Two years ago, my brother-in-law—Greg—wore down my sister’s resistance to the family getting a Wii, and he purchased one for Christmas of 2009. Their two kids loved it, especially Connor, the oldest, who was very big on Wii Sports and Wii Sports Resort. Over the next year, they continued to enjoy it, so when Donkey Kong Country Returns was released in November 2010, I bought two copies—one for myself, and one to give to Greg for Christmas. He’d played back in the day, and I figured he’d enjoy the nostalgia. I also thought Connor would enjoy it; the game is big and colorful, with great music and whimsical character models.
As it turned out, I had it only partially right: Greg was glad to get the game, and over the holidays, we spent a fair amount of time with it. But while Connor watched us for a while, and tried playing, he wasn’t terribly interested. Now, at least part of that lack of interest was probably due to his having received a DSi XL (and Legos Star Wars: The Complete Saga to go with it) for Christmas. The boy was nuts about that game. Until June 2011, that is, shortly after he had discovered Pokemon, at which point most of his gaming energies went into Pokemon Black. Even as I write this on December 26, 2011, he’s still crazy about it.
I arrived for this particular visit on December 23rd. That night, Connor had me playing Wii Sports with him for about an hour, at which point his father suggested we load up DKCR, which sounded good to me. Shortly after I started playing, Connor started asking questions about the game, and wanting to give it a try. I explained the controls to him, and handed him the Wiimote. Aside from those few minutes the year before, he’d never played a platforming-intensive game, and so he had some problems. We spent about an hour trading off the controller, and then it was his bedtime, so off went the boy, and off went the Wii.
When I first saw Connor the next morning (December 24), he immediately asked to play more DKCR. Fine by me, so we got his parents’ okay, and fired it up, playing for a few hours that day, much of it with minimal assistance from me. He burned through a lot of lives, but he was enjoying the gameplay. And basically the same thing on December 25; while he didn’t much give a rip about the game last year, he’s very into it now.
What a difference a year can make!
