The Nintendo Wii’s software lineup has been notoriously harangued by hardcore gamers for the endless string of shovelware titles that have been allowed on the system. Summer Athletics is one such title. Looking to capitalize on the Olympic craze currently sweeping the world, Summer Athletics offers a solid number of events. The problem is that few of them are any good, and the ones that you do tolerate won’t keep you coming back for any appreciable amount of time.

Summer Athletics covers the gamut of most Olympic events: Swimming, Diving, Running, Throwing, Shooting and Jumping archetypes are all included. (With events such as the 100 meter backstroke, 100 meter sprint, Archery, Pole Vault as specific examples) While the game features 25 events, few of them prove to be fun, as poor directions and motion controls knock out most of the enjoyment. Lack of compelling motion controls also hurt the game, as most of the events could be boiled down to waggling the Wii Remote and Nunchuk as fast as you possibly can. There are also some rhythm-based controls in a few of the events, (think Guitar Hero or Rock Band) where a Nunchuk or Wii Remote icons fall down the screen, and you must shake the Nunchuk or Wii Remote at the right time to build power or form for your athlete. However, most of these are prohibitively hard to pull off at the normal difficulty setting, have no rhyme or reason for why there are so many Wii Remotes and Nunchuks heading your way.

It doesn’t help that Summer Athletics looks like a good-looking Nintendo 64 game. Textures are muddy on all characters models, lines on track fields will start blending together when viewed from an overhead perspective, and water looks more like a clear bed of jello. Animation is stiff and rigid, making the athletes look more like robots than human beings. The sound doesn’t fair much better, either, as there is not a single memorable track, and the announcer that calls the events says little, and what he does say is not very interesting and not well delivered.

That is really the story of Summer Athletics: It’s not very interesting and not well delivered. You’ll have your fill of the game shortly after you pick it up, due to the lackluster controls–and if you do enjoy a couple of the events (I personally enjoyed the 100 meter breaststroke), they only last for a couple of minutes and are not going to make you want to boot up the game. There is a career mode and a competition mode that could potentially extend the experience, but you would still be playing the same events multiple times–so it’s unlikely you’ll want to touch much of that aspect of the game. Even if the game retailed at $19.99, ($29.99 is the current retail price) there still isn’t enough here to justify even batting a second eye at the game.