Wii Demo Roundup - 04/11/11

Howdy, Wiifolk! It's time for another Wii Demo Roundup, although I'm beginning to wonder if I should change the name of this weekly feature because "rounding up" a single demo seems kind of silly. But no matter, hope springs eternal as I wait for Nintendo's eShop. Interestingly enough, this week's demo feels right at home in a wild west roundup. Bring your hat, chaps, and holster, it's time to draw!

Fast Draw Showdown
Rated T for Teen, 1-2 players, Wii Remote only, $5.00

Courtesy digitalleisure.com

In 5 words: old, hokey, bad acting, simple

The first thing I noticed upon firing up the Fast Draw Showdown demo is how old it is. Originally copyrighted in 1994, Fast Draw Showdown was a laser disc-based arcade game that I'm pretty sure I saw in my younger arcade urchin years, now that I think about it. Well, now it's been ported to Wii Ware. Should you care? I don't think so.

The graphics look like 1994, the gameplay, while challenging, is very simple, the acting, writing, and costuming are pretty bad...basically, this demo offers very little. I could see myself putting a few quarters into this in an arcade, just for the novelty of it, but outside of that, without a light gun, the novelty is short. Dying to draw with the best of them? Give the demo a try. It's a small download and will only occupy a few minutes of your time. Otherwise, don't bother.

As an aside, I find it quite rich that Nintendo complains about Apple's cheap App Store games and then allows stuff like this to be released on their own hardware. Pots and kettles 'n' all that. At least in the App Store, this might be priced at $0.99 (still not worth it, really) and we wouldn't have waited over a year for a demo.

Well, that's it for this week's roundup. The end of May and the advent of the eShop cannot arrive fast enough.

--Demo Gamer