Ultimate I Spy – WII – Review

As a kid, if you grew up when I did, I’m sure you remember the
very famous I Spy books. And as I did, you probably spent hours upon hours of
trying to find the items the book told you to find. Well, make no mistake,
Ultimate I Spy for the Nintendo Wii will have you doing the exact same.         

Ultimate I Spy is developed and published by Scholastic, Elastic, and Gusto
Games. This game has over 10 environments where you can spy and search the
areas.  In each environment, you have a list of items you must find in the
environment to beat that stage.  It is very similar to the I Spy books. You can
play each environment four times, and the game throws a different list of items
at you each time. I thought the repeat of environments would get old, but since
the game gives you a different list of items each time, it makes it fun and
enjoyable because you have to search even harder for the items you are given.    

Ultimate I Spy is very reminiscent of a point and click game
you might see on your computer. Of course, this is quite a bit more fun on the
Wii because of the motion sensitive controls. But when you are finding all the
items in each environment, you will use the Wii-mote to point and click at the
items, thus finding them. You also have items you can only find by playing a
mini game in the environment. An example of this would be one of the
environments in which you have to do a magic trick, so you will enter the mini
game by clicking on the magic hat, and doing a trick with the Wii-mote. I was
surprised by the amount of mini games in Ultimate I Spy. Some were good, and
some were pretty bad. The mini games that were very fun to play were Fish Racing
and Fly the Rocket to another planet. Players will find most of the mini games
really fun, but there are some that aren’t good at all. Juggling, music, and the
magic mini games were not good. They seemed pointless at times.  Juggling, you
use the Wii-mote to juggle balls, and you must do it accurately to pass and find
the item. The music mini games were a good concept in theory, but I found that
the drum beats were offbeat from the music, which made it hard to really enjoy
that part of the game. The magic mini games were, again, pretty pointless. They
seemed to be used as a device just to find a certain item on the list, which is
fine if they are fun to play.

Ultimate I Spy is very close to the books in searching and finding items and it
is definitely classic I Spy. As I said before, some of the mini games just
didn’t seem that creative or fun to play. As for the multiplayer portion of the
game it is only on the mini games you unlock after beating some of the puzzle
stages when you find the items. You can only have two players, and in this
aspect, multiplayer is lacking.  

Gameplay: 7.5
Controls work excellent with simple point and click that works well with the
game. The game is enjoyable, but it could get repetitive and boring for some
players.

Graphics:  8.0  
Although the Wii isn’t the powerhouse the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 are,
Ultimate I Spy delivers some pretty and creative environments to search for your
items in.

Sound: 7.5
Ultimate I Spy didn’t have much of a musical score, but it did have sound that
worked with the game.  The in game sound and sound effects through the Wii-mote
were very good, and made mini games more fun to play.

Difficulty: Easy

Concept: 6.5
Although it brought back the classic I Spy fun, it could have used a little more
innovation with the mini games that you play throughout the game.
 
Multiplayer: 6.0  
With only two players being able to play, and only with the mini games, it isn’t
that great of a multiplayer experience.

Overall: 7.0
This game brought back memories of playing I Spy as a kid. It is a game that
would be great for kids of all ages, and adults that remember playing the books.
Although, the game is lacking in its concept and multiplayer, it does deliver
the same experience as the books, which is a very good thing.