Kombo's Review Policy: Our reviews are written for you. Our goal is to write honest, to-the-point reviews that don't waste your time. This is why we've split our reviews into four sections: What the Game's About, What's Hot, What's Not and Final Word, so that you can easily find the information you want from our reviews.

What the Game's About
Squeeballs: Party is a mini-game collection that creates a back-story to give some meaning for the reason why you are playing the games. The story goes a little something like this: you are a toy tester in some Pacific island and it is your job to test all the new toys before they get sent to happy homes across the world. The toys are called Squeeballs. These poor toys get minced, pulled, electrocuted, shot and hit during the mini-games featured in the game all in the name of being a toy tester.

What's Hot
Squeeballs is a good mini-game completion on the Wii. There is a health smattering of diverse games to play and the variations built off the main modes keep the game feeling fresh even if you play the game for hours. Some of the changes are small tweaks and some of the changes are more sweeping but ultimately live up to their goal of giving you a range of modes to play. The games are actually fun to play and barrows liberally from games like Boom Blox all the way to Cooking Mama. If you have to pick some games as inspirations, those are some fine picks. Some of the best modes, like the crazy lanes bowling and slingshot painting games, are sure to be instant classics.

The one thing that Squeeballs has is a fresh spirit and unique personality that is usually missing from similar games of this nature. The critters look cute and plucky, like they don't have a care in the world. There is an old school Tom and Jerry feel to the game with the amount of cartoon violence. Through the mini-games, your task is far more sinister than these little guys could even imagine but they'll keep loving you, no matter what, and line up for more. It is nice to see that Squeeballs has an edge to it and embraces that darker tone. This is happening at the same time as some casual friendly gameplay is tossed out so there is a balance struck between something for all interested gamers.



What's Not
The Nintendo Wii is home to more mini-game compilations than there are stars in the sky. Most of them are boring and centered around already tired concepts. Squeeballs features some of these very same pitfalls. A few games that bring out the dreaded "waggling" effect (pretty much anything with the cannon) but there is a lot more personality and other gameplay to dwell too much on the clunkers in the bunch. The inclusion of a single-player mode is a nice touch if you don't have a room full of people wanting to splatter critters on a painting; however, bowling variants tend to appear often and make you wish there was some way of skipping the parts that you aren't in love with. Naturally, the single-player mode is weak since there aren't others to compete against or pass the Wii-mote to.

Final Word
Squeeballs shows that putting some effort behind a game of this nature goes a long way. There have been too many broken, uninspired and creative black holes shoveled on the Wii. When something like Squeeballs comes along, it shows that there are developers taking notice and bucking that horrible trend and creating something more inspired that can be just as appealing. Squeeballs is a colorful option if you are looking for more multiplayer, party style games that won't disappoint with all that it offers. This is a good first effort for a new publisher.