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By Keith B (21st Jul 2007)

Elebits, Konami’s first game for Nintendo’s Wii, has ‘exclusive title’ written all over it: The game is tailored to fit exactly what the console has to offer, and it is no wonder that Elebits was released as a launch title in Japan. The game manages to masterfully show off the full potential of the Wii’s controllers. Now, half a year along the way, Elebits’ control scheme might not strike us as quite so spectacular any more �" an earlier launch date in the West would definitely have helped. Regardless, this is one of the most enjoyable Wii games available to date, and I highly recommend that everyone out there give it a try.

Elebits looks a little like a first person perspective ego shooter. The difference is that the game isn’t violent �" at least not in the gory, scary, creepy sense. You play as Kai, a little ten-year-old, son of two scientists. Your parents’ big thing is to research “Elebits.” These are small beings that contain a strange energy source. As the game’s narrative has it, the Elebits arrived on our planet riding a lightning flash a long time ago. Generously letting mankind partake of the energy exuded by their bodies, the Elebits practically saved Earth before fuel scarcity ever even became a problem. Now, there’s no need for firewood, gas, coalmines, fuel refineries, or nuclear energy plants anywhere in the world �" everything is powered by the Elebits… Of course, humans all around love these little beings. The Elebits are energy, and they won’t charge you for it, neither �" how could you not love them? Well, there’s one kid who hates them: You, hero of this game. Since Kai’s parents are Elebits scientists, they have very little time to spare for their son. And then all of a sudden, the Elebits begin to behave strangely after a lightning flash hits the town, and as a result our little hero can’t watch his favorite TV show! What a drag. Well, the parents go out to investigate, and little Kai, left to his own devices, grabs one of his Dad’s inventions, the ‘capture gun,’ and goes hunting for Elebits around the house, in order to get them to power up the TV.

This, in a nutshell, is the game’s story line. Throughout the game, you’ll roam through the different areas of the house stalking and capturing Elebits, of which there exist many different types. They’re all behaving a little weird, as already mentioned, so they’re all hiding out in various places, or even become aggressive. Your mission is to find them and to suck them up (Ghostbusters-style) with your Dad’s ‘capture gun.’ Sounds simple? Well, it is a bit of a thin narrative. But believe me, it’s excellently structured and designed, and the chaotic hunt for the Elebits is so much fun that you’ll never notice a lack of story content at all. Of course, the Elebits aren’t all that easy to find or to capture. As a matter of fact, they’re putting up a good fight! When you catch them, the little beings will charge up your capture gun, which in turn allows you to interact with your environment more effectively. With enough Watts in your capture gun, you can turn on appliances, open doors and drawers, and do pretty much everything else you would do in a regular house. Like in a decent ego shooter, your device can be upgraded. These upgrades and bonuses are hidden throughout the different levels, and there are a number of hard-to-find extras that can be unlocked. At some point, there’ll be so much power in your capture gun that you will be able not only to simply catch the Elebits, but to perform all kinds of crazy feats on your environment: Now, you can move and throw around everything from little pillows and cups to the neighbor’s entire house. Move things, shake things, turn them upside down �" whatever it takes to make those elusive Elebits show themselves!

To make things a little tougher time limits or other obstacles can be imposed on you in each level. Having to be quick, to keep the noise level down, or to collect a minimum amount of Watts in order to open important doors, etc. will make each of the nearly 30 levels successively harder to beat. Altogether, Elebits has at least 12 hours of original gameplay material to offer. Towards the end of the game, things get really tough. This is due not only to the fabulous level design, but also to the fact that the capture gun becomes harder to control the more powerful it gets. In the last levels, you may find it hard to open a drawer instead of just lifting up the entire chest of drawers, or to turn on a toaster instead of hurling it through the room… Which simply makes the whole experience all the more fun, of course. The force of the capture gun is liable to create such a good amount of hilarious chaos throughout the house that I found myself wishing the game would never end.

In order to make your way through the levels, you use both Wiimote and Nunchuk. Capture Elebits by simple pointing the Wiimote at the screen and pressing the A or B button. Change the perspective by swinging the Wiimote in the appropriate directions, and move, duck or jump with the Nunchuk’s analog stick and Z & C buttons. The controls are really as simple as can be �" and I’ve found them to work as precisely as you could possibly expect them too. Many of the interactions are amazingly naturalistic and logical (reminiscent, in a way, of some of the more life-like Wario Ware mini games) �" you open doors or activate switches just like you would in real life. In case you have any difficulties with the controls, a great tutorial mode will teach you how to interact with the world. This is pretty useful: Despite the fact that most of the controls are pretty self-explanatory, I actually needed to be told exactly how spectacularly realistic some of the simple actions are designed to be.

While Elebits is taken full advantage of the Wii’s awesome powers with regard to the control scheme, it’s a bit of a different story, alas, when we come to the graphics. The game is very pretty looking, but not exactly a NextGen gem. On rare occasion (when you stir up all too much chaos throughout the house), there are slight problems with the frame rate. Generally, however, the graphics and the level design leave very little to be desired. The same goes for Elebits’ sound. Both the songs (which change for each level) and the effects are catchy and well orchestrated. They always fit the mood of the respective levels well, and vary enough never to get boring. In case you don’t like a particular section of the soundtrack, you have the option of just skipping the song.

Once you beat the story mode, an extensive and well thought-out editing mode becomes available. This is a rare option for Wii games so far, and it works very well. You can share screenshots w/ friends over WiiConnect24, review in-game film clips, and do a few more fun childish things in the extras menu. Most interesting, however, is the option to redesign and rebuild all levels, and then replay them alone or with up to three friends. Which finally brings me to the friend play mode, on which I’m particularly happy to report.

In contrast to the wonky solutions we’ve been presented with in many other recent Wii games, here the friend play mode is a fabulous affair. It is offline only, but that comes as no surprise if you’ve been following the way Nintendo is restricting access to developers’ tools for online multiplayer content. When you play with friends, the entire story mode is accessible, and individual levels can also be played on their own. Instead of splitting the screen up into segments, all players share one screen view (the perspective is then controlled, unfortunately, by only one of the players), and up to four capture guns appear on the screen. This actually fortifies the sense that you are really playing with/against each other, as it strengthens the sense of having to vie for the Elebits in the same space.

Overall, Elebits isn’t a very difficult game �" but it is definitely challenging enough to keep you happy for a long time. It comes across as a game for everyone, and in this sense, the balance between difficulty and overall fun has been worked out amazingly well by the developers. Here’s a game, for once, that doesn’t set the bar too high for itself. The story is simple, the game concept is simple �" and still, Elebits goes way beyond itself. The basic idea and the actual realization is great, and the possibility of total interaction is just fabulous. All around, Elebits kept me coming back for a long time. For much longer, in any case, than I’ve spent on most of the more action-packed Wii titles of the last few months…