This game is addictive and fun, sadly the Wii Zapper is not what it was suposed to be.
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The Bad: Zapper doesnt make the game any better – Too Short for its own good
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Link's Crossbow Training is a Nintendo game designe to be played with their brand new peripheral the Wii Zapper, sadly it doesn't make the game much better (or any of the other games designed for it) and it turns out to be just a simplistic piece of plastic that feels like a big rip off.
The Wii Zapper is a piece of white plastic designed to look like a gun, and when you first play it you'll know Nintendo made a big mistake in the design. The Wiimote is placed on the top of the Zapper, exposing the B trigger, which is in the front of the gun and doesnt feel very natural to use it like that, and the nunchuck is placed in the back. It doesn't feel natural at all to be holding it with your right hand while moving the nunchuck with your left thumb, in fact it makes the games it was designed for arguably worse.
Now with the game, Link's Crossbow Training is surprisingly good, it's fast paced and challenging. In the game you go back to Twilight Princess' Hyrule and play as Link. There are many different stages taken directly from the game like Hyrule Field, Castle Town, Lake Hylia and various temples; each stage consist of three levels and there are three different game modes in each. The first one is Score Attack, which consist of shooting the bull's eye before they disappear. Second is Defender mode, where you'll get attacked by a set of different creatures from the game while you're standing; you'll have to kill them before they get to you, because if they do they'll take points from you, luckily there's a radar that will show you the position of each enemy. The last main mode is Ranger, where you can actually move and kill your enemies before the time runs out, and it's the best mode in the game. Each consecutive shot gives you more points and at the end of each level you'll get a medal (or not) based on your score.
To shoot you'll have to point the Wii Zapper to the screen and press the B button, and just like i said before, it doesnt feel natural at all. You can also hold the B button to throw explosive arrows (like the bomb arrows in Twilight Princess) and sometimes an enemy will give you an upgrade for your crossbow that will make it shoot like an automatic weapon. There are also Boss battles in the game, that are really fun and challenging. You can also shoot smaller things to gain some points, but there are also some things you cant shoot, for example in Score Attack you'll encounter several targets with an X in them, if you shoot those you'll lose points.
Other thing that makes the Zapper less than ideal is the fact that in this game you'll need speed, something that the zapper wont give you, specially in Ranger and Defender modes, where you'll be using the analog stick on the nunchuck, it's really hard to be moving Link, turning around and shooting with the Zapper at the same time, so these modes are better played without it.
But Link's crossbow training it's a very addictive game. You'll always want to come back and get a better score, so there's a little bit of replay value into it. Sadly the game is too short, which is disapointing because it's really fun; there's also a multiplayer mode but never with more than one player at the time so that's also disapointing.
Graphically is basically is the same game as Twilight Princess, but that's not bad at all, in fact it looks incredibly good for a light gun game. The music also comes from Twilight Princess, except for a couple of new tunes but it's wonderful.
Overall Link's Crossbow Training is a surprisingly good game, with addictive gameplay, gorgeous graphics and some awesome boss battles. Sadly is too short for it's own good and the Wii Zapper makes it a little bit worse. If you don't want the Wii Zapper then i can't blame you, but if there's any way you can get Link's Crossbow Training without the zapper and for a lesser price then don't loose that chance, because it's a really fun game, plus is a good excuse to go back to the magnificent world of Hyrule.