Big League Sports: Summer Review (Wii)

Wii Sports is fantastic, but it came out in 2006. In other words, it’s time for a new game to step up with a new batch of games.

Attempting to answer that call is Big League Sports: Summer, which has arrived with the old faithfuls -- golf, tennis and baseball -- but also introduces soccer, football and volleyball to round out the card.

And if rounding up mini-games was the only judge of value, then this game would be well done. But it turns out that quality over quantity still holds true.

Gameplay

In Big League Sports: Summer, which is published by Activision, there are 15 mini-games and six sports. Many of the games are very similar to each other, but they have different backdrops -- point, click and swing works in golf, football and baseball. Other games include shaking the Wii remote to push a tackling dummy as fast as possible or turning the controller to the side as you drive your punt return man to the end zone.

Since there are no peripherals tied to your feet, you have to play soccer with your hands. To do so, you simply flick your wrist just like in every other game. You do this flicking motion when you’re stopping shots or playing any of the other 16 mini-games.

The only game that you can play competitively against someone else is volleyball. Volleyball consists of you flicking your wrist any time the ball comes to you, though, you have no real control of where it goes. I must also mention that it’s not fun at all.

You can play the other mini-games with 1-4 people, but the catch is that you must wait your turn. So you have to watch someone else try to kill crabs with golf balls or hit your coach with a frozen rope off the end of the bat -- neither are as fun as they sound -- before getting your turn.

Unlike Wii Sports, I never felt like I was simulating a sports experience; it was more of a torturous exercise in pointing and wrist flicking. Basically if you ever invite your friends to play this game, don’t expect them to answer your calls after that.

Presentation

You know how Thumper had to put Bambi in his place because he was spouting off at the mouth when he didn't have anything nice to say? Well, I can't help myself here. The graphics are bad -- not by Wii standards -- but in general. The developers could stuff these same graphics onto the DS, and you wouldn’t even say they are decent in that forum.

And if you liked creating a Mii and putting him or her to the test, you won’t find that thrill in Big League Sports: Summer. You definitely can create a person to play with, but there are only a few options to tweak. I picked the person that looked most like me, a male with brown hair. If you were to compare the Mii customization options to the ones in Big League Sports: Summer, it would be equivalent to comparing prison food to a five-star Las Vegas buffet.

The music is also grating, the commentary is so generic it hurts, and the sound effects seem to have been pulled out of a Three Stooges routine. The bottom line is that this game was not created for anyone who actually enjoys hearing. I’ve heard the main theme about 30 times, and I’m ready to stand on the runway at an airport just to get that song out of my head.

The menus are at least very Wii Sports-like. That’s probably the best compliment I can give the game at the moment.

Closing Comments

Big League Sports: Summer is not worth your time. After a second go-round you would expect some effort at least. Looks like I was wrong. It’s a $40 collection of terrible mini-games. I wouldn’t consider any of the 16 games worth more than a dollar (many of them considerably less), making this title at least $30 too much. Considering Wii Sports came out almost three years ago, and everyone owns that game already, simply stick with that.

Gameplay: I never thought football, baseball, golf, soccer, volleyball and tennis could be this boring.

Graphics: Bad, but not in the Michael Jackson way.

Presentation: As generic as humanly possible.

Entertainment Value: There is not much to this game.

Learning Curve: If your wrists are functional, you can learn how to play this game in about 30 seconds -- not that it would be a bad thing to have such an easy learning curve, but the game is not a combination of simplistic AND fun.

Online: None to be found, but I wouldn’t want anybody to know I was playing this even if there was.

Score: 2 (Horrendous)