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Even though
Disney/Pixar: Cars may have been released back in
the summer, THQ have seen fit to grace the European launch of Wii
with yet another port of the decent Film tie-in. As the seventh
version of the game reviewed by the
Electronic
Articles
 staff, the Wii issue garners perhaps the greatest
interest from the team. Will this iteration push the boundaries of
game interaction? Or is it time to crack out the GameCube
controllers?
There is good news and bad. While the game does make decent use of
the Wii Remote, this release of
Disney/Pixar: Cars is
fundamentally exactly the same as all the other home console
versions. Players take control of Lightning McQueen and must
complete Mini-Games, Collection Missions and, of course, win Races
in order to progress through the story. The Piston Cup Races provide
a Level Structure to the proceedings, each is unlocked through
earning Medals in the various Missions and completing each Piston
Cup unlocks new Missions for the player until all have been
completed. The structure works well and should keep most of its
target audience busy for at least eight hours, regardless of the
Arcade Modes. The real differences between the last generation and
Wii versions are, predictably, the controls and graphics.
One of the better Third-Party uses of the unique Wii hardware so far
has been using the Wii Remote as a steering wheel and
Disney/Pixar: Cars continues the trend. Holding the Wii Remote
sideways in the NES configuration and tilting it left and right
steers while Button 2 accelerates. The A Button brakes, while the B
Trigger handbrakes, and gesturing upwards sharply jumps. The
controls are slightly disorienting at first, mostly due to habit
formed on traditional controllers, however they do become familiar
quickly and most of the time, are actually
 more fun. While in the
Pit on the Piston Cup Races there are a variety of Mini-Games to be
performed before Lightning is allowed back on the Track. While it
was hoped that these would use the Wii Remote extensively, in actual
fact they are very similar to those on the PlayStation2 version,
with a little added Wii Remote shaking in place of presses of the
Face Buttons, hopefully not the start of a regular Wii habit.
Graphically the game is, at first, on par with the Xbox360 version.
The game seems to run in a higher resolution than its PlayStation2
generation rivals and the cars have a notable Next-Generation gloss
about them. However, unlike its Next-Generation peer, there are
noticeable Frame-Rate problems which do damage the playability of
the title somewhat, nothing too serious, but a shame as the controls
do make the Wii version the best otherwise. The sound is identical
to the other versions, all licensed music, voice and effects from
the film.
Disney/Pixar: Cars is a good game from younger gamers and the
Wii version is no exception, in fact, the new controls make the game
more amusing to play and should entertain children even more than
the other versions. As a launch game,
Disney/Pixar: Cars
isn’t a system seller, but it is one of the better titles due to its
humble but well executed nature.
Wii Sports and The Legend
Of Zelda: Twilight Princess may grab all the headlines, but
solid Third-Party support is what Wii needs to succeed and
Disney/Pixar: Cars is a better start than most so far. |
