Table Tennis for Wii demo duffed

Aug 22, 2007

Looks like someone at Leipzig has had a little too much Hefeweizen during employee orientation.Whenvisitors to publisher Rockstar's booth at the gigantic European gaming convention began pointing out how terribly the Wii version of Rockstar Games Presents Table Tennis controlled, the publisher set out to investigate. What it found was that the reporters were right - because the demoers were all wrong.

Apparently, the demoers were teaching all the visiting press to play the game using an ultra-simplifiedcontrol method designed for casual players that uses only the nunchuk.A scheme that many writers, being hardcore gamers, felt gave the game an unpleasant, on-rails feeling. Which they immediately started bitching about, sometimes in official, game journalist capacity.

The thing is, there are also two other control schemes that incorporate both the remote and the nunchuk, giving more serious gamers more precision and command. It's just that the demoers, who apparently don't really want to keep working for Rockstar, didn't teach them to anyone.

Thus, the massive outcry of journalists shouting about how the game sucks has been replaced by an massive outcry of Rockstar defenders promising that everything will bebetter tomorrow -when the game will be demomed using the more sophisticated control options that gamers of our incredible intellect and discerning taste require.

We'll have our full impressions of Table Tennis tomorrow.In the meantime, if you read any negative reports about the game coming out of Leipzig, be sure to note whether the writer was playing with just the thing that looks like a TV remote or with both the remote and also the thing that looks like a kidney bean with a giant navel protrubance. It apparently makes a big difference.

Eric Bratcher
I was the founding Executive Editor/Editor in Chief here at GR, charged with making sure we published great stories every day without burning down the building or getting sued. Which isn't nearly as easy as you might imagine. I don't work for GR any longer, but I still come here - why wouldn't I? It's awesome. I'm a fairly average person who has nursed an above average love of video games since I first played Pong just over 30 years ago. I entered the games journalism world as a freelancer and have since been on staff at the magazines Next Generation and PSM before coming over to GamesRadar. Outside of gaming, I also love music (especially classic metal and hard rock), my lovely wife, my pet pig Bacon, Japanese monster movies, and my dented, now dearly departed '89 Ranger pickup truck. I pray sincerely. I cheer for the Bears, Bulls, and White Sox. And behind Tyler Nagata, I am probably the GR staffer least likely to get arrested... again.