the steamy surroundings fog up your visor, you know you are in the midst of something sensational. The map design was impeccable, the abilities' tremendous representation in 3D, and the creature and boss design were all fantastic. The story was subtle, usually requiring the player to scan data from objects, wildlife, plant life, and computers strewn about the planet to gather information. The secrets like extra energy tanks, power bomb upgrades, and missile tanks were hidden especially well. Every inch, every segment, and every room of the world of Tallon IV had reason for existing. Metroid Prime is one of my favorite titles of time, and the Wii edition makes this the superior iteration. The controls are smooth, flawless, and make precision a priority and almost effortless to do. The fun of flanking foes and blasting them from behind is always a treat, and taking down the expertly created bosses is always a thrilling prospect. If you can somehow manage to score a used copy of Metroid Prime Trilogy, then you will no doubt play one of the best games in Nintendo's grand history. Note: The Wii version can only be found outside of Japan in the Metroid Prime Trilogy collection.

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Rank Up! is all ranked out. We have flourishingly conquered yet another edition of this popular and most requested segment. Next week we will be hitting court and ranking the Mario Tennis games while our tennis rackets are still hot. Until later, have a magnificent weekend!

Pikmin 2 (Wii) Review

Simply called Pikmin 2 in North America, this New Play Control title has been a long time coming. Europe and Japan have had it for three years now, so to say that Nintendo of America is a tad late is a bit of an understatement. Nonetheless, it's here now, so here is my full review of this GameCube classic turned Wii port.

The Perfect "Pik" for Wii Owners

It has been over ten years since the mind behind Mario, Donkey Kong, and Zelda, Shigeru Miyamoto, used his passion and new hobby of gardening as the inspiration for the GameCube near-launch, real-time strategy title Pikmin. The game would receive a much desired sequel later on in the system's life, but this go around the time constraints of the original were removed. On the Wii, Nintendo has gone back to its GameCube catalog to port several classics onto their motion-controlled system with all-new Wii methods of input in a series called New Play Control. The original Pikmin was one of the these, but while Europe received the second game, North Americans have had to wait three long years for the game. Well, Nintendo of America has finally released Pikmin 2 for Wii to get gamers' appetites whetted for the upcoming Wii U's Pikmin 3. And considering how expensive even used copies of the GameCube version of Pikmin 2 are, this pointer-controlled iteration is a steal.

While Captain Olimar was on his "vacation" in Pikmin 1 (a crash landing on an unknown planet full of hostile creatures is hardly what I would call vacation time), his shipping company was free-falling into debt. When Olimar arrives back on his home planet, his boss informs him of the grim fate threatening the company. It turns out Olimar's ship, the Dolphin, can value certain acquisitions. The various treasures that are found by Olimar and new partner Louie and then appraised by the Dolphin can slowly but surely knock down the amount of debt their employer possesses. Back to the planet upon which Olimar had previously crash landed on to score some treasure! Of course, Olimar and Louie need not accomplish this task by themselves. As they explore the planet they get reacquainted with the Pikmin creatures Olimar had met before. Even after the 10,000 Poko debt has been repaid, the adventure still isn't over.

The Wii pointer works wonderfully with this game.

The goal of Pikmin 2 is to accumulate enough money to pay off the Hocotate debt. How this is done is by finding various treasures (funnily enough, real life objects like Duracel batteries, Nintendo's Game and Watch handheld system, Chapstick, and other worldly items) lying about among the four lands of the game while dispatching Olimar and Louie's Pikmin to defeat enemies and stow the goodies back to Olimar's ship. While the day limit of the original Pikmin is gone, there is still the matter of the day cycle. It is essentially a 15 minute period of time beginning with the start of the day and ending with the sun setting. The planet is highly hazardous to one's livelihood at night, so Olimar, Louie, and their plethora of Pikmin must escape before night falls. If any Pikmin are left behind, they will suffer the grisly fate of being gulped up by the nighttime lifeforms.

What are everyday items to you and me
is treasure to Olimar and Louie.

At the beginning of the game, both astronauts have a paltry amount of Pikmin to use. By killing belligerent baddies and using the Pikmin horde to carry their carcasses back to the Pikmin's own various Onion vessels as well as taking colored pellets plucked from flowers around the various lands to these previously mentioned Pikmin ships, more Pikmin will be generated for Olimar and Louie to pick from the ground. There can only be 100 Pikmin on the ground at once, so choosing the right balance of Pikmin types is key to get the most amount of work done in the least amount of time.

