Memory Card: Mario & Sonic at the Winter Olympic Games (2009)

Christmas morning, 2009, a six-year-old James Kellett lies wide awake in wonder of the gifts awaiting downstairs. Still hesitant as to whether he had made Santa’s good list, there was one gift on his mind, Mario & Sonic at the Winter Olympic Games (2009).

Coinciding with the success of Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (2007), Nintendo opted to act on this success and develop a winter instalment due to the upcoming Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada.

I myself did not play the first of the collection of Olympic Nintendo games, however I have fond memories of sprinting to my friend’s house to challenge him at a multitude of sports with our favourite Mario and Sonic characters.

Christmas 2009 saw the one-year anniversary of my Nintendo Wii thus meaning I had a stretching list covered with games for the Wii, Mario & Sonic being situated firmly at the top. Waking up on the 25^{th of} December 2009 to discover my Christmas dream had come true, I hopped straight onto my sacred Nintendo Wii and plunged myself into the Mario and Sonic winter wonderland.

Reminiscing on the days of inserting a game disc and being able to immerse yourself into the ‘gamescape’ without having to impatiently wait for the game to download, I hopped straight onto my newly acquired game and was simply in awe of the games opening clip. The majestic soundtrack gave goosebumps of anticipation for the fun ahead, we are shown multiple Mario and Sonic characters competing in a range of winter sports which in turn only further heightened my excitement. The game included all of the traditional Winter Olympic events, Bobsleigh being a notable favourite due to my recent introduction of the iconic Winter Sport film, Cool Runnings.

An aspect which made this video game all the more enjoyable was the increased emphasis on ‘Dream Events’. Although the sports fan within me enjoyed playing each sport at the official Olympic venue, the wonderous child also within me would also enjoy playing such sports in locations based around the worlds of Mario and Sonic. My wonder for Bobsleigh would only increase when being given the opportunity to play ‘Dream Bobsleigh’ in ‘Nocturnus Cage’, which made its first appearance in Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood. The mixture of official events and dream events provided a satisfying duality to this game and in turn simply provided more depth. Each dream event would provide an additional challenge as compared to an official event, but it would simultaneously play on the Mario and Sonic fantasies that had been previously embedded into the majority of the players.

One additional feature that made this Mario and Sonic instalment so enjoyable was the inclusion of a shop that enabled players to make in game features customisable. The shop within this game was labelled as the ‘Christmas Village’, which included five unique shops called, ‘The Music Shop’, ‘The Secret Shop’, ‘The Sports Shop’, ‘The Boutique Shop’, and ‘The Library’. The customisable nature of each shop would allow players to use the in-game credit system of ‘Star Tokens’ to purchase various items from each shop. Players could purchase soundtracks from previous Mario/Sonic games, paint sheets and decals to decorate gear, clothes and accessories for you Mii and much more. My favourite shop out of the five was easily ‘The Library’. It was here I could use my earned Star Tokens to purchase facts and trivia about previous Winter Olympic Games. It is fair to assume that my passion for sport as a whole was greatly cultivated by this feature.

Learning about facts of other sports would only broaden my curiosity of sports in general which is why I believe I have quite a lot to thank for when it comes to remembering this game. In addition to the hours of fun I experienced with Mario and Sonic, I look back fondly on my days with this game, and I am thankful it opened my eyes to beautiful complexities of winter sports, and sport in general.