Aside from the rather stellar adaptation of Resident Evil 4 for Wii, last Tuesday there was an influx of a couple more Gamecube titles released on the Wii with Pikmin and Mario Power Tennis. Obviously Nintendo continues its profiteering with a trend of re-releasing titles. Of course, none of that holds a candle to the cash cow Nintendo is reaping in with distributed ‘shovel-ware’ and brand marketing muscle ‘casual appeal’ of the Wii.

Having played Pikmin, I can readily say it is worth the thirty dollar price point, as I can only imagine the Wii Remote improving the interface of this fantastic strategy action title. Pikmin is a game where you enslave a small race of cute critters and use them to collect your broken spaceship. Throughout Pikmin, you sacrifice the pikmin to save yourself from larger beasts. I found much to enjoy years ago on the GameCube release and would recommend it to anyone looking for another Shigeru Miyamoto title (creator of Mario, Donkey Kong, and Zelda). Not only that, Pikmin is kid friendly, so you can play it with your little sister or other youngsters around. This all of course omits one of its major downfalls, that of being single-player only, as I feel the title would have benefited greatly from a co-operative multiplayer. Do steer clear however if you’re afraid the cutesy little fellows swarming over strawberry colored beasts will hurt your pride or your image.

Mario Power Tennis… I hear It was a fun game, and it involves tennis, sure to appeal to all the casual gamers that own a Wii, although judging from some of Gamestop’s clientele, many wouldn’t see why they should get another tennis game aside from Wii Sports. Garnering from the rather negative reviews, with a Metacritic score of 70 for the Wii rendition (with the original at the much more palatable 80), they apparently dumbed down the port in this effort. Mario Tennis used to be worth much more in terms of game play and depth before they gutted it in this version; nothing much stops that mass market simplicity goal by Nintendo which rewards the inept and caters to the passerby. With lackluster views on the newest Mario Power Tennis release, a new Wii Motion Plus enhanced sequel will probably never come to fruition.

Wii Motion Plus is in line to be bundled at release with Wii Sports 2, a.k.a. Wii Sports Resort, which still has a TBA release date. I imagine the team which created Star Wars Clone Wars: Lightsaber Duels will never forgive Nintendo for omitting the little detail of this upcoming peripheral, as a 1 to 1 ratio on motion controls seems too perfect for a lightsaber dueling title. At any rate, be prepared to fork over even more money for peripherals for the Wii system that should have been included in the box. Seeing as much of the motion control in so far is used in a manner which is unforgivably loose and imprecise, I’m mildly positive about the upcoming addition of Wii Motion Plus, as I know, tighter controls would allow me to appreciate the Wii remote to a much greater extent.

Nintendo’s lack of care or communication with outside parties brings up the question of how much Nintendo cares about the quality of non-Nintendo titles, or even whether or not Nintendo’s very own franchises will see the polish they deserve. I’ve yet to see a GameCube controller option on my Wii Zelda Twilight Princess. I’d rather my wrist didn’t have to do the talking and Link’s sword cut with timing and precision. In addition, I find a small headache building up just trying to play Smash Brothers Brawl online. Lackluster communication and support on Nintendo’s part in these matters is quite disappointing.

Nintendo is insulting gamers with its low-quality and tarnished redressing of their titles. If Nintendo was paying attention, they’d realize that titles which cater to both worlds can be their best sellers, an example being how Smash Brothers Brawl manages to acknowledge all realms of gamers (even with the shoddy and almost unforgiveable online support). However, as it will probably continue to be easier to sell the Mario Kart/Wii-Fit/Wii-Play/Wii Sports in the world, each with their own gimmicky peripheral item, we will probably see the gamer catered to few and far between by Nintendo. I’ll be speaking with my money and endeavoring to not buy undeserving games, even though that may mean that my Wii will collect an awful lot of dust in the meanwhile.

For now, I look forward to seeing how Muramasa: The Demon Blade turns out from Vanillaware this July (made by the creators of the well-received action RPG Odin Sphere for PS2). Until then, I guess I have the new beat-em-up Mad World to play. Other than that, I should pull out an SNES for my Nintendo fancy.