Wario Ware: Smooth Moves Review – Nintendo Wii

Wario Ware uses the Wiimote exclusively. If your nunchuk is attached to the Wiimote when you begin the game, Wario Ware kindly asks you to remove it. Also, Wario Ware has its own disclaimer warning you to make sure that damn wrist strap is fastened tight. So, if you didn’t get it once when you turned on the system, make sure you get it now. I don’t want any more mentally challenged Neaderthals complaining that they ruined their 50″ plasma screen while playing Wario Ware. If you’re stupid enough to launch your Wiimote into the TV, you shouldn’t be allowed in public without a helmet.

Anyways, the “form baton” (as the Wiimote is called in this game) is used to win the minigames. You must learn a variety of secret moves to advance through the levels, and each one is taught to you in an interesting way.

When it is time to learn a new move, a dopey voice like the narrator from a meditation tape comes on and explains how to use the form. Before each minigame begins a picture of the form is displayed on the screen incase you forget what you’re supposed to do. Forms range from the elephant to the waiter, handlebars, remote, punch in the face, finger food, and sketch artist.

There are many many moves to discover in Wario Ware, and the new moves keep the game content interesting. The minigames turn into sessions of “simon says” as you complete tasks using the given form.

The amount of minigames that you must win per level increases with the difficulty of the storyline. As the player continues to learn new moves, the new and old are incorporated together to make longer and longer sequences. Some of the minigames mimic those you have done previously, but usually there is some small change in them. For example, you may cut a log several times, but the design in the middle is never the same. It is refreshing when familiar minigames come on, as the player already knows what they have to do to win it.

This leads me into my only gripe about the game. It is sometimes incredibly difficult to figure out what you must do in 5 seconds to complete the minigame. The game tells you which form you must use and gives you some vague instructions (shred the paper!), but other than that you are left to figure it out for yourself.

Sometimes you win the game by accident, and swinging the controller wildly is the only way to figure out how to make the controller move correctly. This became irritating to me after awhile, and often I’d lose the story just because I couldn’t figure out how to pick the giant nose on the screen.