Thomas The Tank Engine And Friends "Hero of the Rails" for the Wii - a Review

Baby Boy is two years old and loves to play on the Wii, unfortunately for him, most of the games are just a little too complicated for him to play with any great success. When Ubisoft asked if I would be interested in reviewing a new Thomas The Tank Engine and Friends Game titled "Hero of the Rails" I knew that Thomas mad Baby Boy would adore the game.

The first screen gives you two options, you can either go to a "Story" section or a "Game" section. On our first play Daddy went to the Game section and we chose a random game which was a race between two engines, one of which is controlled by your hand movements on the Wii controller. The game started before explaining how you were to use the controller to make your engine move and Daddy found himself working very hard to catch up (and then overtake) the engine he was racing.

Baby Boy, Top Ender and I played the other games taking turns as they are all one player games and I was thinking that this might not be a good game as it was rather boring and didn't seem to be as great as I was expecting for something associated with Thomas the Tank Engine brand.

After doing all the games, we decided to listen to the story. I was sitting on the floor when suddenly I realised that the story needs input in order to progress. All the games that we had just been playing in the Games Section are in the story! This put a new spin on things and even Top Ender (who says that she doesn't like Thomas the Tank Engine) was enjoying helping Thomas and friends help save a long forgotten steam engine called Hiro (Yes like in Heroes) get fixed up all whilst keeping it secret from Spencer.

Baby Boy found the game easier for him to complete than other games that we have and it took thirty minutes to listen to the story and do the games within the story. Daddy was a bit worried that Baby Boy would get bored after he had completed the game, but he has asked to play it again on a couple of occasions and has played along with little or no help from me.

The game has an RRP of £19.99 and is rated PEGI 3 and I think that this is a great game to get for younger Wii users, as they will get to grips with what they need to do quite quickly and it uses characters that they are familiar with, as I don't think I know any children who don't know of Thomas the Tank Engine!

Just Dance for the Wii

On Sunday I wrote a review about Dance on Broadway for the Wii. We had been playing the game as a family and had enjoyed it so much that I felt the need to share with everyone about this fab game! I haven't stopped tweeting about the game (or the blog post) since and it has meant that a few people asked me how I compared it to Just Dance for the Wii. This of course meant that I had to go out and buy Just Dance for the Wii so I could make a comparison (quick someone ask me to compare it to another game!).

So last night Daddy and I played Just Dance for the first time. It was fairly late at night and I was very tired so for the first song I was on the sofa. Daddy flicked through the songs until he got to Cotton-Eye Joe, I could see the gleam in his eye and knew that I was about to witness something truly great. I wish that I had been sitting nearer a camera, this was the funniest thing I had seen ever and I have no doubt that this video would have been able to stop wars.

Seeing how much fun it was I joined in for the second dance and used one of the features that this game has that Dance on Broadway doesn't, a quick play option and we danced to "That's the way I like it" by KC and the Sunshine band but it was over all too quickly. We played again and this time we went for the full version, I found it hard following the neon character and found them ever so slightly disturbing and I would have to say the backgrounds on Dance on Broadway are much Prettier than the plain backgrounds in Just Dance.

Again as soon as Daddy had a score higher than mine he retired from competitive dancing, claiming himself to be Family Champion. Revenge will be mine.

I am not disappointed with either of my purchases, but would suggest if you were only buying one to think about what sort of music you prefer. If you like Pop Music or want to buy a game for use at a party go for Just dance, if you like Musicals then go with Dance on Broadway. If you were forcing me to make a choice then it would be Dance on Broadway that wins because it looks prettier.

Overall I would say that Ubisoft made improvements on the original Just Dance when they released Dance on Broadway and I hope they are making more improvements when they release Just Dance 2 later this year. And here is the trailer for Just Dance 2!

The recommended retail price is £24.99, but you can buy it for less in a lot of places. I was not paid to review this and only went and brought it because of the questions about it on Twitter as a comparison to Dance on Broadway.

Dance on Broadway for the Wii

I love our Wii and I love Musicals so when I saw the game Dance On Broadway for the Wii I knew that I had to have it. Luckily I must have done something that meant that Daddy was thinking I also needed a treat and he bought it for me!

We decided that today after lunch would be a good time to play it and as I was taking my time to get back into the living room Daddy and Top Ender started without me. They were going through the songs deciding which ones would be best for them to dance to and decided upon "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" from Mary Poppins.

I arrived in the living room just in time to see them exhausting themselves dancing along with the Wii, by dancing badly. Top Ender got the highest score and declared herself to have won and that it was now my turn to join in. As all you need to dance is a Wii remote for each player, I was soon clicking on the character I wanted to dance as, and before I knew it we were dancing to "Time Warp" from The Rocky Horror Show.

Top Ender won again and I came a close second but it was at a price as both Daddy and I were exhausted!

We went through a few more songs and each time Top Ender won. Although I did redeem myself on "Bend & Snap" from Legally Blonde with a very high score and the sweat dripping off me as a prize.* 

Daddy however wasn't going to give up without a fight and kept repeating;

"Just once more!"

Eventually he got his victory with a score higher than both Top Ender and I had reached, immediately declared himself the family champion and retired from competitive dancing. Yes, he's a cheat.

There are a lot of songs on the game (all of which I recognised and was able to sing along with) and they range in effort needed and difficulty. I did work up a good sweat and my first thoughts that this game wasn't any good because both Top Ender and Daddy didn't seem to be doing well, were wrong and I love this game. I am going to add this to my exercise routine and hopefully dance my way to skinny!

The recommended retail price is £29.99, but you can buy it for less in a lot of places! I was not paid or asked to review this, but we had so much fun that I just wanted to share it with you all!

*If anyone wants to see my rendition of "Bend & Snap" let me know and if enough of you speak up it shall be a vlog!