It’s a warm summer morning, and the sun is shining. You’re in a good mood, and fancy a trip to the coast. Walking along the promenade with a face full of candyfloss, a stall catches your attention. Two minutes later, you’re the proud owner of a water pistol disguised as a calculator.  It’s a novelty, something that you will get out from time to time when the mood suits you.  And that pretty much sums up Wii Play.

Wii Play isn’t a standalone game.  For £30 you can pick up a Wii Controller (called a Wiimote) and for an extra fiver, you can get Wii Play. Basically it’s a collection of 9 mini games which can be played solo or multiplayer. Once the game loads up, you are greeted by a semi-circular menu of all the available games.  The simple idea of each game is to score as many points as you can, and points in this case mean not prizes, as Bruce Forsyth would have it, but medals, ranging from Bronze to Platinum. So, on to the games then.

First up, you have the Shooting Range. This game consists of five levels, and as the title suggests, it’s all about shooting things.  A cross-hair appears on your screen, and you move it by point your Wii Mote at the screen.  Firing is done via the B button. The levels feature a variety of targets, including clay pigeons, cans and UFOs, among other things. The UFO level features a running theme throughout WiiPlay, which is heavy use of Miis, the Wii avatars that you create to represent you in Mii-compatible games. In this case, the UFOs are trying to capture the Miis, and you have to stop them. Shooting Range is addictive, and easy to master. Because of the simple nature of the game, it’s likely to appeal to young and old alike. 

Next is Find Mii, a very simple yet tricky "observation" game. All you do is identify either identical Miis or odd-Mii-out or the fastest-moving Mii. The Miis can be wearing different coloured clothes, moving around, or even swimming.  It’s an interesting idea, but after a dozen levels, I found myself becoming bored as it became repetitive, with little long-term appeal.

Much better is Table Tennis. Make a serve by pressing the A button, and then hit the ball over the net as many times as you can. Control is particularly sensitive, and I found that once the bat was at
the furthest left or right of the table, keeping the rally going became harder. I would advise using your other hand to support the arm holding the controller, as it makes things a bit easier. Table Tennis is a seriously wicked game. Although simplistic, it’s very addictive, but does require a stiff arm.  Two player mode is even more fun.

Back to the Miis again, with Pose Mii. Perhaps a long distant relative of Tetris, large bubbles containing silhouettes of Miis in various poses float from the top of the screen to the bottom. All you have to do is simply position your Mii inside each silhouette, matching up the pose of your Mii with the one required in the bubble. Pressing the A and B buttons changes the Miis pose. One each silhouette has been matched up, the bubble disappears. If you take too long and the bubble hits the bottom of the screen, you lose a life. Although the game is moderately enjoyable at first, it goes on, and on, and on, eventually becoming repetitive and boring. 

Back on form again with Laser Hockey, which is basically a brighly coloured version of air hockey, which you find in arcades throughout the country. A top down view, you control a strange looking paddle on a vibrant neon-coloured table. Get the puck into your opponent’s goal - simple as that. 
The control is frustratingly sensitive, and the paddle can hit the puck from all sorts of different angles, making it a little tricky to get used to.  Addictive? Most definitely. Brilliant? Oh yes.

Billards, next. The balls are placed in diamond formation, and you have to pot the balls in their numeric value, starting with 1, in the fewest number of shots.  The controller is used almost like a proper snooker cue, except that you use one hand.  You press the B button where you want the cue to hit the cue ball, pull back on the Wii Mote, and then move it forwards, pressing the B button again.  The amount which you pull back and move forward determines how hard the cue ball is hit. It is quite tricky to start off with, but after a few games, you soon get used to the control method.  And it’s really worth it, too, as you really do have complete control over the cue ball - control that quite possibly no other snooker or pool game throughout the history of gaming has been able to replicate. There is an enormous amount of satisfaction to be gained when you clear the table in under ten shots, or potting four balls from your break. Definitely one of the better games in the package.

Time to go Fishing. Holding your Wii Mote, cast your line into the lake.  Wait for the Wii Mote to vibrate, which means the fishing is nibbling.  Pull the Wii Mote towards you, and you’ve caught your fish.  The game is timed and throughout the game, you get an extra bonus for catching a highlighted fish. It’s ok for a laugh, but it’s fun factor quickly wears off.

Charge is quite possibly the strangest game in the compilation. "Cow racing" pretty much sums it up. The game is played with the Wii Mote held horizontally, so that the D pad is in your left hand. Tilt to the left or right, and the cow moves to the left or right. Tilt it forwards and backwards makes the cow accelerate or brake.  A sharp pull up sees the cow jump.  On a single, timed lap, you have to run into as many scarecrows as possible, jumping over fences. It’s good clean fun, and the animation is cute, but there quite simply is no longevity in single player mode.

Finally we come to "Tanks", which is the only game to require control from both the Wii Mote and the Nunchuck. It’s a more-or-less top down view on what appears to be a wooden board with walls.
The idea of  the game is to move the tank around the screen (with the nunchuck) and then shoot the opposing tank (with the Wiimote). By pressing the A button, you can lay a mine. I liked this game, and it had a sort of retro feel to it. There was a similar game on the old Atari games console, well over 25 years ago, and it reminded me of that.

Overall opinion? A mish mash of games, with very little depth, and it’s quite likely that after 30 minutes on most of the games you will have had enough, although more enjoyment can be had from the multiplayer modes.  Wii Play is something that you are likely to play only now and again. The graphics and the sound are far from mind blowing. But one thing that Wii Play does do well is to give a fascinating insight of things to come, and of the potential of the Wii controllers.  Take a look at Tanks for example. Now, translate this into say EA’s Medal of Honour.  You control the soldier with the nunchuck, pressing the B button to run, and the A button to hit the deck, with another press to raise. The Wii Mote is then used to aim the gun and fire. Similarly, couldn’t this use of 2 controllers be used for flight sims? What about Billiards?  That clearly shows how good a full-on pool or snooker game could be.

Wii Play is about getting you used to using the Wii Mote and Nunchuck, but more importantly, showing you and the developers what can be done with the Wii.  It shows you that the control system can take you to another dimension of games playing never seen before. And in this respect, it’s a job well done.