Dancing with the Stars: We Dance (Wii) (Wii)

If the battle of the ballroom show Dancing with the Stars tickles your fancy, then this Wii game might be of interest to you. In DANCING WITH THE STARS: WE DANCE!, you shepherd a pair of dancers through their ballroom paces in hope of winning the coveted Mirror Ball Trophy. This is a movement game where you swing the Wii remote and Nunchuk to try to match arrows that cascade down the screen. There are 10 dance pairs including Apolo Anton Ohno and Julianne Hough, Drew Lachey and Cheryl Burke, and Mel B and Maksim Chmerkovskiy. These pairs are shown dancing in animation but not in real video footage from the TV show. The game includes contestants from the first seven seasons.

While your selected couple dances on the screen, you use both the Wii remote and the Nunchuk to match arrows that float down the side of the screen. When an arrow enters the target zone on the screen, you try to do the request motion, including gesturing in a specific direction, shaking the controls, or even twisting back and forth. At first there are only two dance couples to choose from, but you can unlock one more each time you play through a season of competition. The game can be played on two levels of difficulty.

This is an adequate movement game, but it isn't spectacular. The animations look somewhat like the performers, but it would have been better to watch actual footage from the show. The voice talent is of the show's actual judges, but their comments are abbreviated and repetitive. The Wii controls work, but at times, it seems as though you did the motion at the right time but got no credit for it. Also, this game works better with a wireless Nunchuk so that cords don't get in the way.

The multiplayer mode is a plus, allowing you to take on a friend or family member in a dance-off on the same screen. And the game will get you up and moving. The DS game of the same name provides a deeper game experience but its close-up character graphics are atrocious.