Archery was unveiled at Nintendo's E3 Media Briefing and we got a chance to play it.
The control in Wii Sports Resort Archery is the main selling point of this game. It is designed to showcase what the Wii MotionPlus adds to Wii experience, and it does just that.
The controls are intuitive, and rewarding. While playing the game all I had to do was calibrate the Wii Remote, by using the IR Pointer, is to click an on-screen target. From that point on, the entire experience is very similar to actual archery. You hold the Wii Remote vertically, with the pointer end facing up. That is your bow. You hold the Nunchuk behind the Remote. That is your draw-string. To take the ready position, you press and hold A. Then, press the Z button on the Nunchuk to begin drawing back the arrow. Pulling back hard on the Nunchuk will pull the arrow back faster.
Once the arrow is drawn an aiming circle appears on screen. It slowly zooms in on the target. To adjust your aim you simply adjust your “bow” in space. The Wii MotionPlus maps the aim fantastically on screen to your motions of the remote. Once you have your aim you simply release the Z button and watch the arrow fly. When I first held the controls I immediately “got it.” The whole thing made sense.
It is a very cool experience to hit the bulls-eye because it actually feels like you accomplished something noteworthy. Of all the Wii Sports Resort games I played this one was easily my favorite. The challenge that was demoed allowed me to shoot three arrows at four targets, of increasing distance. Competition made the experience more fun. Watching over your rivals shoulder as he tried to play catch-up was great.
Of course, the game looks just like Wii Sports, but with a tropical vaneer. One cool effect was the wide-angle replay that accompanied a bulls-eye.
Overall Archery was really impressive, and did a good job showing how the Wii MotionPlus can be used.