With House of the Dead Overkill aiming at the more adult market, EA fires it's new Nerf title at the whole family, but does it hit the target?

 

Gamers and gimmicks go hand in hand, most of the time you get some loosely associated trinket like a model Master Chief or the really cool chainsaw controller for Resi 4, Nerf beats them all by supplying you with a real Nerf gun, a Switch Shot EX-3 to be exact. The Nerf blaster can hold 3 darts and you manually reload after each shot. The distance achieved with this blaster is pretty cool, causing Mrs Magnapop to dive for cover too often. Once you have had your fun and ear chewed off by the missus you may actually want to play the N-Strike game, simply pull out the air pump from the blaster and replace it with the Wii-mote, making a pretty cool Wii-pistol.

 

 

In Nerf N-Strike you play as Shane, a hot shot at the local arcades who gets selected by B.O.B, a N-Stirke recruitment robot, sweetening the deal by offering the use of top secret Nerf blasters and with the chance keep them, how can he refuse.

 

The main game mode is the Mission Mode, here you are placed against other recruits and tasked with beating their scores on certain levels in order to progress to the next challenger and to become a N-Strike Elite.

 

There is a hefty selection of levels to play through, each opponent will have similar levels but they do get progressively get harder.

 

In the Blockade and Pummell modes you float around a 3D puzzle shooting blocks away to find a goal block or to clear the table, this is like Jenga but with a lot of shooting. Megaspheres has you shoot at balls to make them ricochet off each other and into goal mouths, Commandeer requires you to cover balls in colour, once totally covered they will explode and give you points, but there are other balls that when hit will reset the colours of all of the balls close by. You then have more classic modes like an on-rail shooter going through a robot factor and Onslaught which has you fighting wave after wave of incoming enemies, some will hold power-ups like explosive darts or score multipliers.

The final mode included is Standoff and Draw Aim, this has you shooting specific coloured robots as quickly as possible in a kind of target range.

 

 

Control during gameplay is simple, especially when using the Nerf blaster, the trigger fires and either A or firing off the screen reloads. Nerf is all about the blasters and there are over 20 to unlock and play with. Some have automatic sniper scope, explosive rounds, a high rate of fire, can shoot foam balls and even missiles. Each weapon has it's uses and you will find that if you struggle on a certain level, usually a change of Nerf blaster will make it all easier. On top of that there is also a code input screen where if you see a new Nerf weapon around you can input a secret code and use this new weapon in the game.

 

The multiplayer mode has exactly the same games to play but with up to four players at a time. You can create a gauntlet mode of up to ten levels of your choice, easily enough to ensure that everyone gets a chance to play their favourite.

 

At £34.99 Nerf N-Strike is a great price for a solid family game and a Nerf blaster. £12.99 for each extra Switch Shot EX-3 is a very competitive price considering its dual use and is also compatible with any other shooters on the Wii.