New Game!

I have been eyeing up Super Mario Smash Bros. for my Wii console. I have never played it or any of the predecessors, but I have read & heard a lot of good things about it. So I been snooping around ebay of late trying to find a good deal on this game.

I had looked at Game Stop and their used version was still $45, which is only a 10% savings, which I think says this is a good game if they can charge that much. And good Wii games never go on sale.

Yesterday at work, I finally won for what i wanted to pay, $26 shipped for Super Mario Smash Bros. on ebay, I feel good about this find! More to come on the game play and what I think of it. I am sure I will have Jacon over to play, we can report on our head to head results.

Speaking of head to head results, I beat Jacon quite regularly in head to head on Mario Kart :)

I also have been bidding on Zelda & Call of Duty games on ebay as well.

Get back on your wheels quickly

There is nothing quite as irritating as getting bumped off the track or POW'd as you approach a jump and you slide off into an abyss. While good drivers stay clear of falling off tracks, there are certain times that it is inevitable and out of your control.

So the next question is, how do you minimize the effects of when you are unfairly removed from the track by your competitors??

When are being dropped back on the track by Lakitu (the cloud guy), hit & hold the acceleration button at the exact time you hit the track and you will get a nice turbo boost to help you get back to full speed and minimize time lost.

Good Racing!!

Not so Wii Fit

I've owned Wii Fit for a week now. My initial startup age was 33, which I didn't think was that bad. Tonight was the first time I dove into all the categories of the game, other than just the balance games - which for me are the most fun.

I focused on a lot of the strength exercises, and quickly realized how out of shape I was. The push-up side plank exercise is going to leave me sore at work tomorrow for sure. It was pretty interesting doing a push-up on the wii fit board, but surprisingly worked pretty well. The side plank part of the push-up is what I'm going to feel tomorrow.

The other exercise that's going to leave me sore was the leg lunges, I haven't gotten that good of a leg work-out since I was in track in high-school. I like how it counts your reps for you, which really makes it so you can't cheat out of that last rep, not matter how much you want to.

I really think that if you are someone who doesn't like going to the gym, but still wants to work out, that the Wii Fit is definitely something you should try. It really works a lot of different core muscle groups, from Abs, to legs, to arms, all within one work out, and the game comes with your own personal trainer.

Mashing Buttons Locks in your Items Faster!

Have you ever been racing along, grabbed an item box, waiting for your item to lock in & get shot by a red shell before you get locked in??? Is the computer just trying to cheat you or do your competitors know something you don't?

Once you have picked up an item, repeatedly tapping the B or Left direction pad on the Wii wheel (left trigger on the Game Cube controller), will make locking in on the next item you get, much quicker. Careful not to press to many time or you fill deploy your new toy before you are ready. This is very useful if you know that one of your friends behind you has a Red Shell, or it could be useful for firing a shell quickly before the person in front of you locks in or if you think someone is about to win a race!

Hopefully you can surprise a few of your friends with this little trick!

Wii Fit Rules

After much anticipation, and months of waiting...I finally am the proud owner of Wii Fit.

It was seemingly sold out everywhere, and going for higher than normal prices online. Until one fateful day, we were shopping at Best Buy, and there was one sitting in the middle of the aisle on the floor. We instantly ran to it and picked it up.

If you are in the market for a Wii Fit, I would say your best bet, is to go to Best Buy everyday. jk. But if you're serious, you almost kind of have to. It's a decent amount of money, I think we paid $90 bucks or so for ours. So don't settle for paying double than that online.

Also, I asked the manager at Target when they normally get them in, and they usually get bigger shipments in on Sundays, and they said the Wii Fits are sold out after just a few hours.

So if you really want to get your hands on a wii fit, either stalk your neighborhood Best Buy, or camp out at Target on Saturday night...or you can just leave it up to chance, since sooner or later, you're bound to find one while casually browsing at the store like we did.

Started with a Wii Fit Age = 33
Looking forward to unlocking all the different levels, I'll keep updates on my Wii Fit Progress and anything cool I encounter.

Hoarding Item Boxes Helps

Typically you can drag one item (shell or banana, etc) behind you and have another up in your queue box upper left of you screen. When you hit items boxes it makes them disappear but you get no more items. You should still drive over them when you can....

It takes a bit for them to refresh, so by you grabbing it, that is one less item box for someone to grab behind you to get a bullet, star, red shells and all that goofy stuff. It will help you keep your lead. Also, if you are taking your normal fast line and grabbing the easiest ones, your fellow competitors may need to take wider corner or line, which will slow them down more to grab an item box.

