The 2016 Olympics in Rio are in full force! Many TV channels are talking at length about the many, many competitions that have been taking place since August 5th. Obviously, there’s money to be made with the Olympics in the video game industry as well, and thus Nintendo jumped on the occasion in 2008. After all, the Wii’s motion-detector controls would certainly allow the gamers to get more active, right? There are many other games out there that force the player to get up and exhaust themselves in front of the TV, but this one managed to separate itself from the others by featuring already-famous video game characters: The Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games series. With one game released every two years, for both summer and winter Olympics, this had to be a winning decision!
But wait… why Mario and Sonic, exactly? Well… there
can be many reasons to bring the rivalry between these two mascots into the
Olympic Games. For starters, Mario and his crew have always loved to play
various sports, from the NES era to now. Golf, go-karting, tennis, baseball,
soccer, hockey… The list goes on. As for Sonic’s franchise, it’s a lot less
prone to make spin-offs based on sports, and they practice very few sports
outside of those that requires speed – like the Sonic Riders series. However,
the characters of the Sonic series are a lot more active, in a way. They
explore, they climb walls and jump left and right all the time, Sonic almost
does parkour in some games… The Sonic crew is physically active, even the less
action-oriented characters, which makes them perfect for a sports competition.
Doesn’t explain how Eggman’s body allows him to keep up with everyone else,
though.
Then, there’s also Mario and Sonic’s rivalry spanning
decades already. This is a clash everyone wanted to see, the battle to end all
battles… as a 100-Meter race, a trampoline skill match, a javelin-throwing
competition…. Hey! Where’s the Fight To End All Fights between these two giants
of the gaming industry? Oh, you’ll get one… as long as you don’t mind it being
a fencing duel. If you want to see these two duking it out, pop in Smash Bros.
for Wii U/3DS, or Brawl. These video game mascot Olympics will be as friendly
as can be. Probably as a way to avoid tipping the balance on a side or another,
seeing as both the Mario and Sonic fandoms would be convinced that their side
steamrolls the other in an actual fight. Never underestimate the power of
fanboys to argue all day on who would win in a hypothetical scuffle. Everyone
here has been given stats preventing them from reaching the full potential they
exhibit in their home series – in particular folks like Sonic and Shadow, who
were considerably slowed down. You can lose a 100-meters race while playing as Sonic here,
how unbelievable is that?
Alright, enough discussion, let’s jump right into the
game. There’s not a plot to speak of, so I’ll mostly go over the different
modes and competitions. When you open a save file, you type a name and then
choose a country of origin, the country to represent at the Games, and then we
get to the menu.
Knuckles is determined to get some medals. Or at least retrieve the Chaos Emeralds |
Single Match mode is split in nine categories:
Athletics (Track and Field), Gymnastics, Shooting, Aquatics, Fencing, Table
Tennis, Rowing, Archery and Dream Sports. The latter three must be unlocked
through Circuit mode. When you play for the first time, there are 12 sports
available.
Athletics,
Track: 100m, 100m Hurdles.
Athletics,
Field: Long Jump, Triple Jump, Hammer Throw, Javelin Throw.
Gymnastics: Trampoline.
Shooting: Skeet.
Aquatics: 100m Freestyle, 4X100m Freestyle.
Fencing: Individual Epée.
Table
Tennis: Singles.
As you move forward in Circuit mode, you unlock 12
additional competitions.
Athletics,
Track: 400m, 4X100m Relay, 400m Hurdles.
Athletics,
Field: High Jump, Pole Vault.
Gymnastics: Vault.
Rowing: Single Sculls.
Archery: Archery (Of course; did you expect knitting?)
Dream
Sports: Dream Race, Dream Platform, Dream Fencing, Dream
Table Tennis.
"I am in a dream! So I can go and be faster than everyone else!" |
Yes, I know, Pokémon Go exists now, we can actually go
play video games outside and exercise. But Pokémon Go will make your feet and
legs sore, and besides Pokémon Go sucks. The Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games series will make your
arms very, very sore. This game is extremely demanding to your arms, as very
frequently what you’ll be doing is this:
That’s three very different sports, but they all need
the same thing: That you move your arms up and down very quickly. All sports
that require running or swimming for part of it will demand these movements.
Long Jump, Triple Jump, Pole Vault, Aquatics 100m and 4X100m Freestyle, all
Track Athletics… I think this game is more exhausting than any Just Dance game
in that regard. I will probably talk more about this problem later.
Circuit Mode is divided in 16 courses, split over
three classes (difficulties): Beginner (5 circuits, 3 sports each), Advanced (5
circuits, 4 sports each) and Master (6 circuits, 5 sports each). You need to be
good at every sport if you want to get the gold medal, as you get points based
on your ranking after each sport and your total at the end defines your overall
ranking for that circuit. It’s similar to Mario Kart in that regard, except
with various sports instead of go-kart racing. You can also build your own
circuit out of all the sports unlocked thus far, or have one created at random
Sonic is ready to win it, or lose and never live it down for the rest of his hedgehog life. Luigi is already setting his death glare into motion. |
As for why all 16 characters are available from the
get-go, it’s fairly simple; some sports in this game need to put the characters
in four teams of four; among others, this applies to the 4X100m Freestyle, which
is available as soon as you start playing, or 4X100m Relay, which is unlocked
in Circuit Mode. A competition cannot be played with less than the required
number of participants, after all! Other events pit eight characters: The one
you chose and seven picked at random among the roster. Some others, mostly the ones that are arranged like a mini-tournament (like fencing or table tennis), only star your character and three more.
