Wii owners are finally getting used to the fact that they won’t see PS3-quality visuals on their shiny new console, and it’s games like this that help soften that blow. Everything looks and feels solid and there’s a really effective use of colour, tone and shade. The cel-shaded design works wonderfully and is a real step up from the rather sparse visuals of the original Mercury.
MERCURY MELTDOWN REVOLUTION WII PSP
Graphically, things aren’t massively improved from the PSP version, which isn’t really too much of an issue as the game looks fantastic anyway. These are accessed by successfully collecting various stars that are dotted around each level. The addition of unlockable ‘party’ games is the icing on the cake. Sega’s Monkey Ball could get incredibly annoying at times so it’s fortunate that MMR avoids falling into the same trap.
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There are mercifully few difficulty spikes (something that cannot be said about the first game in the series), and even when you do become stuck there’s an undeniable urge to dust yourself off and try again. There are 150 different levels to progress through, but Ignition Banbury have thankfully resisted the urge to make them painfully frustrating. The excellent in-game tutorial breaks you in slowly, drip-feeding information on the various elements contained within each level and ranks as one of the more effective training modes seen in this kind of game. At times you are even called to ‘split’ your blob in two, and successfully manipulate both sections in order to reach the goal. The physics engine displayed here is so effective that control soon becomes totally intuitive and practically anyone can pick up the controller and get to grips with things in the space of a few minutes – Nintendo’s dream of the Wii bringing gaming to all walks of life is furthered yet again.Īlong the way you encounter a wide range of tricky situations, ranging from colour-coded doors (these can only be passed when you change the colour of your mercury), unfriendly enemies and precariously thin ledges.
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![mercury meltdown revolution wii mercury meltdown revolution wii](https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/lXYAAOSwqHFcttT9/s-l300.jpg)
The ultimate aim of MMR is to guide your blob of mercury through a maze packed with daunting obstacles and traps by using Wiimote (held sideways, as in Excite Truck) to tilt the landscape, thus effecting the direction the aforementioned blob travels in. This follow-up improved on the original in practically every way and gained plaudits from all corners of the video gaming press. Thankfully the core concept was strong enough to succeed regardless and it quite rightly went on to become one of the more critically acclaimed launch titles.Ī sequel was almost inevitable, although the project had to overcome the departure of legendary developer Archer Maclean – an unfortunate event that would have spelt doom to many other games, but ironically seemed to spur the UK-based studio Ignition Banbury onto bigger and better things. Designed to take advantage of the proposed motion-senses capability of the PSP, the original Mercury was hastily re-tooled when it became clear that the console would not come with such a feature.
![mercury meltdown revolution wii mercury meltdown revolution wii](https://8images.cgames.de/images/gsgp/287/mercury-meltdown-revolution-wii-6_1198117.jpg)
There are obviously notable exceptions to this - the stunningly addictive Mercury being one such example. Even the most stubbornly loyal Sony fanboy would admit, albeit begrudgingly, that the PSP has a less then stellar reputation for quality software.