At its Games Convention 2007 booth in Leipzig, Germany today, Rockstar revealed the Wii version of Rockstar Presents Table Tennis for the first time. Because the game made its debut on Xbox 360, there have been many questions about how it would transfer to Wii. Naturally, the control scheme seems like an easy fit -- given that it's a tennis game -- but the visuals and online elements can't make the jump quite so easily, so we took a look to see how Rockstar Leeds and Rockstar San Diego are designing the port.
The game has three control schemes. In Standard, players don't need to worry about complex controls involving the Nunchuck and the game works like Wii Sports' tennis -- flip the remote up to start your serve, then swing away to actually hit the ball. You can put your special abilities to work by holding down different buttons, and though it sometimes feels like there's a bit of a delay when swinging, the controls provide a nice simple solution for transferring the 360 game's setup to Wii.
The other two control schemes are Control Freak and Sharp Shooter -- both of which involve the Nunchuck. Control Freak allows you to move your character around with the analog stick on the Nunchuck, while Sharp Shooter uses the analog stick to aim the ball after you hit it.
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| SCREENS: Click the image above to check out all Table Tennis Wii screens. |
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The rest of the game looks to be similar to the 360 game, with the same characters and the same arenas. Visually, it's a clear step down from the 360 version, but it looks quite nice for a Wii game and does a good job of maintaining that game's overall style. Online play is missing from the Wii version, but everything else (minus 360-specific features like Achievements) seems to be intact.
We don't have any word on pricing for the game just yet, but given the 360 version's $39.99 retail price, we wouldn't be surprised to see the Wii game sell for less than a normal title as well. Then again, many players have been asking for a full-fledged tennis title on Wii, so perhaps Rockstar could get away with charging full price. We'll be back with more details on that -- and the rest of the game -- as we can get them, but for now this looks to be pretty much exactly what we expected when we heard Table Tennis was coming to Wii in the first place.
