When a bunch of imps get together all hell seems to break loose and when you throw in a fairy that flies around and an Evil Clown you have a mess. In Cocoto Magic Circus the Fairy says hey there is a strange circus in town and there is this wickedly cool looking clown throwing the gig let’s go check it out. And in old school monster movie rules everybody agrees and away they go to this circus in a big tent. Well when the Cocoto and the Imps with the Fairy get to the circus the wickedly cool looking clown meets them. The clown does a little dance and slight of hand and grabs the fairy in fairy-nap style. Now it is up to one of the four imps to rescue the Fairy. Well after selecting one of the imps you are equipped with a dart pistol to take care of business and how fitting with an old school gallery feeling in a circus tent.

There are several levels in Cocoto Magic Circus but after playing the game you realize there are really just a few levels that repeat in variations of shoot the explosive ball (with variations on the object thought it still says ball), shoot the targets, shoot enemies or knock off enemies in one shot. The enemies consist of moles, spiders, worms, mosquitoes, turtles and more. Plus you get to shoot – many times – at bosses at the end of each level. The bosses consist of an octopus, an ape, a genie and more. Each level has a special theme that runs throughout the various sections a couple of them are a volcano theme, underwater theme, and a heaven theme.

The game play is fairly simplex. You point, aim with your crosshair, and press the B button on the Wii-mote to shoot. Many people just reading what I just wrote would not even look at this game but I can tell you that I had fun with the game and the variations of the levels mix up the shooting even getting to the point of being complex. When I speak of complex it is not just shooting enemies you have to avoid malus red balloons which have negative effects on the level such as reducing time, shaking the level, flipping the level upside down, and the most annoying is they are in the foreground getting in the way of your darts. On the flip side there are green balloons, which are bonus items, which help you out on your circus adventure. A couple of the positive balloons are an extra life, multiple shots, and time freeze.

As for game modes there are a couple of those first off single player mode, which consists of Training, and Arcade modes. Training is pretty much what you can guess and for those that can’t guess Training allows you to practice the levels of the game. Arcade mode is just that a continuous mode of dart shooting through the various levels where you gain hearts for life or loose hearts – you have five hearts to start with – when you do not meet up with the level goals which are explained to you by the evil clown with a hello and a couple of claps.

I can only attest to the single player mode, as most of my friends really do not play games. However speaking of friends there are a couple modes for those that play with others specifically Tournament Mode and duel mode. In tournament mode each player takes a turn with one Wii-mote to gain the most points possible and those that do get the most points wins. The other mode is Duel Mode where it allows 2 players to play at the same time on each level and again the person with the most points wins. In the 4-player mode however it is pretty much the same as tournament mode where each player takes a turn but in this case with their own Wii-motes. In duel mode it is only for points there is no heart values.

The graphics and sound are an interesting mixture. The graphics are actually pretty well done with a quasi-cell shaded method that works quite well with these characters especially the Evil Clown. For the sound it really is just a step above bleeps, bloops and character grunts, oohhs, and ahhs. Don’t get me wrong it works well for this game but if you are looking for something spectacular in the audio department this is not the game for you.

There is a records section to marvel at your points and to show off to other players and as for an options section it is rather brief with only a Language and Sound Volume (0 to 100% – you can do the math.)

Now the question is this. Is this game for gamers or casual gamers? Well I am going to state that both types of gamers can like this game and both can easily pick up the controller and start playing. I will state this the game is only for short rounds of gaming and becomes quite boring after awhile and this is not a negative towards Neko Entertainment and their work it is just the game needed more variation to keep it fresh while playing the game.

And now moving towards the negatives of the game, which in actuality is not a real problem, just something I found infuriating about the game. When you are playing the game there is no way to exit and save your location. You have to keep going or keep dying to exit out of the game. And if your pretty good at shooting your heart amount will be quite high towards the middle of the game so you would have to die at least six to 10 times to exit. Well doing that or just turning off the game but the game does not save until you beat a boss level.

Now the second thing I found negative but not really so much is that this game could have been a pretty sweet online ranking or multiplayer game where you can match up your points or play against people. Especially since the graphics of the game are pretty minimal though nice looking there could have definitely been an online mode of some type.

In conclusion though I would state this is a pretty good basic game that any gamer of any skill level can pickup and play. The game is actually a perfect fit to those multiplayer Wii party situations that seem to pop up more and more these days. The game can become boring if you sit down and play it until the end of the game but it is quite fun in short bouts when there is minimal time to play as long as you keep your heart level to around two to three hearts. I am going to be generous and rate this game as a B minus as the game is focused on the casual gamer and Neko Entertainment nailed it.