Bowling just got better.
Wii Sports and its sequel, Wii Play, were basically tech demos to get people invested in the Wii’s unique control scheme, and, by gum, it worked. It worked so well that the Wii was perpetually sold out for almost two years following its release. Wii Sports made me a believer, and it made my wife’s family a believer. I took the Wii to their house one Christmas and we played bowling, golf, and tennis every damn night. I never got Wii Play, because I didn’t need the extra Wii Remote, but almost three years after the Wii launched, we got Wii Sports Resort—and it came with a new doohickey that improved every Wii sport it was involved with.

It’s easy to forget that, when the Wii Remote Plus launched, it was just a cube stuffed in a big Wii Remote Jacket that plugged into the bottom of the Wii Remote. Wii Sports Resort actually opens with a tutorial video showing you how to connect the dongle to the Remote. It’s a gyroscope, kids, so now your Wii Remote can recognize tilt. This made games like bowling and golf feel completely different. Suddenly, putting spin on the ball actually meant something, and golf suddenly became more difficult. Most of the other games in the collection (frisbee, archery, sword fighting, etc.) show off the Wii Remote Plus in different ways. Not all the games are fun, though—wakeboarding in particular seems half-baked—but they are all worth a shot, and are all more feature-heavy than any of the games in Wii Sports or Wii Play. These are games that, if you really wanted to, you could play solo.
But Wii Sports Resort is still a game I play with other people in the room. My wife still gets a hankering for some kayaking and bowling once in a blue moon. When her family is visiting, golf is the name of the game. There’s really something for everyone in Wii Sports Resort, and it really is the best game in the “series” (if you can call it that). We had to have one of these Wii Sports games on our list—they’re what made the Wii so damn successful, and we went with the best one. Now I kind of want to go play some archer. I’m really very good at it.