You guys may have noticed that we had a bit of a technical difficulty on the site late tonight. Glad to say that it was a small snafu, and all is looking just fine. Just incase, I wanted to make sure I got up the ‘End of Day’ thought for you guys, because D3stiny_Sm4sher worked hard on it. You enjoy the review, and I’ll see you all in a few, short hours! - RMC I dunno about you guys, but I’ve seriously been soaking up the holiday season. Specifically, the Christmas season. I’d be curious to know which of you folks out there celebrate different holidays. Hopefully, no matter what name you prescribe to the whole “Good will toward men (and women!)” time of year, you folks are all enjoying it. I know I sure am. I just spent about 14 hours of the past 30 playing Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. Holy crap, such a wonderfully made game. But when it comes to this season, I can’t think of a more appropriate game than Mario and Sonic at the Winter Olympics. - D3stiny_Sm4sher Mario and Sonic at the Winter Olympics -Opening Ceremony- Time played: About 7-9 hours Obtained: Rented via GameFly Other Conditions: Have played the previous Olympics game. Played multiplayer for about 1 hour. -Let the Competition Begin- A couple of years back, Mario and Sonic and some of their friends competed in the Summer Olympic games, so it really isn’t that surprising that they’ve taken another go at it now that the inverse Olympic season approaches. Fortunately, the sequel tries to add some more to overall package in an attempt to up the ante. But just how much has Sega improved the minigame formula? For starters, the sports that you’ll participate in are obviously flavored with a lot more white. Skiing, snowboarding, curling, ice skating, bobsleigh…It’s all here, it’s all simple, and it’s all fairly forgiving. There are optional tutorials to explain every event’s controls, and there are many motions or steering controls that are universal across like-minded events. One of my issues with the original title was how much it forced players to mindlessly flail their arms to the point of exhaustion. Fortunately, Sega was smart enough to not include a single event like this. One can play this title for a couple hours on end if they like and never feel their arms tiring out. Definitely a good choice. Controls are fairly lenient, as well, though oftentimes, more experienced gamers will feel like they’re a bit sluggish or lag behind, at least in terms of what gets displayed compared to when the gesture is performed. The variety in sports doesn’t feel as great as the original, but given the season, this makes sense. The gameplay elements can blur together snowboarding and skiing feel similar in many ways, for example. But to mix things up, there are a number of Dream Events to play. Quite a bit — definitely moreso than the original. And I found the Dream Events to be a real hook, surprisingly. They are all deliberately video game-themed, mixing and expanding upon the traditional sports. For example, the ski jump Dream Event involves players flying off into space through the Good Egg Galaxy (a la Super Mario Galaxy), steering through zero gravity to fly through Star Bits and hoops for a high score. Dream Figure Skating was incredibly endearing to me, taking a “Mario and Sonic on Ice” approach with its presentation - it plays itself off as an ice skating musical version of each series. It’s simple and cute. Every Dream Event features a remix from Mario and Sonic’s adventures, along with locations from the games. Mario Kart Wii to Sonic Adventure 2, it does a much better job at capitalizing on the history of these franchises than the original title. I would say the Dream Events are probably the overall highlight of the game. They’re certainly not amazing but they feel much more “Mario” and “Sonic” in their atmospheres. While any event can be played after it’s unlocked in Free Play mode, players will need to play through the Festival Mode to unlock the Dream Events. Festival Mode goes through the Olympic schedule, in a sense, letting players “train” in sports and then participate in them to earn medals/points toward an overall ranking at the end. It can drag on a bit, but it does save your progress. Furthermore, there are amusing cameos (I won’t spoil any) from each respective franchise that serve as “bosses” of sorts every couple of days or so. All the while, however you choose to play, you will earn Star Tokens which can be used to purchase the myriad of unlockable features, from decals to your sports equipment to costumes for your Miis to use in-game to music tracks, and even some extra challenges, such as unlocking collectible Blue Coins in some of the Dream Events which contribute to a reward. There’s just a lot of stuff to unlock. I just wish the music tracks that you unlock had more applications other than just a jukebox. It’d be great to play some Mario/Sonic remixes during the standard events, for example. And yes, online leaderboards are back for those of you interested in competing for records, though there isn’t online play. Honestly, I’m not sure what this would matter, since many events are played by taking turns, anyway. This isn’t a specifically competitive game (ironically), so online isn’t really a big loss, though it could have added some incentive for replayability. By now, it probably sounds like a no-brainer that, as a whole, the Winter Olympics have much more to offer than the Summer ones. Frankly, that’s pretty much the case. The visual presentation is kicked up a notch, with very slick menus and another well-executed, “Olympic Spirit” inducing intro cutscene. Visuals look a bit more detailed but there’s still room for improvement in areas such as the crowds or backgrounds. Music is either proper game remixes or orchestral Olympic fare, all of which is pretty effective. The sound effects, however, are incredibly aggravating. Do I really need to hear my character repeat the same chirp of excitement every single damned time they do ANYTHING correctly? Seriously, it gets just plain annoying to the point where I turned off the sound now and again. Mario and Sonic has a varied and pretty well-represented cast, decent variety in its events, and simple, approachable mini-game play style which makes it an effective party game. That said, it can get kind of repetitive if you play it for more than a half hour to an hour, and the general execution of controls makes it feel like the game is sometimes auto-piloting a little too much to let the tilt controls feel natural, or the images on screen react sluggish to your actions. There are also some fairly long loading times that occur too frequently from what has been seen on other Wii games. The set of minigames won’t blow your mind, and some are just generally bland. There’s more depth than you might expect in some events but it’s still a fairly cut-and-dry affair that doesn’t fully make good use of the control scheme available to it. -Awards Ceremony- Another bronze medal goes to Mario and Sonic in their Winter Olympic festival. While definitely a step up from the original sports title in terms of execution and presentation, there’s not quite enough polish and content and quality here to make the game pass into that land of specifically great games. It’s definitely one of the better mini-game collections on the platform and will definitely keep more casual audiences occupied for many short bursts of time, and the more deliberate references to the game series are a nice nod to core gamer fans. If you’re up for a more light-hearted game you can play with your friends and family, look into trying this one out. -High Score- 7/10
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GoNintendo ‘End of Day’ thoughts - Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games review by D3stiny_Sm4sher
