Super Monkey Ball Step & Roll (Wii)

Gamecow’s Price	RRP $69.95     Save $8.00 $61.95
Availability
Genre	Party Games
Platform	Nintendo Wii
Release Date	11/02/2010
Rated

Super Monkey Ball Step & Roll (Wii) Product Information

With the whole world at your feet, are you ready to roll!?

AiAi and all his friends are stepping onto the Wii Balance Board in an all-new party game for Wii. Super Monkey Ball Step & Roll brings back what you love about Super Monkey Ball and promises plenty of surprises around every turn. Get ready for a whole new level of monkey madness as Super Monkey Ball Step & Roll rolls into your living rooms!

Features 

• Use your Wii Remote or step on to the Wii Balance Board and use your whole body to get your monkey moving!
• New character, Jam, joins the cast of AiAi, MeeMee, GonGon and Baby for more monkey madness!
• 70 all-new mind-blowing puzzle levels have been created to test your skills.
• Work together with friends in the all-new Co-op Mode and blast away obstacles with the Wii Remote to clear a path for your monkey-rolling teammate on the Wii Balance Board.
• Test your stamina in the new Marathon Mode and try to complete all 7 Worlds in one sitting!
• See how well you can memorize each level…and then attempt them all flipped in Mirror Mode.
• Over 20 addictive multiplayer party games including fan favorites such as Monkey Racing, Red Light Green Light and Monkey Target. Also jump into some fantastic brand-new ones including Sky Diving, Sumo Smash and Firefighter!
• Burn "Monkey Calories" by playing the main game using Wii Balance Board. The more you move your body, the more Monkey Calories you will burn! 
• There are dozens of achievements that can be unlocked by collecting bananas and burning Monkey Calories. Can you collect them all?

Source NINTENDO

Super Monkey Ball Step & Roll (Wii) Review

Gameplay for players familiar with the Monkey Ball series is a no-brainer. Move the level surface with into order to roll a little monkey in a ball through a level to a goal, collecting bananas for extra score. "Super Monkey Ball: Step & Roll" has mixed things up a little bit with regard to the levels, with it now offering up a number of ‘Worlds’ (such as Monkey Island, Excavation Site and Chimpansea) each with 10 stages. The levels encompass various different themes and are quite well designed, starting out quite simple and linear and then moving through to more difficult levels with narrow bridges turns and rollercoaster like rises and falls.

The heads-up display offers a clear and uncluttered view of all information pertinent to rolling your monkey. The speed of your ball is displayed are on the bottom right (with balance board weight ‘widget’ on the left). Bananas are strategically positioned around each level and extra score is accumulated by collecting them. Collect twenty bananas and you are rewarded with an extra life. The information relating to the current score and bananas collected in the top right of the screen.

The clear differentiator of "Super Monkey Ball: Step & Roll" from other games in the series is the addition of Balance Board support to the control schemes. Players can choose to select either the traditional Wii Remote control or Balance Board when starting the game, and the score boards reflect the control style used. This is warranted as for all but the extremely gifted balance-boarders, there will be a clear difference between the control styles in terms of scores. Leaning left, right, back or forward will move the level and in turn your monkey ball. The issue with the balance board is that it is overly sensitive and once you get out of rhythm there is a tendency to overcompensate making matter worse. Throw into the mix a camera view that changes perspective to circle your monkey, and things can get frustrating quite fast. Perhaps this could have been addressed by offering an option to adjust the sensitivity.

The impressive number of mini games (which are still rather hit and miss) has been reduced and the agreeable jump mechanics introduced in “Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz” have disappeared in favour of balance board support which doesn’t really deliver because of it’s frustrating implementation. The two player co-op mode puts a new spin on the game-play, but doesn’t hold any real long term appeal. This latest Monkey Ball incarnation does feature some nice graphics and familiar gameplay as well as some innovative (albeit short) mini games which work well with multiple players. Overall it may attract fans of the series who want the novelty of balance board control, but “Super Monkey Ball – Step & Roll” (like its colours and sound effects) is probably best suited to a ‘single digit’ birthday party.

Full review MYWII