Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games

and presses various buttons, as instructed, to perform tricks in the trampolining event. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games is a collection of 24 events based on the Olympic Games. for example, swinging the Wii Remote to replicate hammer throw or pulling back the remote and tilting the Nunchuk like a bow and arrow. While the Nunchuk is required for archery, it is optional for most of the events. There are also events that are more physically demanding, such as the five running events which require rapid drumming of the controller. These environments are stylized to fit the futuristic style of Sonic and the cartoon style of Mario. Each playable character their own statistics, which serve as an advantage or disadvantage depending on the event. The characters are divided into four categories: all-around, speed, power, and skill. The two versions also have leaderboards that uses the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection to display the best times and scores in each event. Events Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games features authentic Olympic events for the single match and circuit modes. The events closely follow rules and regulations of the specific sports. The types of Wii events are classified as athletics, gymnastics, shooting, archery, rowing, aquatics, fencing, and table tennis. Similar events have varying gameplay aspects; for example, getting a starting boost in the is more important than in the longer races, since the initial short burst of greater speed would play less of a role in winning the longer distance runs. In relay events, such as the relay and aquatics relay, players can assemble teams comprising any four characters. Besides these regular events, there are alternate versions of Olympic events called Dream Events. Unlike the regular events, the gameplay in Dream Events is exaggerated. Taking place in locations and using objects from older games of the Mario and Sonic series, Dream Events allow players to use the special abilities of characters and display dramatic moments in slow motion. Although the Wii and DS versions of the game feature mostly the same events, each version has events that are not found in the other. For example, the DS version has 10 m Platform Diving, cycling, and five Dream Events—canoeing, boxing, basketball, long jump, and skeet shooting—not featured on the Wii version. ==Development==

After Sega transitioned from hardware to third-party development in 2001, Nintendo and Sega developed a closer relationship, with the first significant video game collaboration between the two being Amusement Vision developing F-Zero GX for the GameCube in 2003. The idea for a crossover game between Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog and Nintendo's Mario characters had been casually discussed between the two companies; Sonic Team leader Yuji Naka and Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto, respectively, had their private discussions revealed in 2005. Despite the discussions, the idea was not acted on as it lacked a setting that would give the game "an exclamation mark". Both companies felt that the competitive sportsmanship of the Olympic Games provided an ideal choice as a setting for the once-rival mascots. Mario & Sonic was officially announced with a joint press release by Sega and Nintendo on March 28, 2007 In another showing of the collaboration between the two companies, the game was predominantly developed by the Sega Sports R&D Department of Sega Japan under the supervision of Shigeru Miyamoto. He served as senior producer. Racjin and according to gaming site IGN, TOSE, a developer known to avoid crediting itself in its works, helped to develop Mario & Sonic. The game is officially licensed by the IOC through exclusive licensee ISM and is the first official video game of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games. It was released in 2007 in North America on November 6, in Japan on November 22, in Australia and in Europe on November 23, and in Korea on May 29, 2008. The DS version followed in 2008 in Japan on January 17, in Europe on February 8, and in South Korea on June 26. Both versions were published by Nintendo for Japan (where it is known as ) ==Reception==

Sales Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games was a commercial success. in the first few months of release, it was on four separate occasions the top-selling game in the United Kingdom all-formats chart. It accumulated seven weeks as the number-one seller, including the first two weeks after its release. The Wii version sold a half-million units in the UK during those seven weeks. By June 2008, both Wii and DS versions reached combined sales of 1.2 million copies in the UK, prompting Sega to create plans on re-marketing the game there. The game went on to sell over two million units combined in the country. According to the NPD Group, the Wii game was one of the top-ten best-sellers for the month of December 2007 in the United States, selling 613,000 units. Electronic Entertainment Design and Research analyst Jesse Divnich argued the game is a fitting example of brand awareness' role in determining Wii game sales. The Wii is an exception to the correlation that higher quality games lead to better sales as seen on the Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3. Divnich added "To the casual and social gamer, it didn't matter that the game received sub-70 Metacritic scores," the recognizable "Mario" and "Sonic" brand names participating in a recognizable action, "The Olympic Games," contributed to the game's US sales. As of December 28, 2008, 594,157 units of the Wii version and as of December 27, 2009, 383,655 copies of the Nintendo DS version has been sold in Japan. The Nintendo DS version is the twenty-seventh best-selling game of Japan for 2008. In the same year for Australia, it is the eighth best-selling game while the Wii version is number four. In July 2008, Simon Jeffrey, president of Sega of America, announced that Sega has sold approximately 10 million units worldwide combined of Mario & Sonic and showed interest in again collaborating with Nintendo to produce another game featuring the two companies' mascots. The game is listed in the ''Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition 2010'' book as the "Best-selling gaming character cross-over" with 7.09 million on Wii and 4.22 million copies on DS sold. Critical response Although the Wii version of Mario and Sonic was awarded the "Best Wii game of 2007" at the Games Convention in Leipzig, it and the DS version received mixed reviews. A common complaint was that Sega and Nintendo failed to set the first matchup between their mascots in the genre that made them famous—platform games. Instead, the two companies threw Mario and Sonic into an Olympic-themed party video game, GameSpots Aaron Thomas rated the Wii version's motion control scheme as "uninteresting and occasionally frustrating". Andrew Fitch of 1UP.com assured readers in his review that the less physically demanding gameplay of the DS version made the game accessible for extended periods of time. Fitch further stated that in nearly "every case, events [were] far more enjoyable on the DS" due to the requirement of the human body's finer motor skill abilities to control the characters. and Thomas added that the graphics were "crisp and colorful". Echoing this sentiment for the DS version, Emily Balistrieri of GamePro thought "most of the music [wasn't] too interesting". Developed by AirPlay and published by Sega, the game features five events based on the Olympic Games starring Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Amy. Players control one character from a two-dimensional perspective through one-button commands. The commercial success of Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games started a series of Mario & Sonic sport video games to coincide with upcoming Summer and Winter Olympic Games. sold 6.53 million copies in the US and Europe by March 31, 2010, while Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games, based on the 2012 Summer Olympics and released on the Wii in November 2011 and the Nintendo 3DS in February 2012, sold 3.28 million copies in the US and Europe by March 31, 2012. Sean Ratcliffe, vice president of marketing at Sega of America said, "I think the key factor that decides the ongoing building of this franchise is basically success. Is the game successful? Are consumers happy with it?". ==Notes==