The Science of Move and Red Steel 2

I can go on quite a tangent on how deeply attracted I am to Red Steel 2's re-imagining of its predecessor by its pleasant concoction of a spaghetti Western, Samurai code sampling, and cel-shaded visuals that wax nostalgic of the seminal Jet Grind Radio, but it does a bit more than that.

More importantly is how it tackles the Wii's — relatively — new Motion Plus attachment. It's not perfect, but it pushes the right buttons for me.

Instead of recreating a first-person shooter/"Star Wars" fantasy that was supposed to hold up to what was happening on the big boy systems like the first Red Steel, Ubisoft took to the drawing board again with RS2 and this time chose to respect the Wii's unique capabilities.

Red Steel 2 relies on the added detection of movements for its sword combat experience. Unlike most Wii games where a simple flick will create the necessary force to launch/kick/punch/eat/bowl your way to success, RS2 demands actual physical exertion.

It may sound exhausting but, outside of a few annoying QTEs transplanted to movement sequences, the real genius is that Ubisoft looked to how games are played differently on Wii than on other consoles.

There are stretches of exploration and "slow" moments in RS2 that magnify the excitement whenever you enter into battles that rarely last more than five minutes at a time. You go in for battle, fight for you life (literally), and then move on to your next quest.

Any particular assignment you take on from the game's mission board will last, at the most, fifteen minutes to complete. It respects your time by giving you a sense of completion relatively quickly and respects your arms' burnout limits as well.

Of the strain-inducing motions you may encounter, they are usually alleviated by the variety of ways you can kill enemies. Tired of consecutively hitting an enemy with strong, red swipe attacks to destroy his shield? Just zip around to his backside and annihilate from that angle.

Now, like I said initially, RS2's motion controls aren't perfect. For example, bosses, like most games, can be incredibly annoying and killing them usually falls back on the same, tired weakness. Otherwise, the game shows that developers are definitely listening to gamer complaints and learning of the particular pros and cons they need to contend with if they choose to develop for Wii.

Red Steel 2 may be seen as the game Ubisoft uses to straddle the line between hardcore and casual but, for the most part, works well enough for the Wii gamer regardless of the type of gamer gang you affiliate yourself with. Supporting it should signal to others devs that they, too, should take a chance on making something good that isn't another Carnival Games title.

Via HawtWired