New Carnival Funfair Games (Hands-On) (Wii) Preview

Due to the low quality of both the Wii original, its DS counterpart and the home console Mini-Golf spin-off, expectations were low for New Carnival Funfair Games and I purposely avoided going anywhere near it for most of the event. As it was tucked away in a far corner this did not prove to be much of a problem. However, it was directly opposite Kirby’s Epic Yarn in that unsurprisingly desolate section beyond the GoldenEye 007 and NBA Jam stands, and since I am such a sucker for the pink inhaling machine, I had to eventually wander over for a gander, and rather than play Kirby first and despise my time with New Carnival Funfair Games afterwards, I opted to tackle Take 2 / 2K Play’s upcoming release first.

The first thing to be noted was the lack of MotionPlus attachment on the Wii Remote, which whilst not too shocking given the lack of the add-on at the show in general (no The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for us…), was still ultimately disappointing. Instead it was a case of testing five of the thirty-plus games included in the package, the majority of which are new, with a smattering of tweaked favourites returning. The E3 demo shown in the US a couple of months back highlighted the MotionPlus features, but here the likes of ‘Shatter Pitch,’ ‘Smile,’ ‘Haunted Hunting,’ ‘Under 7, Over 31’ and ‘Soda Pop Up’ were sampled in their standard motion forms.

Considering the first Wii game is currently the fourth biggest selling Third Party Wii game in the US, it is no wonder developer Cat Daddy has been asked to develop something more substantial than the first entry in order to capitalise on the six million-plus strong fan base around the world. Even though most are not in the same league as the mini-games featured in the WarioWare series, some are fun when played in groups. In ‘Shatter Pitch,’ players are given the chance to throw baseballs at plates, aiming to break as many as possible in order to win one of the three hundred unique prizes on offer. Trying out ‘Smile’ gave me and fellow Cubed3 writer Stuart Lawrence the chance to knock the teeth out of various annoying clown faces by firing cannon balls in the right direction, whilst ‘Haunted Hunting’ appeared to be a mini-game that would make good use of the MotionPlus peripheral, with the objective being to shoot as many skeleton- and zombie-held targets as possible during the train ride.

‘Under 7, Over 31,’ as might be implied by the name itself, requires a total score of lower than seven or higher than thirty-one, both of which can be achieved by holding the Wii Remote on its side and tilting the angle slightly until ready to drop your ball down the slots and hope it lands in the appropriately scored hole (labelled one-to-six). This definitely comes down to sheer luck, sadly, and more effort was spent on the other games included, with the last one being ‘Soda Pop Up,’ where the Wii Remote is used as a fishing rod and fallen cans must hooked, then slowly pulled to a vertical standing position, without toppling the can from the barrel where it currently resides.