Punch-Out!! -- Final Opinion.

I've taken Punch-Out!! on the Wii about as far as I'm going to take it. I've completed the career mode. There is a considerable amount of game left to be had after career mode for those wishing for more. Once you've completed a fight in career mode you're able to enter challenge mode with each boxer. Challenge mode has you attempting to accomplish three goals with each boxer. They're specific to each boxer but follow the basic formula as knocking out an opponent within a set time or number of punches or finding every counter. What they really amount to is being able to fully understand and exploit each fighter. Once you've completed the career mode for the first time, title defense mode unlocks. You're able to defend your championship title against the boxers again. This time around the boxers are considerably tougher. It's not just a matter of balancing them to make the boxers harder. They've gone and given them new combinations and routines. You're also able to enter challenge mode for each of the title defense versions of the boxers. In this mode the challenge is ramped way up to being for the truly dedicated and or insane. Overall Punch-Out!! on the Wii is a great looking game. The animation for each boxer is impressive. The graphics aren't exactly impressive in that they're technically sparse but the cartoonish art style is very appealing. The music features a remix of the Punch-Out!! theme for each individual boxer. The characters are now voiced entirely in their native languages without any subtitles. While the voice is cool, not knowing what they're saying is slightly annoying. The boxers all ooze character in the ring. Which is rather impressive given it's a boxing title. The game allows for the classic NES style controls when holding the Wii Remote sideways. So the control is perfect during the matches. There is an annoyance in not being able to navigate the menus with the Wii Remote held sideways. Having to switch from sideways and back to pointer and back over and over started to grate on me. Something so seemingly minor probably shouldn't have bothered me, but it did. Another annoyance is the surprisingly long loading times. You are able to skip the victory and defeat scenes but you're still going to be facing considerable load times in and out of the matches and throughout all the menus. Overall I have to say I enjoyed Punch-Out!! and it was great to see the series return. I'm giving Punch-Out!! an 8.5.