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Wii Roundup Review
Wii Review by Ellie Gibson
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Emergency Heroes
This game looks like it's based on a shonky Saturday morning cartoon series, perhaps one subsidised by the Canadian Goverment and produced collaboratively by studios in Japan and Quebec, who argue constantly over how spiky the hair should be. In fact, Emergency Heroes has been invented by Ubisoft, and produced collaboratively by studios in Barcelona and Newcastle. I was hoping for Byker Grove as reimagined by Gaudi, but I was disappointed. Instead, think Knight Rider meets Casualty. On Caprica.
Emergency Heroes is set in a futuristic world where just one emergency service takes care of all crime, medical and fire-related business. As a member of this task force you're given a series of missions to carry out, and a collection of increasingly silly vehicles to play around with. Take the fire engine, for example - which is in fact a big red SUV with a giant hose welded to the roof. Then there's a police car which looks like a blue Batmobile with an enormous black and yellow-striped snowplow stuck on the front. There are also buggies, motorbikes, trucks and plenty of other vehicles - nearly 50 in total.
Missions involve things like chasing another car and ramming it to the point of destruction, or using the hose on to extinguish fires as you drive round a circuit. None of them are tricky to complete, and most of them are so easy as to be tedious. Like the ones where you just drive the blue Batmobile through pile after pile of burned-out cars, which requires no skill other than the ability to drive the car in a straight line.
This is a much easier proposition than in Off Road, as the controls in Emergency Heroes aren't too bad. Once again you hold the remote horizontally and tilt to steer. There's a little bit of swerving and the handbrake is so excitable it's pretty much useless, but basically the controls work.
They should do a The Bill movie set in the future, where Sunhill is a small planet and Burnside has a cybernetic arm.
The environments are described as "free-roaming", which is fair - you can choose what order you tackle missions in, and must drive to different start points to embark on them. However, there's not much of an area to roam around, and what there is isn't pretty. It's all sci-fi skyscrapers, ramps, overpasses and monorails, and it all looks like it belongs in a PSone game.
Still. Emergency Heroes has got police snowplows and fire jeeps and motorbikes and if you fill up the turbo meter you can go faster, and you can put the siren on whenever you like, and it's not too hard and you don't die and if you are a five year-old boy you will love it.
If you're the parent of a five year-old boy, you can sit them in front of Emergency Heroes and leave the room, confident it's less graphically violent than an episode of The Archers. Just be aware that for anyone over five, it's also less thrilling. Which brings us neatly to:
5/10
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Poster
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This is the kind of shit that is so typical of the wii lineup lately. Hence why I and a few of my mates have recently sold our wiis.
EG should do an expose (gutter journalism style!) on how much rubbish there is on the wii atm. Nintendo fanboys might not like it but if its in the interests of good games on the system it is worth doing. ... and Ill take 3! |
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PlugMonkey
03/09/08 @ 13:11
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EG should do an expose (gutter journalism style!) on how much rubbish there is on the wii atm. Nintendo fanboys might not like it but if its in the interests of good games on the system it is worth doing.
I'd be fairly surprised if the shit to good ratio was any different from either of the other two consoles. They should do a The Bill movie set in the future, where Sunhill is a small planet and Burnside has a cybernetic arm. That would rock more than I can put into words. |
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/agrees with PatAU
Not sure it was a wise idea to namecheck the BNP in the photo tags though...still, great roundup. Looking at the release scheds for the Wii between now and christmas, you could do one of these roundups every week and still not break an average score for the lot of more than 4/10 |
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 13:17
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What the hell is wrong with the Wii?!?!
The console itself is ace, and the first party titles are always well turned out, but the third party market seems to almost entirely consist and dross. I STILL haven't bought a Wii for exactly this reason, and I bloody want one too. I keep getting so damn close, but then I look at how decent many games are available and I just can't justify the spend for Okami and not much else. And people complain about the lack of PS3 games out there! Someone give me a list of ten Wii games (not including the various Wii sports and play titles that get bundled) that are actually worth the money, please. |
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CapnCloudchaser
03/09/08 @ 13:21
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I'm not sure why people don't buy Wii's or sell their Wii's because of third party titles. You don't have to buy them, and I don't think buying a Wii is in direct support of them. Unless you need the money, I don't understand why you'll sell it either. There are other good games on the system and more will be developed in the future. I don't understand why people panic so much :O
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JohnnyWashnGo
03/09/08 @ 13:28
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Why would you sell your Wii for Gods sake?
Just because a glut of shite comes out for it doesn't make all the good games suddenly bad. They could release a thousand crappy sports/driving/quiz games and would still keep the console so that I can play Metroid and Mario. I never understand people who sell their consoles in protest - it seem really quite immature. |
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"Someone give me a list of ten Wii games (not including the various Wii sports and play titles that get bundled) that are actually worth the money, please."
