I am an “older” gamer. I got back to gaming because of Pac Man World and Crash Team Racing.

I thought CTR was one of the greatest games ever. I have tried to find simialr games since and nothing came close until Cars - Maternational!

You drive around the main town going from race to race and mini games. Unclocking new races and courses as you progress.

The mini games that I have played so far are:
1. a game of tag - reminds me of Smugglers Run
2. relay races - you drive three different cars during a race.
3. match the beat. you have to hit the keys on the controllers to a beat to earn a flag.
4. Dont run out of gas - you have to race around the track three times without runing out gas. there are gas tangs spread out and you have to hit the right ones.

The only thing missing is there is no crates to crash to get new powerups and such but it works well without it!

I was searching for a game that my 4 year old can play on the Wii, since most of the popular games are aimed at older players. The draw was that the Wii remote can be used to steer the car like a steering wheel, rather than using the nunchuk. Nunchuk steering is a little tricky. Setting up to steer with the remote is not obvious. The sequence is the following:
(1) plug in the nunchuk
(2) main menu
(3) options
(4) player one/two controls. Control settings are shown.
(5) choose “preset 2″.
From then on, that remote has to be held sideways, and the nunchuk can be disconnected.

The difficulty for young kids is that the accelerator is all or nothing (e.g. you can’t have the pedal half-way down). so, it’s a little tricky for them to learn how to go at a reasonable speed that allows steering accuracy. But the game is very forgiving as crashing into things does not do major damage, other than time lost in recovering.

We’ve noticed weirdness where plants protrude thru cars and such. But not a major issue. The game is fun for older kids. But this is not the game for younger players.

My daughter is learning to use the wii with this game. And loving the stories along the way.

When we were looking for a new Wii game for our daughter we ran across this game. It got such rave reviews we decided to get it since she loves stories. I must say part of me did question if it would be good for a girl given the picture of the dad and son on the cover. Well, the 4 stories are all more suited for a boy. My daughter was not interested at all. I would have appreciated knowing the stories on the game before hand, too. This would helped in my decision making, too. Later we did find a similar game with a mom and daughter on the cover. Sadly, that did not get good reviews. Very disappointed.

Not only is it interactive (child is asked, about once every 10 still pictures, to complete a task with the Wiimote), but it is flexible.

Parents can choose to have the voice talent read the story or you can turn the option off and read the story for your child.

While there is a robust Options menu (volume, subtitles, page turning, sound effects), it’s a shame that the subtitle size can’t be changed. Bigger text would help the younger kids with word recognition.

With each of the four stories lasting about 15-20 minutes (depending on how fast your child is able to handle the interactive tasks), this can potentially be a fun bedtime routine alternative to the standard story time.

Lastly, I found the stories to be non-violent, inclusive and respectful of diversity.

Man, I never write reviews, but this game is just too cool. Especially once I saw that people were dissing it, I had to throw my two cents in. I don’t understand how someone could say something negative (or even neutral) about this game! It is so much fun! Yes, a few of the mini-games (like Trombone) are awesome in theory, but don’t really work in practice. But there are FIFTY of them!! AND - they are all UNLOCKED from the get go! That is SO awesome! Some of the games require you to get really into it as well. I love that! One of the mini-games has you flying like a bird through rings, and I couldn’t get the controls to work right until I started flapping my arms like a bird. Yes, FLAPPING MY FREAKING ARMS LIKE A BIRD!! I’m a 30 year old man with two kids and a hot wife and I own businesses and I’m flapping two controllers like a bird in my living room. NINTENDO Wii IS THE GREATEST THING EVER!!
***A WORD TO THE CURIOUS***
Almost all of the negativity I’ve heard about the Wii and/or its games comes from hardcore gamers. They are used to pushing buttons to hit a homerun, and getting their thumbs to do everything. But with Wii (and Super Monkey Ball and its mini-games), if you want a better backhand, you’ve got to practice your backhand! My videogame-illiterate wife picked up this game and is just having a blast with it! It is very intuitive, especially to those that have little experiences to marr their Wii adventures. New wine fits better in new bottles, to paraphrase a biblical passage.
Also, I should point out that the regular Monkey Ball game is better than ever, too. It takes a second to adapt if you’re familiar with the old games, but using the Wii controller is so much more fun. Also, you can jump now! In closing, my favorite mini-game is a racing game in which you turn your Wii controller sideways and drive it like a steering wheel!! It really changes the whole game experience. Once everybody gets used to this way of gaming, Xbox and Playstation don’t stand a chance. Who cares if the graphics are great if you still hit a button with your thumb to swing your sword? And this game is the best game to experience Wii that I’ve played (which I realize only includes Zelda and Wii Sports, but still). If you have doubts, rent it first. But don’t listen to the skeptics - you’ll love it once you get a taste. Trust me. I usually sell games a week after buying them, but this one isn’t for sale.

