THQ takes it's turn between the inumerous sports games released for the Wii in it's life cycle(and Wii Sports copycats),now in the beach,but will it's sport take a last-second win from all the other competitors,or shall this be left hidden in the sand unnoticed as it should?
Big Beach Sports was released on 2008 as an exclusive Wii game by THQ that apparently is most notable for being its exclusive factor that you can interact the game with a Nintendo DS system,but is it really worth it?
This sports fest includes six sports to choose and play,including volleyball,boules/bocce,American football,soccer,disc golf and cricket.Looking at each of the sports individually,let's analyze how each fair for the game's reception as a hole.
Volleyball is as simple as it can get,yet again,as clunky as it could get here.It controls alright,giving you the requirement to swing the Wii Remote to serve,pass or hit the ball,and sometimes press the A or B button to do so,but feels a bit stiff at times with occasional late responses.It still does play a bit safe and fine.
Boules,for those not aware of the sport,is a wide range of games in which the objective is to throw or roll heavy balls (called boules in France,and bocce in Italy) as close as possible to a small target ball,pretty similar to playing with marbles.Honestly,when I first played this,I had no idea how to play or win points in this,and even if it all made sense after that explanation,the game still wasn't as easy to play.I was still rather confused because the game would sort of force you to swing the Wii Remote more fiercely than expected,and aiming is a bit hard to manage because you can't really zoom in and plan your strategy to get as close as possible to the target ball,unless you remember the spot where the ball landed.Also,I don't think the results for points don't often make a lot of sense.
American Football is most likely to be the worst sport of the six ones included here.It It plays fine as you start throwing the ball,until it becomes a game of luck.Seriously,it does.Because there are only four on the field,divided by two teams,you think if you be simple to just run and avoid being caught by the other two,but that's not it.To run,I don't even know how to do such thing.I try pressing the D-pad to do so,but it always take like two seconds to respond,and because of that,it turns into a game of luck when you're team mate tries to outrun the others from getting the ball.It feels so awkward and messed to have to play like this,admitely.
Soccer is ok,but confusing.You play with three partners of the same team against four other competitors on a mini-field,and you pass or kick the ball by the simple press of some buttons.I thought this one was rather too crowded to play on,and you don't even get to choose yourself to play as the goal defender,so this one is a bit of a mixbag,but still not the one with the worst controls.
Disc Golf is one of the ones I enjoyed the most out of all this so far average package.Basically,as theorized,this is golf with discs.How does it work?You hold the Wii Remote like if you were preparing to throw the disc,depending if you're left or right handed,and throw the object,and of course,like usual golf,you have to worry about your terrain surroundings,as well as the wind's forces and your throw in generall.It may also be one of the funniest ones to play against the CPU,because since you can't switch its difficulty level,I'm used to think that sometimes it plays decently,and other times not.One time,I was playing on one course of this one(there are eighteen holes,and you can change the number of holes you want to play on),and one computer player in particular has sent the disc flying out of bounds into the far oblivious of the ocean.It was a hysterically funny moment,to be fair.The courses themselfs ar pretty simple,and sometimes,the stage hazards like trees can get in the way for some,but not completly ruining the experience.All n' all,it's a fine game to play by yourself or with friends.
Cricket,as for those who don't know,is pretty similar to baseball in almost every sense of the word,and plays fine here,generally speaking.You hold the Wii Remote like a golf club,and swing it when the ball is coming near you by the other team's thrower.Depending on your hit,you'll score four runs(runs are what you could say are this sport's points) if the ball passes the circular field by ground,and six runs if you do a shot very alike like a home-run.It works just fine,even if it does require some getting used to swing the controller at the precise moment for more run points,especially for those who are playing for the first time,where they can miss the ball by swinging at the wrong moment.
Also,I'm not used to talk about a game's graphics(the closest I've gotten to that so far was talking about the animated cutscenes in Professor Layton and the Curious Village),but I feel like I have to point out the game's visuals when something's out of place.The game looks like it would have belonged on the Nintendo 64's Rumble Pack games,and because of that,the game looks pretty mediocre.Character models look like those you would come with in a beta,and they are a bit shiny than usual,and they all do the same four or five victory/lose animations in each sport.In certain times though,they will use the losing victory animation when they win(by doing a facepalm),which makes me think they're just ungrateful for their winning,sadly.Unless they have put solar protection on for their models,than there's no need for that brightness which make them look like plastic,in all honesty.Also,the character design is just ugly.I'm often open for different types of designs and visuals,but this one's case is just passable.
Now,to the last and most likely interesting factor of this game:the Nintendo DS interactivity.It might as well be a disappointing factor here,because all it does is create your own avatar for the game with the full head parts,like eyes,mouth,nose and even ears,and considering the game's looks,I found this to be an useless feature,considering that you can also customize your character(not Miis for assurance) without the DS interactivity in general.
Although some of the sports here are alright with their controls and even fun moments for them,Big Beach Sports is essentially another attempt to reach the success of Wii Sports,but not as entertaining for a long time.To be fair,I heard this is one of the better titles on the category of Wii Sports rip-offs,so if you are somewhat looking for a title similar to that game,this is most likely be one of your best choices if you already have games like Mario Sports Mix and similar games that have more than one sport in their internal memory.In the end,I didn't think this was a bad game per say,but nothing too special to get above the OK rating.Oh well,it did try to be decent at least,compared to others who would have gotten the red card after minutes of gameplay.