Hate myself for this but here you go. Here's some games i've enjoyed: Mario Galaxy Wario Land Shake Fire Emblem Zelda TP Okami Zack & Wiki Mario Kart Smash Bros Super Paper Mario No More Heroes Battallion Wars Excite Truck Trauma Center PES Metroid Prime Endless Ocean Resident Evil UC MLB Power Pros If you don't like them? Well you've got 2 other choices. |
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 13:38
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@CapnCloudchaser
"I'm not sure why people don't buy Wii's or sell their Wii's because of third party titles." Because 3rd party titles always form the majority of games available on any platform. Why would I buy a console if there are insufficient decent games on it? Hey, if you have that list of 10 good games tucked in your back pocket, please do dig it out and post it here (though peteb's slightly comical plea has pretty much got me won over, so your work is cut out for you). |
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kangarootoo, I'd recommend (in no particular order) Super Mario Galaxy, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Okami, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption,
Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure, Boom Blox, Mario Kart, WarioWare: Smooth Moves, LostWinds along with Super Paper Mario, No More Heroes, Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles (if they float your boat) and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Resident Evil 4 if you haven't played them already.
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most recently on 03/09/08 @ 14:43
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 13:41
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@spazmo
Nice one. I shall investigate. I already have the other two choices, but there are a few games on the Wii that I can't get elsewhere (Okami was asking for the Wii to come along really). However, I don't want to buy one and play the few games I've had my eye on, only to find that is all there is. I shall investigate your list and see where that leaves me. |
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Ahh don't listen to me, I'm just a pessimistic prick. Maybe the quality of the third party releases will pick up next year or later and then I'll regret selling it. But for now I want the money to go towards a PS3. I already have a 360, and having all 3 consoles is a bit too much for the missus anyway, so it makes sense to sell the Wii since its never on.
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 13:45
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@JonFE
Cheers also. I know already that SSB isn't my bag, but there are some others in there that might be food for thought. If I did go for one it would probably be post Xmas (the older you get, the more you seem to spend at Xmas in my experience) so there might even be a few more worthy items out there by then. |
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I sold my wii because it has no more good games coming out for it and Ive played all the ones worth playing on it. I didnt end up selling it out of spite. The last good game to come out for the system was No more heroes. Kart and smash bros were complete and utter tosh.
Thanks to the high resale value of the console, I effectively had a cheap 18 month rental of a novelty console and a few good games. The rest of the cash paid for a 360 which lets me play games. |
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@kangarootoo
It would be hard to give you a list of enjoyable Wii games without SSBB present, since my 9-year-old son spends more time on that than any other game since late June. I understand, of course, that the choices of a 9-year-old should not necessarily reflect my own - but he is certainly enjoying handing my arse back to me every time we brawl against each other :)
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most recently on 03/09/08 @ 14:55
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 13:57
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@JonFE
Now you see, if you sold your Wii and took him on hand to hand, your sucess rate would no doubt rocket ;) |
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The wii doesn't get enough flak. Everyone is too busy giving nintendo a hand shandy to actually realise that the wii isn't the best thing since sliced bread. Crappy, novel control system that doesn't work properly (hence an expensive add on), expensive console (it's basically a gamecube with a higher rated cpu) and shite games (unless you want to play a mario/zelda game).
I own all 3 consoles and have hardly played the wii. Only makes an appearance when friends want to play it. Bad Nintendo! |
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What the hell is wrong with the Wii?!?!
The console itself is ace, and the first party titles are always well turned out, but the third party market seems to almost entirely consist and dross. well, since you asked. the wii opened up gaming to a lot of people who wouldn't have touched it before. which i would generally consider a good thing. BUT those people are also not very likely to read reviews in magazines or on the internet, so shite like Carnival Games can ride high in the charts for weeks off the back of a few tv adverts and maybe promotional features in non-gaming publications. other publishers see this success and realise that they, too, can make money out of a shoddy game that took fuck-all effort to make. and they do. |
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People really seem to believe that shovelware started with the Wii, don't they? God, it's like people get amnesia of previous gaming history every time a new generation starts.
Seriously, crap shovelware games litter every leading console. It's also true that when third parties bother to put effort into their Wii projects, the results are usually good. What's the problem? |
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@PlugMonkey, "I'd be fairly surprised if the shit to good ratio was any different from either of the other two consoles."