No worries-- these Red Pikmin
can take the heat!

This time there are five varieties of Pikmin for Captain Olimar and Louie to befriend and utilize to assist them on their treasure hunting exploits. The three primary Pikmin types from the first game return: red, yellow, and blue. Red Pikmin are great attackers as well as being fire-resistant. This means they can handle certain enemies who breathe scorching flames without problem, and they can destroy geysers that spew flames that would otherwise set the remaining Pikmin types ablaze. Yellow Pikmin are more lightweight, meaning they can be thrown to higher areas. They also are immune to electricity, making them perfect to dispose of shocking foes and bringing down high voltage gates that no other Pikmin type could manage without perishing. Blue Pikmin are the only brand to be able to walk in water without drowning.

Some Pikmin types would find this gate shocking;
Not these Yellow Pikmin, though!

Now that the old kind of Pikmin have been explained, time for the new. There are two new types that are only found underground through tossing preexisting Pikmin into either purple or white flowers. Purple Pikmin are the strongest variety around. One Purple Pikmin also weighs ten times as much as one normal Pikmin. White Pikmin are thin as can be, but their appearance shouldn't be taken lightly. They are unaffected by harmful toxins as they are themselves poisonous. In fact, if they are gobbled up by a foe (oh, the horror!), the enemy that consumed them will slowly lose health from having eaten their poisoned prey. White Pikmin are also expert diggers. They excel at finding treasure hidden and buried beneath the soil.

The New Play Control controls of Pikmin 2 work rather well. While you aren't using any gestures for control inputs, you will be utilizing the Wii remote's pointer to aim at where you wish to chuck your numerous Pikmin. What's great and convenient about this-- and something that would be impossible with the GameCube controller-- is that you can point at Pikmin (say ones that are at the edge of the screen) that would have otherwise been out of your range and call them back to you. In the GameCube version, you would have to run all the way back to where the idle Pikmin were standing just to round them back up. This is the convenience of the Wii remote's pointer in action.

Pikmin 2 on Wii puts in practice the Wii remote and nunchuk. All of the buttons that were dedicated to specific orders on the GameCube controller are emulated via the Wii remote and nunchuk combination. From tossing Pikmin to dismissing them into separate groups, to switching between Louie and Olimar, to calling Pikmin to your side, every input is here at your disposal.

Speaking of Louie and Olimar, most of the time the two need not work together to do well, but proficient players will divide tasks up between the two for the best amount of efficiency. While one gets his group of Pikmin to tear down a gate, the other orders his Pikmin ranks to build a bridge to cross otherwise inhospitable waters. Sometimes you will be forced to switch between the two in order to approach in different circumstances impossible to reach areas. This occurs in the second area of the game, Awakening Wood, where either Olimar or Louie must stand on one block while the other tosses Pikmin onto the other block which is protruding upwards. The weight of the Pikmin on the one block causes the block the other astronaut is on to rise, allowing him to chuck Pikmin up towards a treasure that would have been otherwise futile to reach.

Split up the work evenly if you wish!

Apart from the four main areas of the game taking place across winter wonderlands and rugged mountainous valleys are subterranean holes. These are the most dangerous and challenging places in the game. In these you only have the Pikmin you bring in with you to survive with no hope of spawning new ones while you are deep inside. Time doesn't pass in these areas, and some span 10+ floors. Most conclude with a perilous boss confrontation. I'm talking about giant spiders, obese insects that roll over to squash your adorable combat partners, and snake-like birds that have no quarrels with chomping down on your Pikmin pals. Each floor contains various treasures, usually more than one per floor. The Treasure Gauge, an item that is recovered through normal play, will tell you if you have salvaged all of the items on a given floor. The catch to treasure hunting in the numerous subterranean caves of Pikmin 2 is that if you surrender and retreat from a cave without escaping from a geyser, all the treasure you collected will be put back. For the caves with a seemingly infinite amount of sublevels, the strategy when you reach an exit geyser is critical. Do you continue down the rabbit hole, knowing that the dangers below will be even more difficult as you move on, or do you take what treasures you have now and retreat to the surface, better to be safe than sorry?

The third area of Pikmin 2: The Perplexing Pool.

Aside from the decent-length single player story mode, there is multiplayer as well as other modes. Two players can battle via split-screen in a contest to collect their opponent's marble or to gather four yellow marbles before their opponent can. There is also a Challenge Mode, unlocked through playing the solo game, which has you and your limited number of Pikmin retrieving keys (as well as treasures) to access the next subfloor. You only have an assigned amount of time to reach the goal, but at the same time you want to collect as much treasure as possible to get a high score.

