Nintendo: Rolling with Kororinpa

Koro - what? Right, let's take that one step at a time. Just let those syllables roll off the tip of your tongue: 'ko-ro-rin-pa'. See? That wasn't so hard after all now, was it?

This decidedly funky title is derived from a Japanese word for 'rolling' often used by children, and though it is indeed child's play to understand the basics of the gameplay, it's going to take tons of skill and precision to see it through to the end.

Kororinpa is all about rolling balls from the start of a 3D maze to its finish, but any finesse with button-pressing you might have built up over years of gaming will be useless. You see, the game only uses the motion sensors in the Wii Remote to get the ball rolling: by tilting it you move the maze to guide the ball to the goal.

Spread over five environments (ranging from a garden to a dinner table), there are over 50 of such mazes in the game, getting ever more tricky. As these are laid out in three dimensions, you'll have to tilt the Wii Remote from side to side or even upside down, as you exercise enough control to keep the ball from falling off, and plan your strategy to use obstacles like magnets and conveyor belts to direct the ball to its final destination.

Along the way you'll need to collect a set amount of red crystals before the exit at the end of the maze opens up. In some places you'll even encounter harder-to-reach green crystals. Who knows what these might unlock?

There are many different balls (resembling marbles, watermelons and even penguins) to collect, all with different Speed, Response, Slide and Bounce attributes, adding an extra element of strategy to the challenge, as you'll need to pick the ball that's best suited to the maze at hand. Yes, the age-old question 'Will you take the pig or the penguin?' is set to rear its head again, and we have Kororinpa to thank for it.

Plug a Nunchuk into the Wii Remote and you're all set for a frantic two-player race, as you and a friend can both try to get to the finish as fast as possible. Keep an eye out for our Playtest in your VIP Lounge soon - Nintendo.