You would, but a quick check at Metacritic tells a slightly different story. While it is slighly skewed because it's hard to take out VC, Live Arcade and PSN titles (so I haven't bothered), I've worked on the basis that games with a score of 80-100 can be considered "good", 50-79 "average) and below 50 as shovelware. In reality, a score of 50% should equal "average", but we all know that most game mags and sites don't work on that policy. Anyway, the breakdown: Wii (80-100) 27, (50-79) 169, (0-49) 57 - Total 253 360 (80-100) 107, (50-79) 296, (0-49) 44 - Total 447 PS3 (80-100) 63, (50-79) 122, (0-49) 11 - Total 196 So what that actually gives you is remarkable parity in percentages of games that fall within the "average" range, with the Wii at 66.8%, 360 at 66.22% and PS3 at 62.24%. Where it gets interesting is that only 10.67% is Wii games score an average of 80% or more. Compare that to the 360 with 23.94% and it looks bad indeed. The PS3 is the clear winner here with 32.14% of games scoring over 80%. At the other end of the scale you have only 5.61% of PS3 titles scoring 49% and below, 9.84% of 360 titles doing the same, but a massive 22.53% of Wii titles falling into the shovelware department. And when you take in account that over half of the 360 titles in that range are Live Arcade titles, it makes it even worse for the Wii as the vast majority for that platfom are retail boxed products. I hope this helps you be surprised. :) |
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IronCladChicken
03/09/08 @ 14:38
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@gerg
"People really seem to believe that shovelware started with the Wii, don't they?" These people have names y'know!!! - Their called Xbox360 owners. |
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 14:43
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"So people without a Wii feel so violated by some shit games that they have to drag their sorry asses into a Wii thread and moan"
Yeah, and a previously cheeful internet is all ruined as a result. I wonder whether moaning in a thread about people moaning in a thread is ironic or just odd? "Seriously, crap shovelware games litter every leading console. It's also true that when third parties bother to put effort into their Wii projects, the results are usually good. What's the problem?" Well first off, I've been around long enough to know it hasn't always been this way. And secondly, the other two platforms aren't suffering the same problem, so the comparison stands. |
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""People really seem to believe that shovelware started with the Wii, don't they?"
These people have names y'know!!! - Their called Xbox360 owners." I don't think anyone moaning about the wii's high level of shovel ware mentioned any of the other consoles at all. Get off your high horse for godsake. People don't have to be fan boys to comment on a lack of quality software on ANY of the consoles. |
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kangarootoo: You deny the huge volumes of shovelware that has littered the PS2, SNES and NES? Jesus.
Furthermore, I said "leading console". Not only that, but as most major developers are too afraid and/or lazy to try something new and different on the Wii (or the PS3 or Xbox 360 for that matter), they gladly place their AAA titles on the PS3 and Xbox 360. Third party support for the Wii is pretty rubbish, and is ever so slowly improving. However, it is rubbish because third parties choose to ignore the system, and not because of petty shovelware. |
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kinky_mong
03/09/08 @ 14:54
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Well I bought a Wii purely for Smash Bros (with Mario Galaxy, Metroid and Okami all being nice bonuses) and I'm still ploughing through it when I'm not on the 360. The future looks bleak apart from a few titles but I've got a large enough backlog of games to go through that it doesn't bother me.
I did find Lost Winds a huge let down though after the hype. Felt ripped off even though technically I didn't pay anything for it (used the whole swapping Nintendo stars for Wii points thing). Should have got Mario RPG! Bah. |
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 15:07
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@gerg
I suspect you are going to start splitting hairs with me between percentages and actual numbers. The PS2 may have had a few thousand shite games, but it had equal numbers of good ones, certainly more good games than I could reasonably play and still have any kind of tan. The rest of your post goes on about third parties ignoring the system, and developers being lazy etc. Without sounding like an ass, I just don't care about the excuses. People seem to do this all the time on pages like these. Someone levels a critism, and someone else responds with "yeah, but that is only because..." as if having an excuse somehow changes the fabric of reality. "This cheese grater is no use as a submarine" "Yeah, but that is only 'cos its full of holes" "Errr, I don't really care about that, I just don't want to drown" I'm not a fanboy or any platform, as I'm sure I don't have to point out. And I think the Wii is a great machine, with some awesome and fantastic games on it. But there just (seemingly) isn't ENOUGH good games on it to warrant a purchase by me. I don't care why this is unless the knowing of the why also brings a solution, and I don't really care what percentage of SNES games also sucked balls. All I care about is that I find it hard to justify the purchase of a Wii, 'cos I know one month later it will be gathering dust unless something changes. I find this annoying, as there are games on the Wii that I want to play, but I can't really justify forking out £240 (console + 2 games) just to play 2 games. That is how it is. |
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WII sucks bad... last generation hardware with childish games... nop, not for me at least, oh and by the way, the only truly next gen/revolutionary system in market are neither the Pc or the Xbox (wich are structurally the same, with the Xbox only being a medium/low spec gaming Pc), the Ps3 "with it's new revolutionary/architecture", its the only next gen system.
But i must admit that all all of thouse (xbox, ps3 and pc) are great for true gamers.
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kangarootoo
03/09/08 @ 16:08
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@Krelle
Insert "joke about your mum" of your choice here. @anomagnus But again, I don't care about the definitions of games or not games. I'm all for novelty toys for the living room, if they are fun fun fun. You seem to have some other agenda, driven by some sense of elitist purity in gaming. Its fair to say I don't share that agenda. We seriously just keep getting bogged down in all the unimportant stuff. The definition of the Wii isn't important, and the reasons why 3rd party games often blow isn't important, and how many shit games there was on the Atari 2600 isn't important. I just want a decent number of fun games (or whatever you want to call them) on the Wii. Is that too much to ask? |
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My mate bob's gardeners best mate sold his wii because crap games get released that somehow he was forced to buy.
He couldnt help himself, every time he saw a bad game review he rushed out and bought it.. And then was dismayed that it was crap. His mate of a mate of mate of an ex room mate also sold his for the same reason. He didnt buy anything good for the machine.. Only tripe.. Thats why he sold it. |
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