You can also drop items behind you as you approach them to make room for new items, so you still keep the same number of items but not you have dropped some trash for them to work around or hit when trying to get their items. Often racers take similar lines, so you can throw them off by hoarding the easy boxes.

The only downside, is that Bananas & shells are good shields when dragged, if you drop a green shell and then end up with a fake dummy box, you lose your shield, so keep that in mind as you plan your item drop & grab strategy. Maybe it will help you keep the lead against your friends or gain you a few precious points on the WFC!

Beat The Game - Credits Roll - Why Wait?

When you finally beat the Lightning Cup and the credits start rolling, the peaceful mario music starts playing and it appears that you have to wait the 3-5 minutes or so for all the credits to roll, until it goes back to the main menu.


Some of us might go make a snack, or take some time to write a blog, maybe go outside and see the sun for 5 minutes...

However, if you just press the '+ button' on your wii remote, it skips through all the credits and brings you to the congratulations menu where your mii is standing there, then it shows what you opened such as a new kart or character. So to ensure you can continue right back into your Mario Kart playing just press +

Rosalina is Finally Mine!!!

Sunday afternoon I started playing Mario Kart with only the Mirror Special Cup to get a Star Ranking on and Rosalina would finally be mine. Since I was successful with Bowser Jr (not sure why, he is not really fast, quick or stable) & the Super Blooper, I decided to try it again. After about 3 tries, I won the cup with 60pts, had raced pretty clean and had not used much for Super Weapons.

I anxiously clicked through the screens and waited to see if I would get a letter rank or the Star I so desperately sought after.... That split second seemed to take forever, then there it was, a single STAR!!!!

After the obnoxious ending, the game reboots, I click on my license and finally Rosalina is MINE!!!!

I also went into my License details and saw the Star in place of the "A" that I had for so long on my Overall ranking. So it took me a total of 1305 races to get Rosalina. All using the Wii remote and all on Automatic Settings.

Since then I have jumped online and done a little WFC racing, just to see the Star next to my name online, got my WFC Ranking up to 7002 just last night.

So what is left..... Well I plan to put on an assault against my friends Time Trials and try to best all their times so I am leading on Mario Channel among my friends and to keep pushing my score up on WFC. Also, I would eventually like to add that 2nd or 3rd star next to my name on WFC!!

Maybe we should have a pool to see how long before, my Blog Co-Authour, Jacon can get Rosaline????

The Mario Kart Effect

First of all, I want to congratulate my fellow blogger on beating all the mirror modes with a star rating, which now leads me to a little phenomena called "The Mario Kart Effect".

For those of you who play Mario Kart, and are old enough to drive, you might already know what I'm talking about. For those of you who aren't as obsessed with playing Mario Kart as us, read on.

After spending a few hours last weekend playing Mario Kart, we were driving home from our friend's house when out of nowhere I get cut off by another driver. I instinctively pulled the trigger (aka windshield wipers), to try and throw a red shell at the driver, and then remembered I wasn't playing Mario Kart, but actually driving a real car.

This also happens if I play Mario Kart before going to bed. The next morning on my drive to work, "The Mario Kart Effect" will hit me without notice, someone will cut me off, and I will throw my banana I'm eating for breakfast out the window at that car. Just kidding, haven't done that yet, but you think that you want to throw it at them.

So, if your driving and you see a turtle shell fly past your car, you're either
a.) playing Mario Kart or b.) Someone's taken "The Mario Kart Effect" to the next level.

Closing in on Rosalina...

Friday night I played a little Kart before bed. I kept on playing the Star Mirror cup with my Mii and Super Blooper, kept getting A ranks, so close, finally I started switching characters and bikes to change things up. Finally with Bowser Jr and the Super Blooper, Star status was attained, then went on WFC and got my score up to 6800+. Overall pretty productive evening.

Saturday afternoon we spent some time on our Wii Fit with the family, after that since the Wii was warm, I slid in the Mario Kart disc. I used Funky Kong and the Flame Runner bike to get a star on the Lightning Mirror cup after about 5 trys.

Then some friends came over, we played some Super Mario Party 8. After they left, I fired up Mario Kart again. On my second try with Bowser Jr & Super Blooper I won the Special Mirror cup, but I only got an A rank, with 52pts, very close.

After the win, there was a special ending and a different commemorative photo. That also unlocked the Large Phantom Bike. So now I have everything unlocked except Rosalina. I just need to get that Star Rank on the final Special Mirror Mode cup. That will also give me a star next to my name when I race online. Who knows, maybe tonight I will get it done....