Work with or against the other player in multiplayer mode.

Pikmin 2 was ported directly from the GameCube, so all assets and the like are the exact same on the Wii. By far the star of the presentation is the framerate which generally stays locked and solid even if 100 Pikmin and a menagerie of menacing adversaries are hanging around. Enemy characters look pleasant as does the crystal clear water, especially as you and your Pikmin cohorts waft through it. What isn't so pleasant are the ground textures. If you zoom the camera up close (the camera can be zoomed in and out via the d-pad's left direction), you can easily see the unappealing muddy textures. Moving on from visuals, the sound design is lovely. The quaint music and fanfares are alluring and the cheers and cries of Pikmin are both adorable and disturbing, more so when they are being devoured in front of your eyes.

North Americans like me might have had to wait three more years than the rest of the world (I won't say the wait was worth it), but it's terrific to finally be able to play Pikmin 2 with pointer controls. Whether they are better than the GameCube controls is an argument that will have no clear winner. I find the Wii controls more convenient (tremendous for calling faraway Pikmin without having to walk across the screen to reach them) and comfortable to use (allowing my hands to not be bound together on a dual analog controller is freeing). At twenty dollars and with used copies of the GameCube game going online for so much more, this Wii edition is a fantastic buy. It is certainly the type of game that will "pik" your interests.

[SuperPhillip Says: 9.0/10]

New Play Control! Pikmin 2 (Wii) New Trailer

To get North Americans enthused for the Wii U's Pikmin 3, Nintendo of America is finally releasing the New Play Control! version of Pikmin 2, a version that the rest of the world has had for several years now. This trailer shows off the various Pikmin and multiplayer available in the game. I thought the addition of Wii remote controls in the original Pikmin made for a better experience, so the sequel should be even more intriguing.

Rank Up! Mario Sports on Wii

Mario Sports Mix slam-dunked its way onto the Wii last month, so now's the perfect time for Rank Up! Rank Up! is the every now and then feature where we list a series of games from worst to best. It's a simple concept that's been very popular here on SPC. Today we're taking a look at Mario's sport outings on the Wii. There's been many, but which ones reign supreme? Let's find out, but first let's see which games we'll be putting under the metaphorical microscope.

Mario Sports Mix (Wii)
Mario Kart Wii (Wii)
Mario Super Sluggers (Wii)
Mario Strikers Charged (Wii)
Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games (Wii)
Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games (Wii)
New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis (Wii)


Ever since the Game and Watch days, Mario has spread his wings and dabbled in other jobs and sports. On the Nintendo Entertainment System, he teed it up on the green in Golf, while it was on the Super Nintendo where seemingly his most popular sports entry was given birth in the form of Super Mario Kart. That series would go on to be one of most popular Mario sports series in history. From then til now, Mario has participated in nearly every sport under the sun sans North American football.

7) New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis (Wii)


The New Play Control! line of games was to fill the holes in Nintendo's own release schedule. What better way to do this than port Gamecube games to the Wii with special Wii remote controls? Seems flawless. Unfortunately, the controls in NPC Mario Power Tennis were anything but. In fact, they were fundamentally broken. The game did not register whether you were hitting with topspin or backspin, and the game would randomly lob the ball up into the air. After playing this game for less than a hour, I was embittered and quickly sent the game back to Blockbuster. A perfect chance to show off what motion controls can do, and Nintendo absolutely botched it.

6) Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games (Wii)


When it was announced that Mario and Sonic would be in the same game together, millions spun their rumor mills guessing what type of game it would be. Would it be a 3D platformer in the ilk of Super Mario 64 and Sonic Adventure? When it was revealed that their first game would be a mini-game collection, the hype died down considerably-- but not the sales, mind you. Regardless, most mini-games required you to waggle the Wii remote to speed up your character which by now, waggle was no longer a fun concept. We did it in Wii Sports boxing, we did it to control Link's sword in Twilight Princess, and most of us had had enough. Even with all of the fan-service in the game, nothing could stop this title from being the below-average game it was.

5) Mario Super Sluggers (Wii)


Taking Mario and the Mushroom Kingdom out to the ballgame, Mario Super Sluggers was the sequel to Mario Superstar Baseball on the Gamecube. In this sequel, the single-player mode consisted of an adventure-like mission mode where saving the day awarded you with new items and new teammates for your roster. The fundamentals itself added motion controls to swing at the ball. Holding the Wii remote back charged your swing while for pitchers, it charged their throw. With multiple stadiums to play on including the gimmick-free Mario Stadium, the topsy turvy Daisy Cruiser, and the frozen floors of Peach Castle, America's favorite pastime was well-represented in Mario Super Sluggers.

4) Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games (Wii)


One could label this as a glorified mini-game collection, and they'd be correct in that assessment. However, each sport unlike this game's predecessor did not rely heavily on waggle to play. Instead you twisted and turned the Wii remote and nunchuk to carve through the snow as you skied downhill, participated in one of many dream events which had you racing through Mario Kart Wii's Mario Circuit track or speed skating in Eggman's Base, and unlocked character costumes for your Wii in the in-game shop. There were many events to partake in from real to dream, and the variety of control made each event feel different from the last no matter if you were interested in speeding through the bobsled course or the slalom course.

3) Mario Sports Mix (Wii)


From multiple mini-games to four sports in one, Mario Sports Mix was an enjoyable romp through all four sports: basketball, volleyball, dodgeball, and hockey. Each sport had its own set of three cups to participate in to earn the mythical star cup trophy in each sport. Doing so enabled you to take on Behemoth from the Final Fantasy series in a two-on-one battle for supremacy. Each sport had just enough depth that repeated playings wouldn't get boring. The arenas were filled with eye candy as well from Waluigi Pinball's giant steel pinballs looming around the stage to Luigi's Mansion's ghosts turning off the lights during play. Mario Sports Mix ranks third on this impressive list of Wii Mario sports titles.

2) Mario Strikers Charged (Wii)


We go from a game with four sports with a game with just soccer as its focus in Mario Strikers Charged. In Europe, this was the first online game for Wii allowing players to take on one another across the nation or across the world. There were multiple captains and secondary teammates to choose from--from the eccentric Boo to the hammer-spamming Hammer Bro. You could even score up to five goals at once using a super shot which randomly shot five balls at your opponent's goalie who had to use the Wii remote to point at the screen and swiftly deflect said shots. One of the better anti-simulation soccer experiences, Mario Strikers Charged is an excellent edition to Mario's sports legacy.

1) Mario Kart Wii (Wii)


At last we've reached the number one spot where Mario Kart Wii zoomed into first place. Filled to the brim with content, Mario Kart Wii features a multitude of unlockable characters, weekly online racing challenges, online play with up to eleven other racers from around the world, sixteen new races, and sixteen retro races from past Mario Kart games. If you can get past the cheap AI who constantly seem to abuse items in later difficulties, you're in for a wild ride. Yes, you'll be cursing out the computer or human opponents when a lightning bolts stops all of your momentum while you're careening over a pit, but for all the cheap moments you'll experience, there's a lot of fun ones to be had as well.

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Rank Up! is out for the time being. Until next time where we rank a series of games, we'll be seeing you! Do you have a franchise you'd like to see get the Rank Up! treatment? Let me know in the comments section.

New Play Control!: Donkey Kong Jungle Beat (Wii) Review

I had this review planned for the past two weeks, but I fell ill. Regardless, here it finally is-- my review of New Play Control! Donkey Kong Jungle Beat.

Rumble in the Jungle All Over Again

A little known development team created a fresh new platforming bonanza which utilized a special bongo peripheral. This project was the cult-classic known as Donkey Kong Jungle Beat for the Nintendo Gamecube. This same team's next project was a game you may or may not have heard of. It's something called Super Mario Galaxy, and this development team is none other than Nintendo EAD 1, the premiere first-party team under Nintendo's arsenal of capable developers. It's 2009 and the New Play Control line of Gamecube games remade with Wii controllers in mind have already made their assault on Wii consoles with varying degrees of success. It's Donkey Kong Jungle Beat's time to get a second chance in the spotlight, but this time, the bongos are nowhere to be found. Is this bongo-less version of Jungle Beat one you'll go bananas for?

In the original Donkey Kong Jungle Beat your controller was a controller shaped like a pair of bongo drums. Smacking the left drum would move Donkey Kong left whereas drumming on the right drum would move him right funnily enough. Pouncing upon both drums at the same time would make DK leap into the air, and clapping or tapping the rims of the bongos to attack enemies or grab banana bunches within reach. The New Play Control version tosses aside these bongo controls with no option to use them. That makes sense as it'd defeat the purpose of having Wii controls, but that's all lost if the new control set-up is a hindrance (see: NPC: Mario Power Tennis). Thankfully, this is nowhere near the case with this Wii-make.

Leap on a foe, and pummel 'em into submission.

