Ridiculous fun for the whole family. The only reason to put it down is to give yourself a chance to blink.

User Rating: 9 | Wario Ware, Inc: Minigame Mania GBA
WarioWare, for those who are not yet familiar, is a collection of frenetic mini-games thrown at you in quick succession. And by mini, I mean really mini. They games last less than five seconds and typically only involve a few simple controls. Any game taken on it's own is nothing but thrown at you in random order and in increasingly rapid succession, they challenge the memory and the reflexes in a way that is both fun and satisfying.

Anime style graphics set the stage for these crazy little games. Gameplay is divided into many different themed levels each w/ their own set of games and a boss. The variety here helps keep the game feeling fresh throughout despite the fact that there's really not a whole lot of depth in games you can play in under five seconds. The music changes rapidly along w/ the games and is complimented by sound bytes from each individual character. This helps pull the player deeper into the game but I have been assured that this is incredibly annoying for some (usually sympathetic) bystanders to overhear. The end result is fun and accomplishes everything it needs to.

This is a short game, the main mode of which will be easily completed in under two hours by all but the most ham-fisted gamers but it's a custom fit for those old school players who find satisfaction in challenging themselves to beat their old best scores. In addition to the main mode, there is also one where you can play any single mini-game over and over, which is a lot more fun than it sounds. The games come on quicker and w/ small but challenging twists as you progress through levels. Unlocking these games also provides incentive to replay the levels in the main game. There is a lot of fun to be had given WarioWare's limited scope.

While some people might write this off as "just" a quirky puzzle game, it is a really unique game that should appeal to a lot of gamers, if only for the occasional pick-up-and-play session. The combination of a brand new type of gameplay with classic replayability makes it hard to put down.