After checking out a few DS games, our friends from Nintendo had pulled out and set-up the Wii (trust me, you don't leave anything sitting out in one of these trailers when you're driving, unless you want it in pieces).



First up was Wii Fit Plus, the follow-up to the absurdly successful Wii Fit. Despite the Plus in the name, this game doesn't make any use of the Motion Plus peripheral, much to my chagrin. Despite that, I think Nintendo took the right route with this. After establishing a pretty solid base of what the Wii Balance Board can do in the first installment, there isn't too much entirely new to add to the experience. With that in mind, Nintendo is making this version of Wii Fit only $19.99 without the Balance Board.

There's enough refinement here that it looks like it would be a good investment for anyone that uses Wii Fit regularly. The number of mini-games has expanded quite a bit; I tried one that has you in a chicken suit, flapping from platform to platform. Let's not start the "and boy are my arms tired!" jokes, though. I was pretty terrible at the game, though I suspect playing it on terra firma instead of a shaking trailer might yield better results. I'm worried what passers-by might've thought. I hope they didn't think we were playing Dance Dance Revolution in there or something.



Aside from mini-games, the exercise menu has been streamlined quite a bit. Instead of going out and picking your exercises one-by-one, you can setup a personalized menu or even just have the game auto-generate a menu based on how long you want to work out. I'll be curious to try it at length and see how much a difference it makes in the quality of the workout.

Brent also mentioned that you can use the Balance Board to weigh your pets and such, but I opted not to go outside and grab the nearest raccoon for testing.

Finally—finally!—we moved onto the big one. You know what you've been waiting for. New Super Mario Bros. Wii! At about this time, John from Drunken Gamers Radio joined us. Brent, John and I tried out a few of levels that offered the most variety, and I'll say that of the four demos, this one more than any other left me wanting more.

I believe this is the build that was present at E3. There were a number of unrelated levels meant to show off the game's new features. With three players on the screen, the screen was in total chaos. I'll admit I lost track of my character a few times, but the fun of the cooperative play more than made up for it.

As you race through the levels with your friends, you can jump off them to get some extra air, pick them up and throw them or even jump on a Yoshi and inhale one of your buddies before floating over a particularly large gap. Aside from Yoshi, we tried out a few new items. First was the propeller hat. Controlled by hefting the Wii remote into the air to get the beanie propeller going, this hat gives some impressive air to its wearer. The penguin suit, which will stand well next to the Bee and Tanuki suits in the Mario hall of fame, lets you slide down hills on your belly and shoot iceballs at your enemies. Even cooler, it turns them into a block of ice—-a convenient platform that will make for some interesting situations. In one level, we went underground and hopped on a boat with a spotlight. The light's direction is controlled by the first player on, letting them decide whether to point the light at something useful or to make their friends' lives as difficult as possible.



As many stories on the internet have described, this game is brutally hard. If it isn't an entire level of rocking platforms, it'll be some of the most precise jumps you've ever had to make in a Mario game—-or any game for that matter. Those of you that go through Super Mario World with hundreds of lives will have a lot to do here between surviving and mastering levels and finding all the secrets. As hard as the game is, we didn't get to check out the auto-play mode, which only kicks in during single player when you fail the level enough times and go into the menu to turn it on.

Every level we played reminded me what it is I like about Mario games and about multiplayer. This is the game Mario fans have been waiting for. As fun and gorgeous as Mario Galaxy is, this is pure, visceral platforming with carefully crafted levels and what's going to make for a very addictive multiplayer.

As much as people (me) complain Nintendo doesn't release enough games, this Holiday season looks like it'll have enough to keep any gamer happy.