The Wii Sports Resort Island: Then & Now
Here’s a comparison. I was crazy about the retro look of the old island the minute I laid eyes on it three years ago, but I think the new one, though obviously a lot more detailed and of a higher technical quality, looks rather cheap. The layered rock in the old one instantly brought to mind Choco Mountain, and that’s an instant win. Also, the old water was way cooler.
We’ll see how it looks when it’s released a month from now. I am so excited for this game.
I agree that the first image is actually much better looking. I’m a sucker for the surreal styled worlds though what can I say.
Really I just wonder though if the second image isn’t as good cause it’s not the same view as well. I mean the first image has like some distance fade type effect where it looks like it’s far away and natural almost.
The second image is way too crisp actually. So much to the point that it makes it look like a toy model or something. In either case I’m also going to save my final judgments for when I play the game myself.
Only a month now right? July 26th… I kind of find it funny that NA gets the game last even over Australia and Europe. Either way I’m stoked for this, and new bowling as well! It’s pretty lame I’m looking forward to more bowling probably, lol.
TheMaverickk - 06.21.09, 2:19 pm
According to Miyamoto, the island is the same island that you jog on in Wii Fit. He considers it a new “character” like Mario hosting Punch-Out!! and Tennis in the 80’s.
Carl - 06.21.09, 3:21 pm
I was actually thinking about it and there have been a lot of Nintendo games that involve islands…
Star Tropics, Link’s Awakening, Yoshi’s ISLAND, Super Mario Sunshine, Wind Waker, Captain Rainbow, Wii Fit had an island… now we have Wii Sports Resort with the island.
I gotta do some searching on this now even more… I bet there are even more Nintendo titles that have islands in them. If anyone can contribute any other games to the list please do.
TheMaverickk - 06.21.09, 6:16 pm
I definitely prefer the atmospheric effect of the old one, though a part of that is likely the birds eye view. I find the light blue water and slightly washed out colors to give it a much more summery/resort feeling than the more bold and contrasty colors the new island has.
Now that I think of it the light blue and green in the old island remind me a lot of Earthbound. It may be partly because I played that game over the summer, but I always thought they got the colors really spot on for a bright summer day in that game.
peshue - 06.21.09, 9:54 pm
All I can say is, prepare to be disappointed. Whatever the island looks like, there is not going to be enough of it. Nintendo is notorious for being stingy with this sort of content.
In Galaxy, we finally get the chance to fly, and we only get to do it in how many tiny areas? 2? 3? How many did we WANT to fly around in? Pretty much all, Nintendo! Thanks for being stingy with realizing our dream of flight!
What about Pilotwings 64? I suppose they tried their best to fit as much as they could on that little cart, but 4 measly little islands?!?
But mark my words. We will have even less terrain to explore in Wii Sports Resort. In 2009. With DVD-capacity discs. With no excuse.
I’m all for Nintendo in most cases, and I trust their instincts when it comes to game design, but they seriously drop the ball when it comes to taking a great concept and making it EPIC!
What did we all want from Wii Sports? More. Selectable tennis court surfaces. A few changes of scenery. Cosmic bowling. Sooner or later, even the 90-year-olds still playing bowling are going to get bored staring at the same stuff. Give us one of the end lanes once in a while! Anything! You could’ve dimmed the lights and given us glow-in-the-dark bowling balls and still met your production deadlines! Nintendo!
As for Wii Sports Resilotwings, it’s going to be like wishing your favorite director would put out a two and a half hour epic masterpiece, but instead he’s cool with making a really good 88-minute buddy flick. “F/A-18 Interceptor” on the Amiga in 1988 will have more terrain to explore than we’ll have next month. Oh, did I mention to prepare to be disappointed?
Abe Froman - 06.22.09, 4:09 pm
-The fairly detailed texture that they added to the new mountains really clash with the simple trees.
-Notice also the loss of the mini-archipelago stemming from the old islands. Those would be cool to explore. (Is there really exploring in the game? Abe seems to think so. I love exploring in games where its really not necessary! It would be a subtle way to get the “touch generation” into more regular type games… soon they’ll be beating Zelda master quests!!!)
-Island Games: Pilotwings 64, Diddy Kong Racing, much of SMB3
Cheeseball701 - 06.23.09, 7:39 pm
I noticed straight away in Wii Fit that it was the Sports Island. I think it uses the old look? not too sure but i found it to be a way too basic and graphically poor(lazy). If you’re gonna be able to explore it (which i highly doubt, but would be awesome), they’d need to make it more interesting.
Adriaaaaan - 06.24.09, 8:24 am