Yesterday, I picked up a copy of Wii Play. The reason I bought it was because it cost $49 but came with a Wii Remote in the box. This $49 cost is basically the cost of the Wii Remote itself. I figured that I would be getting a sequel to the Wii Sports game that comes with the Wii, but hopefully a more advanced sequel. Plus I would be getting a 'free' Wii Remote in the process. It turns out rather than being a more advanced version of Wii Sports, that it is really more of the same. In other words, its a bunch of very simple little games that are more designed to teach you how to use the Wii Remote than to be any advanced kind of game. Oddly enough, even though these games are very simple, they are strangely fun to play. The game comes with the following little games:
Target Practice
This is a game designed to train you in using the remote to shoot things. It's a game where you see a grass field. Above this field move various targets, clay 'pigeons' and other things. The purpose it to use your remote as a shotgun to shoot the targets. Some move and some don't. The ones that don't move appear and disappear quickly on the screen so you have to be fast. At one point, you even see a bunch of little people running around in the grass. These little people are multiple copies of your Mii character. They run around in the grass as UFOs fly overhead and try to abduct them. You have to shoot down the UFOs before they can abduct your people. It's all done in a very cartoonish, but entertaining way.
Bubbles
On this game, you see various bubbles dropping down from the top of the screen. Inside the bubble is an outline of your Mii character in various poses. The purpose of the game is to twist the remote so your onscreen Mii lines up with profile in the bubble. Then you click on the bubble with your Mii to 'pop' the bubble. As the levels advance, the rotated positions of the Miis get more varied and the pose of the Mii changes inside the bubble. You have to not only rotate your Mii, but rapidly switch his pose to match the one in the bubble. It gets hard after a while.
Laser Hockey
This is a game similar to playing a game of air hockey. You have two pucks and the object is to bat the ball into the opponents goal. The ball bounces off the walls and off of your puck as you move around, so you have to learn to aim with the remote better to play this one.
Billiards
This is a game where you have a billiards table with 9 balls on it and you have to hit the cue ball to knock the balls into the pockets in order. It teaches you to do some more 3D moves with the remote. For this one, you pull the remote back to pull the cue back, and then thrust it forward to move the cue forward, hitting the cue ball. The cue ball even has the face of your Mii on it...
Mii Matching
This game shows a group of different Mii characters on the screen and you have to find the two that match. What makes this game more difficult is that their faces match, but their clothes don't.
Table Tennis
This game is a version of table tennis (i.e. 'Ping Pong'). You just have to move your remote around to move your paddle so it hits the ball. The object of the game is to see how many times you can hit the ball back to the other side without missing it. As your play, the ball starts to move faster and bounce around the table, so it gets harder...
Tank Battle
This game is a game where you have a tank and the object is to use your tank to shoot the other tanks on the board before they shoot you. There are various obstacles on the board you can use to hide behind. You can also bounce your bullets off of obstacles, allowing you to hit the tank without getting hit yourself. You can also drop mines for the other tanks.
Cow Racing
This is a game where it shows your Mii riding on the back of a cow. The object is to 'race' your cow down a road, knocking over scarecrows and jumping over hurdles. You play this one with the remote held sideways (left to right). You turn the remote to the left or right to steer the cow and you twist it forward or back to speed up or slow down. You lift the remote up rapidly to jump the hurdles.
On a side note, this was my first time trying to connect a second remote to the Wii. One question I had was how to tell which Wii remote was remote 1 and which was remote 2. They are both identical. It turns out that the way this works is once you synchronize the remote as remote 1 or 2, there is a line of 4 lights along the bottom of the remote. For remote 1, the first light is lit, and for remote 2, the second light is lit. This is a nice way to differentiate the two.