Carnival Games Review

Platform: Nintendo Wii
ERSB: E for Everyone
Genre: Party
Number of Players: 1-4
Publisher: 2K Games
Release Date: 10/27/2007
Official Website
Writer: Trina

Rating: 6.0

This Carnival is not worth the ticket price

Whenever the carnival ran through town, most people stood in line to get on the rides. Not me. I went straight to the games. I should have known I was a gamer even back then. Every carnival I would win a goldfish or two (that would die the next day), and come home with various stuffed animals that I could have bought for less than what I spent in tickets to win them. Being such a big carnival games fan, I was really excited when they announced this game for the Nintendo Wii. Unfortunately I can’t be excited still.

Graphics:
This game has the typical Wii graphics, except that on my 60-inch plasma it really looked horrible. You can pick your character, but each character has a very limited selection of looks and clothes. On top of that, the models were all very blurry.

Controls:
Carnival games are based on accuracy and skill. This game suffers so much in accuracy that it doesn’t matter what level of skill you have. Throwing a football through a tire only works if you can aim to begin with. Or if something needs pressure before you can do it, it never seems to build up enough. The controls are a complete hindrance to enjoying this game.

Sound:
The sound consists of pretty basic carnival sounds.

Flow:
The game flows well because you pick what you want to play next. The only place where flow seemed odd is when you select a game you can press A to get passed the long introduction. Up comes the detail screen telling you how to play the game, but in the background is the voice from the long intro. I think it was particularly annoying because it happened every time and seemed to take my concentration away from reading the details on how to play.

Fun Factor:
In each round, you get a chance to spend your tickets to play something really fun. In one area it’s a fortuneteller where you tell your remote what your question is and then she tells you your fortune. Another is a chance to win more tickets by shooting coins and making other coins fall. The mini-games in each area are definitely the highlight of the game.

Female Aspect:
You can play as the mom or the daughter. But there are very limited character models to choose from. The only problem with playing the Woman character is the noises she makes when you play a game that involves throwing. It’s quite annoying as it sounds as if she has to give her whole being to throw a ball.

Replay Value:
The replay value is in playing with friends. Trying to win the stuffed animals gets old after awhile. There are plenty of other mini-game collections if you are really looking for one.

Some people play the Wii because it allows them to do things that normally they couldn’t do physically. If that is you, avoid this game. After 10 minutes of playing this game, my wrist hurt so much it was throbbing. Due to the bad controls you will be throwing, shaking, and lifting more than you would normally need to.