World Sports Competition

~ WORLD SPORTS COMPETITION ~

Hudson Soft

HuCard

1992

I've never been into these "summer games" types of titles. For one thing, I don't care for summer games. For another, they all instantly bring to mind NES Track and Field, which I feel is utter crap. I don't like it when a game forces the player to partake in rapid button annihilation to the degree that the process becomes a cardio exercise in and of itself. And in the almost-never cases where I've been willing to use a turbo-blessed controller to earn a cheap triumph in such a game, I've preferred to cheese my way through something a bit more entertaining, like Pro Wrestling.

World Sports Competition doesn't act ignorant of the fact that there are lots of folks like me out there, players unwilling to mash their thumbs and joypad triggers into oblivion. So while most of its events do call for some old fashioned smashing, you can activate an "auto-fire" option pre-play. (Of course, with a TurboPad you can just flick the turbo switch and, voila, problem averted, but I digress.) And the designers tried to make even the call-to-smash events a little more interesting by incorporating other elements (to be covered momentarily). But really, unless you're truly into this summer stuff and you feel compelled to set records for each type of trial, you'll probably find that there just isn't much to these mini-games. And while eighteen events sounds like a lot, don't kid yourself: there's plenty of redundancy from one to the next. With decent graphics and not-so-good music in tow, WSC rounds out to an average title.

The gun-based events are probably my favorites, as they don't involve button hammering and they do involve good timing, especially the pistol-firing trial. Small crosshairs make practice necessary in clay blasting.

Archery actually plays like a lot of golf games: you have to aim your shot while considering the strength and direction of the wind, and you have to utilize a quick-filling "accuracy meter." It's a decent, if not particularly hard to master, event.

The "throwing stuff" games require you to make your tosses at precise angles in addition to powering your efforts via button bludgeoning.

Most of the track dashes place heavy emphasis on mashing, as you might expect, though you have to make timely leaps in some of them.

Rafting and swimming competitions demand that you get into a rhythm of refraining and hammering lest you deplete your energy/oxygen supply. Getting the timing down in these events is usually a good challenge.

The game provides records for you to break--a little incentive for mastering everything, I guess. I didn't find many other good reasons to stick with it for long.