Penny Racers Party
Ages: Everyone

I tested the game on all difficulty levels and was able to play all the levels rather well. I've never played a racing game, so to do well (coming in first, most times) on all four levels tells me it's probably pretty easy. The controls are simple - hold the remote horizontally and steer as you would a car - button 1 brake, button 2 accelerate are basically all you need, and the Wii response is good.

You can pick from several vehicles and customize different features. After trying a few out, it was obvious that the type you picked did make a difference in how well you did in the race. There are over 50 plus short snub nosed toy versions of Nissan, Honda, Mazda, MX5, S-800, plus oddities like a kart, a school bus, trucks. Customization takes place in the garage and is paid out of your winnings. The courses each had a good variety of obstacles as well as house-type scenery - a bedroom, garden, attic. It had a tutorial which was quite handy in allowing you to quickly understand the remote commands. There are three race modes - mini race - just for fun, single player - for upgrades, multi player - for 2-4 players. Race stats are clearly displayed on screen - laps, course map, energy gauge, speed and your place.

It took three of us to finally be able to start the game. The manual says to start the game - press that A Button - nope. While this is pretty standard practice and then, once in the game, you may get instructions on the specific controls. Not so in this case - you had to hold the remote horizontally and press the 2 button to start the game. The other problem was the choice of typeface which was illegible - even on the large projected screen, and made picking out the vehicle and the various customizing options difficult. Otherwise the game was fun and very suited to the penny racing crowd.

Fun Factor: Easy racer
Player Friendly: May have problem starting game

Reviewed by: Adison Garzon - 12/08