Party Game Sundays: Go Vacation

When we booted up Go Vacation I almost died of excitement. Normally on Party Game Sundays I mentally prep myself for terrible video games. This was the first time during a Party Game Sunday that I was immediately psyched up to play a game. Seriously, I mean check out this hot intro jam.

Everybody loves the word vacation!

Last week I did a quick google search for the best Wii party games. I saw a bunch of fools saying that Mario Party 8 and 9 were amazing, but what I saw most consistently was people singing the praises of Go Vacation. Noukeo decided to order it, and it showed up in time for this weeks session. I am so happy to report that the people on a random forum I looked at were totally right. Go Vacation is the pinnacle of mini-game collections on the Wii. Trust me, I've played a whole bunch of them.

As I showed you earlier it starts out with a super hot introduction theme song. Prior to that though you get control of the cursor, which was what drew me in initially. It was super responsive, and moved at a good pace. That may sound like a minor detail, but normally in Wii games it feels like you're moving the cursor through molasses.

One island, four resorts, fifty activities.

When we actually started playing the game my mind almost exploded. You get to use your Mii, or create an in game avatar. We all opted for in game avatars, because they looked way cooler. I chose a kid, who had a sick afro and made him as large as humanly possible, He ended up looking like a giant baby. Landers opted for a super old Grandpa type who ended up looking like a raging stoner. Noukeo went with the younger father type, and went with more of a pervy style.

All three of us were dropped onto a tropical island to freely explore. The screen was split handily into four sections and the frame rate was actually consistent. What's cool about Go Vacation is that you can actually play every single game with anywhere from one to four players. It's actually a co-op experience where you need to try and play every one of the 50 mini-games. Once you play a game you get a stamp in your stamp book. The game tries to direct you around the island by marking the recommended game on the map, but you can do whatever you want, You can drive around an ATV, a jet ski, or just walk around. Getting around the island is fun on its own. If you want there are all kinds of activities. We played capture the flag, and I got a dog named Hatchi to follow me around. I guess you can also unlock special outfits from hidden treasure chests. The map is huge, and that's just the first resort. There are 3 more areas that each have their own theme. We eventually went to the city where we got to ride skateboards and put on roller-blades.

Up to 4 player split-screen action!

The majority of our time was spent on the tropical island. We played around 20 of the 50 mini-games and they were all incredibly varied. The first game had us racing between check points on a jet ski. You need to tilt the Wii-mote and nunchuck in the direction you want to go. Flicking them upwards while pressing B allows you to jump. If you get enough air you can go crazy on the analog stick in order to do flips and other various tricks. The same controls apply to all vehicles, but with things like skateboards you have to shake them both in order to gain speed.

We got to play volleyball, surf, sky dive, throw pies, do a triathlon, dance, and a bunch more. I was shocked to see that almost every game was unique and controlled well. The controls were fairly simple often involving shaking the Wii-mote with a button press, or just steering by tilting it. My personal favorite game was air hockey, which had us controlling the paddle with the analog stick and holding the Wii-mote sideways in our fist. In order to smash the puck we had to thrust the Wii-mote forwards and add B for a power shot.

Doing dope tricks is one of many things you can do in Go Vacation.

I think one of the main reasons we all got so into the game was because it's co-op. A lot of mini-game collections want you to go through the single player in order to unlock all the games. There's nothing more sad and boring than playing a mini-game collection by yourself, so it's awesome when all of us can play through the game together and unlock everything. We didn't even get halfway through, but we'll definitely play Go Vacation to completion. It's a well put together package that's a ton of fun.

If you own a Wii and are looking for some fun multiplayer action Go Vacation is definitely something you need to check out. It's so good that I'm still in shock. How can a game themed around vacations be so good? I'm very afraid that we'll never be able to find another game to top this one. At least not another third party game.

It's just a great game! I'll leave you with the full version of the theme song. Remember, everybody loves the word vacation