When you’re about to play a sport, before the
competition you may choose to check the instructions again. It’s a nice touch,
since very few sports work exactly the same way, and there are definitely some
things you don’t pick up on your first try. You’ll also notice that many sports
can be played either with the Wii remote and Nunchuk, or with the Wii remote alone;
personally, I prefer using the Wiimote-Nunchuk combo.
You’ll also notice that in many sports, mostly the
ones about running or swimming, there’s an additional rule; on the starting
line, you must hold down B to build up speed before the race. I guess it’s a
good idea, it may allow you a better chance at winning… the problem is that,
when the “Go!” signal appears, you need to shake down the Wii remote, then
start shaking your arms. If you miss the timing, you can be at a
disadvantage, so the start of a race is always risky. I can see though why they implemented that, as having a good start is also extremely important in real-life Olympics. Not a big fan of that,
but it could be worse.
Stupid Exhaustion Meter. Even if I understand the idea, it still annoys me. |
Another issue with the controls in the game is how
some sports demand near-perfect precision in when and how to press buttons or
move the remotes. I mean, it requires rhythm game reflexes in order to work. An
example of when: In High Jump, when your character is jumping over the bar set
to at least 2.20 meters, you have to move up the Nunchuk so that the character
pulls their legs upwards to avoid hitting the bar. Problem is, as the bar
rises, the time window to accomplish this becomes smaller and smaller, and it
does so far too quickly. Same goes for the Long Jump and Triple Jump, both
competitions in which much of your success lies in jumping at exactly the right
moments, jumping a first time without stepping over the line (or else it’s a
foul), and then jumping twice again in Triple Jump. Damn do I hate those.
Weirdly enough, I have no problem with Pole Vault and consider it one of my
favorite sports in the game, because it has next to none of these strict timing
issues forced on the gameplay. Same goes for sports where you have to raise the
Wii Remote at one point, except you can’t raise it too quickly or else you get
a penalty.
Those are actually Knuckles' missions. But once again, Mario can't help but be a goddamn show-stealer. |
If that’s not enough, in Gallery Mode you can play
five mini-games; beating a mini-game in that section teaches you some nice bits
of trivia about the Olympic Games., whether it’s the games overall, the recent
Olympics, the 2008 Beijing Olympics precisely, the Olympics of the Greek
antiquity, and info about the athletes. It’s all very interesting, as long as
you don’t mind playing mini-games that have nothing to do with the actual
sports. Hey, did you know the original Olympics forbade women from
participating and all participants were completely naked? We’ve come a long way
since Ancient Greece, haven’t we?
Of course Yoshi is the best! He flutters! He cheats! |
The Options menuy has only three options: Change name,
change flag, change icon. The icon is selected among the trophies you’ve won
while playing through Circuit Mode.
Alright, that’s all there is to this game… Do I like
it? Heck yes. It’s a challenging game that offers good workout for one’s arms,
seeing how often you have to shake them quickly. At the base, it’s a very good
idea that offers more spotlight on the Nintendo characters for the Sega fans,
and more spotlight on the Sega characters for the Nintendo fans. Show of hands,
who among you Mario fans knew about Vector? Who among you Sonic fans knew about
Daisy? Giving both franchises an equal chance to shine is exactly how it should
have been done, and that’s what they did. That was the right way to go!
Offering a wide range of sports allowed for a
multitude of gameplays, some very similar, some very different. Some sports
start with the same basic controls, then switch it up. Some sports require
pressing a lot of buttons, while others can be won without ever pressing a
button. A lot of creativity there.
Granted, as I explained higher, there are some
gameplay mechanics that bug me here or there. Many sports with an “exhaustion”
meter, as I would like to call it, tend to be annoying. The opponents’ AI can
also be quite infuriating as you cannot set a difficulty for them anywhere.
That would have been a nice touch as, in some sports, the AI characters are
really good, often too good for a human player, even with practice. This may
become a problem in the later Circuits, where your overall performance depends
on your ranking in every sport of the Circuit. Eighth place in Triple Jump?
Tough luck! Power through, or start over! Thankfully, most sports are enjoyable
and don’t have these issues, so you can enjoy them without any problem.
It offers a nice selection of characters (though a few
more could have also been nice), and contains great bonus material. Enough
medals, trophies and crowns are there to be earned for the people who love to
put their all into completing a game. If it weren’t for the gameplay issues, I
would absolutely love this game. That’s one reason I don’t play it as often as
I could, the other reason being that it hurts my arms more than any Just Dance
game ever has.
In the end, it’s just the first one in the series. Another Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games would be released for the 2010 Vancouver
Winter Olympics, one for the 2012 London Olympics and another one for the 2014 Sochi
Winter Olympics. The game for the 2016 Rio Olympics came out in June this year.
I read on the Mario Wiki that Birdo, Donkey Kong, Rouge and Silver were planned
for this first installment but were removed. The following installments would
add many more characters from both sides, with all of them available for the
Rio games, either on the Wii U version or the Nintendo 3DS version. The
editions after this one contained many other sports, such as boxing, BMX,
Equestrian, football, volleyball, discus throw, uneven bars, rhythmic ribbon,
synchronized swimming, and of course many more Dream Sports. So if you don’t
want to check out the first Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games, I
understand; as the first in the series, it has flaws. It’s really good, but
flawed. I do suggest that you check out the next games in the franchise,
they’re worth it! Do check this one too, if the franchise ends up interesting
you enough.
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