For years, Nintendo fans have wondered why a certain popular franchise failed to… ahem, take flight on any of the company’s recent platforms. After successful outings on the SNES and N64, Pilotwings (I bet you thought I was talking about Kid Icarus, huh?) has been left in the hanger by Nintendo. While the game’s premise tends to show up in tech demos, most recently the Wii, the game has yet to materialize… leaving the slot open. The first title vying for the spot is Wing Island, a game that, despite its potential, comes up short of being anything other than a disaster.

If someone were to tell me that Wing Island was meant to be a PS2 or PSP game, I would probably believe them. Although the Wii isn’t the most powerful of the current gen systems, it is capable of much better than Wing Island shows. Planes lack any details and the areas you fly around hover between bland and boring. There are a few times where the game shows off some visual flair, though these moments usually come with a nice framerate drop as well. Wing Island is a game where art style really could have gone a long way, especially considering the premise Wing Island is trying to portray with its story.

Wing Island really could have built a likeable personality for its characters though voicework, but instead all you get are a series of blips and warbles similar to Starfox on the SNES. Shallow, stock sound effects and a vanilla musical score round out an otherwise unremarkable presentation.

Wing Island has the foundation and premise to be a great first-generation Wii game, as well as one that could potentially set the standard for all future flight games on the system. However, the game falls dangerously short of reaching such lofty goals, instead delivering a game that is both limited and difficult to enjoy.

You take on the role of Sparrow Jr., a real sparrow who makes his living flying and repairing planes. The idea of animals doing anything, especially flying planes, always has the potential to be fun. It worked for Snoopy, so why not here? The problem with Sparrow Jr. is that he lacks the flying beagle’s charm and the idea of birds flying planes just feels outright odd.

Sparrow’s adventures play out in as a series of unrelated missions that take place across the island. In one mission, he may be searching for missing animals (just don’t ask…) while in another he may be delivering cargo or helping to put out forest fires. There are attempts to try and bring everything together with a story, though it is unnecessary and forgettable in the long run.

Completing missions earns you money to spent on upgrading your planes. How much you get per mission depends on how well you fly; which usually isn’t much thanks to the controls. Too many things factor into your rating for a mission and, even when you think you’re doing a pretty good job, you can end up only receiving a low score. The odd thing is that there doesn’t seem to be much consistency, since I would fly the same in two missions and might get some money from one yet nothing from the other. There’s nothing more frustrating to a player than to complete a mission and have nothing to show for it.

What little money you earn can be used to upgrade aspects of your plane, including handling and speed. Each aspect can be upgraded a total of five times. You’ll also have to spend your money on repairs for damage you take during missions – so you end up taking a monetary hit two ways.

Wing Island also includes a two-player Multiplayer Mode. A number of gameplay types are available, many of which involve popping balloons. One of the more surprising and unique multiplayer features is that only one Wii-mote is needed to play. One player uses the Wii-mote to control his plane with the other uses the Nunchuck. As novel an idea as this is, it isn’t recommended.

It is already well-documented in the review that Wing Island is a difficult game. The main perpetrator is, of course, the infamous control scheme which is elaborated on in the next section. However, even if you do manage to get a handle on the scheme, there are too many factors at play that keep the game challenging – but not in that good way where you keep wanting to go back and try something. There was never a moment where I crashed and found myself wondering what I could have done differently; instead I found myself always questioning the logic behind the mission structure, control setup and… well, just about everything possible in the game.

In theory, the Wii-mote is perfect for a flight game since all you would really need to do is flip the controller to the side and fly the plane that way. The method has already proven great for driving games, so why not a flying game. It is odd then that the developers ignored this and came up with a scheme that is both original and awkward.

In order to steer the your plane, you hold the Wii-mote towards the screen like you would with any game requiring the system’s “pointer” function. To turn, the controller is twisted in the desired direction while tilting back or forward climb and dive respectively. While I see the idea behind the scheme, it doesn’t work and, as already mentioned, serves as one of the bigger reasons for the game not being as fun as it could be. I understand wanting to be original, but why re-invent the wheel, especially when it ends up looking like a triangle?

Several missions require that you fly in formation with other planes. Formations add even more headaches to the already problematic scheme by introducing gestures that closely resemble the gestures for other flying functions. Pressing forward or back speeds and slows your plane; both of these gestures also resemble formations. I’m sure you can see the problems. Eventually you learn that pressing (A) allows you to cycle through formations, though that doesn’t do much to enhance enjoyment.

As it stands, Wing Island stands as a missed, golden opportunity. Even with the unwieldy control scheme and bland mission structure, there is a real potential for fun here that ends up not working in the long run.