TV Show King - WiiWare review

We can’t be alone in thinking that playing quiz games on your own is more pointless than Paris Hilton. Whether it’s a digital version of Trivial Pursuit or a made-for-consoles title such as PS2’s Buzz!, there’s zero satisfaction or fun to be had pitting your wits against a bunch of AI contestants. This is as true for TV Show King as any other quiz ’em up. However, when the intended number of players is all flesh and blood, quiz games are an altogether more enticing prospect. While playing TSK alone we needed to have our pulses regularly checked to ensure we hadn’t died of boredom, but when three staffers were drafted in for a multiplayer session, the game sparked into life.

It’s a fairly bog standard affair in terms of format – four players answer questions across the usual range of general knowledge. There are three difficulty settings, and you can opt to play three, six or nine rounds. Each question has a cash value and the first person on the pointer with a correct answer gets the majority of the loot, with smaller amounts for being correct but slower. What sets the game apart is The Wheel. It’s spun at the end of every round and depending on where you land, you win or lose stacks of cash, or even swap with someone else’s hard-earned horde. It’s wholly unfair and unbalances the game but it makes things a helluva lot more entertaining with the arguments it causes…

With 3,000 questions, Mii support and a thoroughly evil wheel of fortune, this is both a decent brain-tickler and a remarkably swift argument-starter.

Jun 30, 2008