This game is a less than 1 star game, don't waste your money
If you like the pool game that came on the Wii Play, then don't bother. This game sucks! I only paid [...] for it and I wish I hadn't. It is way too hard to figure out how to play and it is nothing but frustrating. Don't be tempted to buy it because it is the only pool game out there. Even then it is a complete waste of your time and money!
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Do NOT buy this game - stick with Wii Play's Billiards
This is truly a horrible game. I own Wii Play and have played their Billiards game quite a bit. After a while of playing that, I got tired of the single game type (kind of like Rotation with only 9 balls) and decided I'd buy the only other Pool game on the Wii (which, in itself, is quite baffling since the controls make it a natural for pool games!): Pool Party.
After struggling in vain along with my brother-in-law to play two games of pool with it, I packed it back up and returned it to the store, advising them to stop carrying it. It's games like this that could give the Wii a really bad reputation as an inferior console. I'm honestly bewildered that Nintendo licensed this product for release.
Pros & Cons:
Pros:
- Has a very good variety of game types. 8 Ball, 9 Ball, Rotation, Straight Pool, Billiards and some ones I hadn't heard of like Killer and Blackjack, etc. No Cutthroat, though.
Cons: (get comfortable)
- Manual is riddled with typos, including one where they're telling you how to pull back the cue and *leave out the button you have to press while pulling back*. It says something like: "press button while pulling back". They clearly didn't have a proofreader or even a spellcheck. The credits at the back of the manual list just 3 programmers as developing the game and you can tell.
- Awful graphics. The balls are all the wrong colors and somehow you can't even make out the numbers on the balls just by looking at them - even on your 1080p 37" widescreen HDTV. Wii Play's Billiards looks several times better.
- Horrible controls. Incredibly overcomplicated and unintuitive. In Wii Play Billiards, you can put draw and spin on the ball simply by aiming your remote at any point on the ball and you can see where you're aiming by a red dot on the ball. In Pool Play, you have to press and hold a button and then move the aim position by pressing arrows on the screen. WTF? Did the developers even *play* Wii Play Billiards? And you can't even control the power of your shot by how quickly you push forward on the remote - you have to set some power meter by holding A & B while pulling back the remote (which, by the way, is also how you move the camera so you often line up your shot then completely screw it up while pulling back to shoot). It's as if it was developed to be played on a PC with a mouse then just ported to a Wii with a minimum of effort and shipped.
- Muddy, clumsy physics simulation. Once you actually do hit the ball, there's about a full second lag before anything happens on screen. The balls don't seem to bounce off each other with any true elasticity or momentum, spin seems oddly rigid.
- Awful interface. Unintuitive pre-game menus, simple text overlays for messages, no in-game tips or instructions and a PC-like menu you have to open up to switch between things like seeing what number a ball is (in Wii Play Billiards, just put your cursor over it and it tells you), saving and loading, etc.
- General lack of polish. Playing Pool Party and going back to Wii Play Billiards really makes you appreciate the little things Nintendo did to make their Billiards game fun and intuitive. Pool Party makes stupid blunders like starting off your camera pointing the cue ball at a pocket rather than, say, the closest legal ball. Or how about taking up the whole bottom left corner of the screen with your completely useless and noncustomizable portrait (of which there are about 4 or 5 to choose from - all obvious direct renders from Poser) where what you'd really like to see is oh, say, the score?
Truly a horrible game. If anyone has already bought this game, I highly recommend you pick up Wii Play (if you can find it) and see how it should be done (though I warn you it will probably ruin Pool Party for you if you actually enjoy it already). The only thing Pool Party has over Wii Play is the number of game types (but that doesn't really count if the core gameplay mechanics make it unplayable).
If I could give this game negative stars, I would. :/
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