With its world-tilting gameplay, Sega's Super Monkey Ball series of 3D platformers is a perfect candidate for Wii, and designer Toshihiro Nagoshi and his team at Sega's Entertainment R&D1 one have come through with a new iteration of the game for the Wii launch. Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz features ten worlds and fifty minigames utilizing the motion-sensing Wii controller, and is available now. We've taken a comprensive look at the game; check out our full review.

The controls indeed have something of a learning curve, but it is not long before the game's difficulty starts to kick in--and with it, your skill will ramp up as well. Super Monkey Ball newcomers who play Banana Blitz--as well, as perhaps, some skeptical veterans--will quickly find that, despite its colorful visuals and goofy music, Banana Blitz is a true gamer's game. The single-player campaign makes no concessions to the Wii's "gaming for the masses" angle; it delivers an increasingly brutally challenging platforming experience that is rare in modern platforming. There will be moments when, despite this game using the one-handed remote controller configuration, you will find yourself gripping the controller in both white-knuckled hands, in part to remain as steady as possible and in part to keep yourself from chucking the thing across the room, as you fail the same level in the same place again, and again, and again. But when you clear the stage, and it is due to perserverence and intense concentration, you will be supremely vindicated.