Smarty pant dance
Solo mode is ok if youre a real quiz buff or as a means of sprucing up your knowledge before taking on someone else. Its a nice inclusion that makes the playing field even allowing everybody to participate and enjoy the game without being disadvantaged. This means an older adult can play with a young child in a balanced game. A neat feature of the game is that the questions are age-targeted meaning they are aimed to be suitable questions for your age group. Solo mode is obviously for the lone player, and simply requires you to answer as many questions as possible within a certain time limit. There are a couple of play modes to choose from in the game including solo mode, friends mode, and family mode. Ignoring the flaw outlined above, Smarty Pants offers a good quiz experience that is best enjoyed with fellow gamers. Its only one topic of several, yet there is no denying the effect it has on the game. Ultimately, Smarty Pants is very much geared towards the UK audience. It is a task that would have taken just a short amount of time to do, yet it didnt happen. Why EA couldnt change the topic to questions about Australia is beyond me. Its a bit disappointing really, as it sours the gameplay experience when youre hit with questions that really need not be included. Furthermore, even questions in the other topics have a tendency to be related to the UK, such as sports questions regarding local UK football (soccer) clubs. The questions in this topic are very specific and unless youve studied the UK, youll find yourself unsure more often then not. Whilst suitable for European PAL regions, having a whole topic on the UK doesnt make a lot of sense for an Australian audience.
Unfortunately, this latter category doesnt feel right and takes away from the experience. Smarty Pants is a simplistic experience that offers a few different game modes testing general knowledge on a range of areas including science, technology, the world, food and drink, sports and the UK. They do offer an interactive quiz experience and they allow family or friends to get together for a test of knowledge. However, the aforementioned success of games like Buzz counters this argument and quiz games, or at least some of them, have been well received. Considering the whole premise revolves around answering questions, one could argue that quiz games really do not need to be developed into video game format having board game iterations suffice. Quiz games certainly do not appeal to all gamers. Smarty Pants is one such game, but does it deliver the goods or does it leave much to be desired? To see the verdict on Smarty Pants, continue reading. The well received touch generation games that have also been released on the DS and Wii further demonstrate the inevitability of a Wii quiz game. With the ability to use Wii motes as buzzers themselves, it was a given that a quiz game would eventuate. With the success and popularity of the various quiz games on the PS2, particular the Buzz series, it was always a question of when, not if, a quiz game would be released on the Wii. Do you know the capital city of Egypt? How about the date when man first walked on the Moon? Also know how many people are on a water polo team? If youre a master of general knowledge or even if you just want to improve your general knowledge, then Smarty Pants might be the game for you.