Leger vs. Wario Ware: Smooth Moves (Wii)

For all the blame of gimmicks taking over the medium Wii stood there, in the centre of it all.

Accidentally throwing wiimotes in televisions, hitting the shit out of the face of a friend or just looking completely batshit crazy trying to get some moves to register correctly.

Oh.

But considering it all, Wario Ware: Smooth Moves makes sense in every possible way.

Hundreds of a couple of seconds long lasting minigames where the thing seldom is more complex than quickly realizing what button to press or how to physically move the controller.

Aesthetically all over the place, but mostly with thick lines outlining characters and other stuff paving way for a truly cartoony look.

Mixed with some real life textures and the odd out of place whatever thrown into the mix; It all seems logical in the world of Wario.

Just as the grunts, sazzy music and suggestive presentations of all the different wiimote positions to use during the sessions.

That voice, it could lure whomever to bed.

As expected the minigames are extremely varied, and as the main game progresses through the kind of themed stages (certain characters with a certain story and certain ways of using the wiimote) more and more ways of holding the wiimote are introduced to pave way for something rather chaotic in the later part of the game.

At a certain point even the nunchuck is thrown into the mix, and as such it becomes obvious that certain minigames will offer better controls than others.

While pointing at the screen, tilting the controller and pressing buttons always will work just fine, everything that has to do with adjusting the depth by moving the wiimote closer to, or further from, the tv works like shit... so dustsucking is an extremely unpleasant and erratic thing to do, with the thing moving uncontrollably all over the place.

Driving a car by using the wiimote as a steering wheel, pointing at the screen trying to shoot stuff into a giant nose or pretending the wiimote being a hand waving away fart clouds... well... it works flawlessly each and every time.

Actually, considering the wealth of minigames the ones that controls badly are few and far between, but for those trying to unlock everything (which you do by playing and replaying the stages over and over and over again, hoping for the minigames you have not seen yet will randomly appear) it can get pretty annoying to deal with the bad ones again and again and again.

Sometimes it is also oddly unclear what the game expects you to do, even with the holding position of the wiimote presentented and the minigame being practiced over and over again.

Just as it seems that everything related to playing the game with a friend seems like an afterthought (which just the fact of it not becoming available until after having beaten the main game), where the wiimote is passed around between the minigames while certain rules apply depending on the choice of mode (playing darts, pumping up a balloon until it bursts or passing around a bomb while playing random minigames... for example).

If not playing the two minigames where one player uses the wiimote and the other the nunchuck (a race on foot while jumping over holes and a flying minigame collecting friut while avoiding crasching).

Oh, and everything is for some reason presented in 4:3, in a time of 16:9 being what people had come to expect. Certainly not a deal breaker, but it makes it all feel a bit rushed to the market.

Wario Ware: Smooth Moves done right could have been a perfect way of showing off the motion controls and how fun they can be, but unlike Wii Sports which is pretty much as casual as it gets Smooth Moves sometimes demands more from the player than the controls manage to deliver.

It is mostly fun, crazy and intriguing, but lacks something that the series got right from the start on the Game Boy Advance (the controls and making all of the content feel relevant); While trying to evolve the concept, it all comes together as a somewhat disjointed experience.

A trip worth experiencing, for sure, but do expect some tedious and uncomfortable bumps along the way to completion making it rather easy to question the Smooth Moves part of its title.