Jungle Beat now controls like a more traditional platformer as instead of banging a drum or direction to move DK, you just use the nunchuk's analog stick. Parts of the game that required extremely tight precision are less daunting as with the analog stick you feel that you have much more control over the rambunctious ape. Jumping is relegated to the A button while grabbing 'nanas and beating down baddies are assigned to alternating strikes with the Wii remote and nunchuk. It can get tiring, especially during boss fights, but it feels rather good overall. Plus your hands don't become raw after hours of time that flies by. Unless, of course, you're clapping for the heck of it.

There are around 18 or so kingdoms to explore in Donkey Kong Jungle Beat. Each kingdom has two fair-in-length levels followed by a boss encounter. The basic goal of each kingdom is to make it from start-to-finish and take down the kingdom's malevolent monstrosity in order to reclaim the land in the name of all that is right, pure, and banana-craving in the world. However, the real fun and the only way to see the true ending of the game is to collect enough bananas to earn crests. Bananas are scattered all about the levels in Jungle Beat, but there's more to it than just collecting them. If Donkey Kong performs a combo, his bananas collected are multiplied by 2,3,4, and however how he can go before his combo ends. A combo is maintained and boosted by performing completely different aerial moves in one combo such as wall jumps, rope swings, flying on a helibird, ground pounds, and much more. A combo ends when DK touches the ground. The strategy is to find the best way to chain combos in order to accumulate a bounty of bananas. It's entirely possible in later levels to start a combo and maintain it throughout the duration of a level. The immense intelligence of the level designers is immediately apparent as there's not just one way to score as many bananas as possible. There's ways that you'll probably overlook or not even think of until you see the many "Try This" videos that play at the conclusion of each kingdom.

Secret areas are common, so explore a bit!

At each kingdom's finale, you are put up against one of the game's many boss encounters. All of the bananas you've acquired from the past two levels are totaled up and serve as DK's health for the fight. Each time DK is hit, a bunch of bananas are lost. Reach zero, and your main monkey goes down for the count. There's two types of boss fights. The first feels very much like Punch-Out! lite. Your opponent gives you a tell of when they're about to attack, you dodge the attack, and the boss is temporarily vulnerable to a flurry of furry and fiery fists, performed by motion controls of the Wii remote and nunchuk. As the boss' health goes down, his pattern becomes faster and more unpredictable. The second type of boss is a traditional 2D platforming escapade against one of three different bosses. These three different bosses repeat throughout the game but with additional tricks. Regardless, many of the encounters do feel recycled somewhat. Once the boss is vanquished, your banana total is tallied up. Depending on how many yellow gods of fruity awesomeness you obtained, you'll earn up to three crests. Earn three crests in a set of kingdoms, and you unlock a bonus kingdom full of brand-new and more challenging levels.

What goes on in a meeting like this?
"Let's put a chicken head on a spiked plant root."
"Cheers!"

In the Gamecube original, throughout each level, bananas were Donkey Kong's life meter in the game. Each time DK would get damaged, he'd lose a handful of his favorite fruit. This made trying to get platinum crests (by getting over 1,000 bananas in a kingdom) a bit difficult later on. In the New Play Control version, Donkey Kong has a trio of hearts serving as his life. Lose all three hearts, and you have to start the level from the beginning of the level or from a checkpoint. In the original you could throw caution to the wind in completing levels as if you had enough bananas, you could get hit dozens of times. This obviously isn't the case in the Wii offering meaning certain sections of the later levels are quite challenging as you don't have as much of a safety net. Each heart you have left at the end of a level adds fifty bananas to your score which makes getting a high banana count not as hard as it was in the bongo-fueled original.

New animal friends help in many of the game's levels.

It's not really a question of which being better when it comes to the Gamecube or Wii versions. It comes to being different. Not only have certain game elements been changed, a new boss rush mode has been added to the Wii version and many of the levels of the NPC game have been altered to accommodate the new Wii controls, so the two titles feel very much different to each other. This isn't "bad" different either. It's just two individual and fantastic gaming experiences regardless of which version you choose.

Donkey Kong Jungle Beat did not have much fanfare when it was originally released. It came out near the end of the Gamecube's life cycle, and it was on a console that did not have nearly enough excitement from many gamers and the public in general. Now Jungle Beat has been given a second life, and now it's on a platform which many more owners. If you missed out on the Gamecube or the original Jungle Beat, swing on over and pick this budget-priced game up. It's an enjoyable and creative game worthy of the title of "classic".

