In the summer of 2009, I took a vacation to Wuhu Island. I spent the days swordfighting in its arena, wakeboarding around its shores, playing frisbee on its beaches, and refining my archery skills deep within its central volcano. It was a great summer spent playing Wii Sports Resort, the followup to the original cultural phenomenon and the game that introduced us to the new and improved Wii Motion Plus accessory (that would later be built into the Wii Remote itself). It was fun to play with family and friends, but I was always most intrigued by the setting itself.
Wuhu Island was a paradise; a theme park disguised as a tropical resort constructed entirely around sports and the spirit of competition. I loved whenever I got to return to Wuhu Island in later Nintendo games. It appeared as the main setting of Pilotwings Resort on the 3DS’s launch day, a trio of tracks in Mario Kart 7, and a stage in Super Smash Bros. There was a time when Wuhu Island was planned for so many Nintendo games that Shigeru Miyamoto told Satoru Iwata the island itself was becoming a Nintendo character. But then, it disappeared, as 2018 marked our final trip to Wuhu Island for the next eight years.
But now, Nintendo Switch Sports Resort takes us back to my favorite vacation destination for a new era of motion-controlled sports action, and I was so happy to be back. During a demo at San Diego Comic Con, I got to try four of Resort’s 12 sports: archery, bowling, power cruising (which is a trademark-free way of saying jet skiing), and thumb wrestling, which Nintendo’s Yoshiaki Koizumi famously demonstrated for us in last month’s Nintendo Direct.
This series has not changed all that much in 20 years. Each sport used either a single Joy-Con or a split pair of them, relying almost entirely on simple motion controls with the occasional button press. I played 100-pin bowling, returning from the original Wii Sports Resort, where a lone red pin denotes the front of an army of pins to knock down. This was a classic back on the Wii, and I’m glad to see it back after it wasn’t included in 2022’s Nintendo Switch Sports.
In fact, I think Resort is already poised to avoid some of the shortcomings of its predecessor. Nintendo Switch Sports felt very light on content at launch, with only a few sports worth playing One of its sports was wasted on a pretty boring take on soccer, complete with the leg strap accessory that was put to much better use a couple of years earlier in Ring Fit Adventure. It also added multiple sports months or even years later that would have been nice to have at launch.
But Resort’s 12 out-of-the-box sports matches the number from the Wii original, even if the lineup is pretty different. One of the new additions is thumb wrestling, where you hold a single Joy-Con with your thumb on the trigger (like in Arms) as you weave your hand back and forth, trying to outsmart your opponent. When you get pinned, you can shake the Joy-Con 2 as fast as you can to escape it. I’m not sure about the replayability of this one: it seems to lack the depth of something like swordfighting, which was easily my favorite sport in the original, and a far more compelling one-on-one battle than thumb wrestling was when I tried it.
My other favorite sport on Wii was archery, and it’s great here. The lack of cable between the Joy-Con controller – like the Wii Remote and Nunchuck had – meant I could draw my arrow back even further, and it was fun battling the wind to try and hit targets set up around the beaches of Wuhu. There was another course I didn’t get to try on the Plains of Wuhu Island, and I’m excited to perfect each one.
Nearby, in the ocean, I tried power cruising, but I didn’t really play in the ideal conditions. I raced alone and cruised around a very simple course on a timer. All of Switch Sports Resort’s modes are designed with multiplayer in mind, and I imagine it’d be a lot more fun to race against others, but I can’t speak to that just yet. I do love whenever Nintendo brings jet skis back, though, as it always feels like a nod to Wave Race 64.
Something interesting compared to the Wii Remote and Nunchuck is that every sport in Resort had me holding the Joy-Con 2 in a different way. I held a single Joy-Con vertically for bowling, the thumb grip I described earlier while thumb wrestling, and I held the pair of controllers like handlebars when power cruising, and it was a cool feeling to rev the engine for a boost. The gyro aiming on Switch 2 is already a huge improvement over Switch 1’s drifty motion controls, finally allowing the versatility of these little controllers to really shine.
All that said, though, I can’t help but feel like the peak of this franchise is far behind us. Wii Sports had a huge hand in changing the gaming landscape in the 2000s, and there was a time when it was so novel to invite family and friends over to make Miis and play Wii Sports. I am genuinely excited to play the rest of the sports and have Switch Sports Resort enter the rotation of casual party games for the rest of the Switch 2 generation, but most of that is rooted in nostalgia rather than love for this style of gameplay in 2026.
I’m also disappointed that Nintendo continues to push the generic new “Sportsmate” characters in this series. Miis are so intertwined with Wii Sports, and I think they have legitimately stronger character design than the basic avatars introduced in the first Switch Sports. You can still play as a Mii in Resort, I just think they should be front and center again, especially after Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream launched Miis back into popularity earlier this year.
Those issues aside, I did enjoy my return to Wuhu Island in Nintendo Switch Sports Resort. Seventeen years later, I still love the concept of an island fit for all forms of competition, and I’m looking forward to seeing the rest of it through the eight sports I haven’t tried yet. It’s still an excellent vacation destination.
Logan Plant is the host of Nintendo Voice Chat and IGN’s Database Manager & Playlist Editor. The Legend of Zelda is his favorite video game franchise of all time, and he is patiently awaiting the day Nintendo announces a brand new F-Zero. You can find new episodes of NVC every Friday on the IGN Games YouTube channel, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.