I was a little disappointed with Super Monkey Ball. It has a main game, and 50 mini-games. The main game is quite fast paced and fun, however, it is a little too simplistic to justify the cost of a full game. Supposedly the 50 mini-games should make up for it. However, these mini-games are so difficult to control to be any fun. After playing Wii Sports, I just cannot get used to the awkward gaming experience Super Monkey Ball has to offer.

The problem with games like Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz is that you have rabid fans of the series - some who love them no matter what, and others who hate any slight change, no matter how small.

That means that no matter how well or poorly the Wii version was, those who loved the game on previous platforms will either hate it for changing - or love it because it has the same theme.

Let me first say that I love the Super Monkey Ball series in general. I grew up playing the actual marble game - Labyrinth - that this is based on. In the Monkey Ball games, there is a marble (holding a monkey) that rolls around on a surface. You tilt that surface via the controls, to move the marble. Your aim is to gather up bananas, avoid obstacles, stay on course and reach the goal. There are both the main game path, which involves trickier and trickier courses to navigate, as well as mini-games.

With the Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz version for the Wii, you get an entirely new level of interactivity. In essence it’s becoming more “real”. In previous versions you pressed buttons to tilt the board - but now you are actually *tilting* the controller. You’re in essence playing with a real board, with a real marble. You tilt your controller forward, the marble rolls forward. It is incredibly intuitive.

For some people, like me, this is great. It’s no longer a button press “translating” into motion. Your hand is causing the motion. I can hand the controller to anybody that comes into my house, show them the game, and they get it immediately. It’s physics, it’s beautiful.

While this is great, it also means that it gets challenging for really little kids. They don’t have great hand-eye coordination yet. While they might be OK with button pressing, they aren’t wonderful at holding a controller steady to guide a marble along a path. They probably aren’t playing professional soccer either. I’m not saying this is “bad” - but I’m saying it’s something you have to accept. The challenge level of this game is fine for kids in the intro levels, but the later levels are meant to challenge talented gamers. Little kids might feel stumped here. They can always replay those earlier levels to try to get all the points there, and practice their skills until their bodies catch up.

In addition to the main gameplay path, there are 50 mini-games. This is of course a huge number, but as with any new release, some are upset that their previous favorites are altered. That’s going to be true with any new game. I have to agree that some mini-games here aren’t my favorites. I specifically don’t like the games like the “harpoon” games that make me “thrust” my spear into fish. I don’t find that thrusting motion with the Wii to be very accurate. On the other hand, I love some of the other games. That’s why they give you 50 of them - you’ll like some, dislike others. I’m sure other people love the fish game and hate some of my favorites. If you’re fond of some of the previous GameCube mini-games, heck, stick the GameCube game into the Wii to play them. The Wii takes the older discs, after all.

In general the graphics are quite nice, bright and colorful. The music also strikes the right note of fun and casual gameplay. The real beauty of this series - and the Wii controllers - is that you can get anybody to walk into your house and within minutes they grasp what is going on and play along. You can’t say that for most XBox 360 or PS3 titles, or even for several other of the Wii games we own. I really do give Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz great kudos for what they have here. If I had any complaint, it’s that they might have wanted to add a “super easy” mode so that little kids could play through the entire game even if they lacked coordination. This is one of those super-kid-friendly games and while it could allow adults to cheat, I think the benefit to little tykes to “get through the game” and be happy would be worth it.

Our kids enjoy this game - they really love Ford trucks, to it was an easy choice. The controls are simple to learn and two can race against each other. The Wii Wheel is helpful for younger players, although not required. Much of the features come locked, so it only got 4 stars.

I would not recommend this game as the steering controls are terrible making the game too complicated and too frustrating to play -