Big Beach Sports was released on 2008 as an exclusive Wii game by THQ that apparently is most notable for being its exclusive factor that you can interact the game with a Nintendo DS system,but is it really worth it?
This sports fest includes six sports to choose and play,including volleyball,boules/bocce,American football,soccer,disc golf and cricket.Looking at each of the sports individually,let's analyze how each fair for the game's reception as a hole.
Volleyball is as simple as it can get,yet again,as clunky as it could get here.It controls alright,giving you the requirement to swing the Wii Remote to serve,pass or hit the ball,and sometimes press the A or B button to do so,but feels a bit stiff at times with occasional late responses.It still does play a bit safe and fine.
Boules,for those not aware of the sport,is a wide range of games in which the objective is to throw or roll heavy balls (called boules in France,and bocce in Italy) as close as possible to a small target ball,pretty similar to playing with marbles.Honestly,when I first played this,I had no idea how to play or win points in this,and even if it all made sense after that explanation,the game still wasn't as easy to play.I was still rather confused because the game would sort of force you to swing the Wii Remote more fiercely than expected,and aiming is a bit hard to manage because you can't really zoom in and plan your strategy to get as close as possible to the target ball,unless you remember the spot where the ball landed.Also,I don't think the results for points don't often make a lot of sense.
American Football is most likely to be the worst sport of the six ones included here.It It plays fine as you start throwing the ball,until it becomes a game of luck.Seriously,it does.Because there are only four on the field,divided by two teams,you think if you be simple to just run and avoid being caught by the other two,but that's not it.To run,I don't even know how to do such thing.I try pressing the D-pad to do so,but it always take like two seconds to respond,and because of that,it turns into a game of luck when you're team mate tries to outrun the others from getting the ball.It feels so awkward and messed to have to play like this,admitely.
Soccer is ok,but confusing.You play with three partners of the same team against four other competitors on a mini-field,and you pass or kick the ball by the simple press of some buttons.I thought this one was rather too crowded to play on,and you don't even get to choose yourself to play as the goal defender,so this one is a bit of a mixbag,but still not the one with the worst controls.
Disc Golf is one of the ones I enjoyed the most out of all this so far average package.Basically,as theorized,this is golf with discs.How does it work?You hold the Wii Remote like if you were preparing to throw the disc,depending if you're left or right handed,and throw the object,and of course,like usual golf,you have to worry about your terrain surroundings,as well as the wind's forces and your throw in generall.It may also be one of the funniest ones to play against the CPU,because since you can't switch its difficulty level,I'm used to think that sometimes it plays decently,and other times not.One time,I was playing on one course of this one(there are eighteen holes,and you can change the number of holes you want to play on),and one computer player in particular has sent the disc flying out of bounds into the far oblivious of the ocean.It was a hysterically funny moment,to be fair.The courses themselfs ar pretty simple,and sometimes,the stage hazards like trees can get in the way for some,but not completly ruining the experience.All n' all,it's a fine game to play by yourself or with friends.
Cricket,as for those who don't know,is pretty similar to baseball in almost every sense of the word,and plays fine here,generally speaking.You hold the Wii Remote like a golf club,and swing it when the ball is coming near you by the other team's thrower.Depending on your hit,you'll score four runs(runs are what you could say are this sport's points) if the ball passes the circular field by ground,and six runs if you do a shot very alike like a home-run.It works just fine,even if it does require some getting used to swing the controller at the precise moment for more run points,especially for those who are playing for the first time,where they can miss the ball by swinging at the wrong moment.
Also,I'm not used to talk about a game's graphics(the closest I've gotten to that so far was talking about the animated cutscenes in Professor Layton and the Curious Village),but I feel like I have to point out the game's visuals when something's out of place.The game looks like it would have belonged on the Nintendo 64's Rumble Pack games,and because of that,the game looks pretty mediocre.Character models look like those you would come with in a beta,and they are a bit shiny than usual,and they all do the same four or five victory/lose animations in each sport.In certain times though,they will use the losing victory animation when they win(by doing a facepalm),which makes me think they're just ungrateful for their winning,sadly.Unless they have put solar protection on for their models,than there's no need for that brightness which make them look like plastic,in all honesty.Also,the character design is just ugly.I'm often open for different types of designs and visuals,but this one's case is just passable.
Now,to the last and most likely interesting factor of this game:the Nintendo DS interactivity.It might as well be a disappointing factor here,because all it does is create your own avatar for the game with the full head parts,like eyes,mouth,nose and even ears,and considering the game's looks,I found this to be an useless feature,considering that you can also customize your character(not Miis for assurance) without the DS interactivity in general.
Although some of the sports here are alright with their controls and even fun moments for them,Big Beach Sports is essentially another attempt to reach the success of Wii Sports,but not as entertaining for a long time.To be fair,I heard this is one of the better titles on the category of Wii Sports rip-offs,so if you are somewhat looking for a title similar to that game,this is most likely be one of your best choices if you already have games like Mario Sports Mix and similar games that have more than one sport in their internal memory.In the end,I didn't think this was a bad game per say,but nothing too special to get above the OK rating.Oh well,it did try to be decent at least,compared to others who would have gotten the red card after minutes of gameplay.
Rating:
Mediocrity at best,almost getting an out penalty.
Mediocrity at best,almost getting an out penalty.
