Nintendo Wii Review: Major Minor’s Majestic March

Before I begin, let me preface: if you are reading this and between the ages of 4 and 7, this is your review. Major Minor’s Majestic March is a fun rhythm-teaching device with Blue’s Clues like visuals and the attention holding capabilities of the Squibbles live.

With that said, this is for everyone else: This one time at band camp, I played the most painfully boring game ever.

MMMM is the brainchild of PaRappa the Rapper creator and music game visionary Masaya Matusuura. You play as Major Minor, a cat who resides in March Town. In this town marching bands are adored and drum majors are the coolest people you’ll ever meet. Major comes from a family with a long history of leading great bands. With the help of his teddy bear friend, Tom, and his Great Great Grandma Gladiola’s marching baton (GGGG), Major sets out to live up to his family legacy. Are you still reading? I thought I lost you at Drum Majors are cool.

Let’s be frank. In guitars games you strum. In vocal games you sing. In drum games you - guess what – drum. So, it should come as no surprise that in a drum major game you baton wave. Sound like fun? Holding the Wii controller with your arm directly in front, you raise and lower it to set the band’s tempo. Each musician wants to go faster or slower depending on the instrument they play and the map. Your job is to keep everyone happy by smoothly changing the tempo.

If a musician is too stressed, that band member will abandon you. Lose your band – lose the game. New members can be recruited by waiving your baton at spectators on the right beat. Power-ups are also obtained like this and help to keep your band happy and marching. But, just like Mario Kart, make sure to avoid selecting power-downs by accident.

The longest 50 minutes of my life begins… now.

Gain enough points during a single march and you can unlock marching drill bonus levels. These levels invoke the typical Wii, “shake it ‘til your wrist breaks” motion. Drum majors must shake their controllers to match the patterns displayed on screen before the band finishes their movement. Needless to say, after a bunch of these bonus levels, my wrist was soar. Plus, I still had no idea what factors determine the number of drills you get to play per level.

Here’s another issue. Sure, I can comfortably keep a beat and comprehend changing tempo smoothly. But, can the average 4-year old grasp tempo change? Not likely. For most adults this game is way too simple, especially with only about an hours worth of gameplay. But for many children, I can see MMMM being too difficult to maintain their interest.

On a positive note, GGGG comes to the aid of those band majors needing assistance by offering to automatically keep tempo for you if you fail twice on a level. It’s like tee ball - everyone gets to win.

It’s a wonder why none of these band members passed out from boredom.

The graphics are vibrant and very nicely animated by the PaRappa artist Rodney Greenblat. The entire story is delivered in a narrated picture book style, where a few sentences accompany each animation cell. The levels integrate 3D characters with 2D backgrounds and objects to create a Nick Jr. style feel. Kids may love the still frames, but I would have preferred to see a few animations.

The music was the best part of this game. Anyone who’s been to a 4th of July parade will recognize a couple of tunes played by the band. The number and variety of musicians involved determine the quality and complexity of the song. You won’t hear the French horn until you recruit a French horn playing band member. The music transitions match accurately with tempo and keep the same pitch despite performance speed.

The voice acting was great all around, except for the baton, GGGG. It talks you through each level in high-pitched raspy voice. It took about 2 minutes before I considered “accidentally” letting my Wii remote fly into my T.V. just to just to shut it up. Everyone else sounds great, but this thing was like Sylvester from Loony Tunes on helium.

Overall, it took me about 50 minutes to beat the game twice. The first time playing you have no choice of difficulty and are forced to play on easy. The second time you unlock normal mode, which adds a few new musicians and changes the song arrangements. The difficulty doesn’t change too much throughout the game. So, you’ll have to beat normal to unlock the challenging setting. Even with these changes, I had no desire to ever play this game again. I will be happy to retire Major Minor’s Majestic March from my game library, in fact I just did. On the other hand, I remember watching this one Care Bears tape until it tore in my VCR from overuse; so maybe the designers here know something about childhood that I left behind.