GOTY:2011

I was really struggling to recall any stand out gaming experience this year. There were plenty of polished experiences but nothing that particularly blew my mind. UNTIL LAST NIGHT!

We treated ourself to Wii Play Motion, partly for a sexy red controller to match our sexy red classic controller but also to finally get on the Wii Motion train almost two years after it came out, now that Zelda makes the accessory worth owning. Before, this list didn't seem to justify the purchase.

We were big fans of Wii Play especially Tanks!, in fact we think there are only 41 games better than it in existence. So we were quite looking forward to Wii Play Motion. Don't get us wrong there are some rum games in the pack and the experience is severely hampered if you don't have more than one Wii Motion Plus controller. Sometimes rather unnecessarily, a number of the games could easily have been pass the controller multiplayer. However, Star Shuttle is phenomenal and we wish there was a whole game of this stuff. The concept is simple; you and your Mii buddies are putting together a spaceship or station and you have to manoeuvre your little shuttle carrying bits into the proper orientation and then dock them to the ship. The genius bit about the game is that you can control your shuttle in 3D space using six directions of thrusters. At first it can be quite tricky but then after a while your brain clicks with the game and I found myself pulling off all sorts of crazy near misses and daring stunts all in the name of perilous space station construction. Stop for one moment to think about what you are doing with your hands though and it all falls apart. That's a special kind of gameplay sweet spot, especially with the Wii Motion Plus concept when the control design just works and couldn't have been achieved without motion controls. I love it, it makes me miss Colony Wars and Astrolander and wish there was a full game of precision space station building. I haven't explained it very well at all but GOTY 2011. Fact. YEAR OUT..