[SuperPhillip Says: 8.5/10]

New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis (Wii) Review

Nintendo's New Play Control! series seems like a great idea. For those who have played the Gamecube originals, it's a whole new experience, sometimes for the better, for their old favorites. For those who never played them, it's a $30 new game! I entered my local Blockbuster the other day and picked up the NPC version of Mario Power Tennis. I sort of knew how well Pikmin translated to the Wii (and affiliate World 1-1 confirms my suspicions), so I was curious as to the quality of Mario's last new home console tennis game. Hmmm.... I wonder how soon I will give it away in my review...

Fault? No. Double Fault.

Let's face it. Although the Nintendo Gamecube had a fantastic library for the Nintendo faithful, it was pretty much a failure in capturing the majority of the video game market. Now that the Wii has been the breakout hit that it is, Nintendo has opted to let millions of new gamers and those gamers who skipped the Gamecube experience several of the system's best with brand new motion control. Nintendo's label for this series of games is New Play Control with Pikmin and Mario Power Tennis as the first two titles for North American audiences. The latter hasn't turned out so well.

The original Mario Power Tennis released in November of 2004 in North America, and it was a very enjoyable arcade-style tennis title with plenty of fun for newbies yet plenty of strategy and depth for more advanced players. New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis captures neither of these positive qualities. It all has to do with the motion controls that have been implemented, and with the main selling point of these Wii-makes (hurt me for that pun later) being the motion controls, it's rather ironic that Power Tennis suffers because of the phoned-in controls.

Pete Sampras has nothing on Mario save for
that secret about the plumber and the tranny.

Firstly, the motions used for volleying the ball to the opponent's court are completely unintuitive and are inaccurate half the time. To perform a drop shot, where the ball falls just behind the net on the opponent's court, you need to slash the Wii remote directly downward in a completely vertical motion. In the real world, hitting the ball like that would make it land a foot in front of you, costing you the serve. Conversely, moving the remote upward will initiate a high-flying lob shot which also doesn't feel satisfying whatsoever. It doesn't help that regular shots require you to do a cross-body swing that usually registers somehow as a lob or drop shot, and you have one frustrating experience.

But wait-- there's more! A lot of the gameplay from the original Mario Power Tennis has been dumbed down for the New Play Control! version. No longer can you aim where you want to hit the ball via holding the control stick in the direction you want the ball to fall. instead, the location of your shot on the opponent's court lies with the timing of your swing. Seeing as the gestures don't register correctly most of the time, it's essentially about luck. Who needs to hit the ball in that wide open area that your opponent couldn't possibly reach when you can just inadvertently pass it right back to him? Furthermore, charge shots are automatic now. All you need to do is be in position, and your character will power up. There's no need to worry about being in the right place or not as you'll know immediately by whether or not your character gains a glowing aura.

The courts are vibrant and varied.

Other than the new controls added that are detrimental to the experience, the rest of the content from the Gamecube is the same. There's multiple tournaments to enter which the player can save their progress after each round and multiple mini-games usually revolving around one or two elements of tennis play. Unfortunately, nearly all of the available mini-games focus on precision which makes those bothersome motion controls a little difficult to master these games-- much less play them. The cast of color characters from the Mushroom Kingdom are all present and accounted for from Mario to Bowser, Peach to Daisy, and Luigi to Boo. Four characters can be unlocked as well as multiple new courts based off the Super Mario Sunshine and Luigi's Mansion games of the Gamecube era. Each of these have different themes and gimmicks to them from none to ghosts blocking your shots.

Regardless of what anyone says of the Playstation 2 era of graphics, Mario Power Tennis certainly looks bright, vibrant, and alluring to the eyes. There has been a slight bump to the visuals from the transition to Wii. There's nary an instance of the game slowing down or stuttering even in the more busy courts and mini-games. Character models are animated superbly and are full of life. It's just a shame the fate of the controls isn't as fortunate.

Playing against hard opponents with less than
reliable controls is an effort in frustration.

It's disappointing that a series of remakes selling off the idea of new controls suffers from them as badly as New Play Control! Mario Power Tennis has. Those wanting to play Mario Power Tennis for the first time should just find a used Gamecube copy from eBay or Amazon as the Wii version is just an abomination. The completely clumsily implementation of the Wii's motion controls for this game when every Wii owner in North America already owns a superior tennis game from Wii Sports is just pitiful. Stick with Wii Sports Tennis or wait for the upcoming Grand Slam Tennis from EA Sports this June.

[SuperPhillip Says: 3.5/10]