NPPL Championship Paintball 2009 for Wii Reviews by Gamers

Hardcore paintball fans that want to bring the sport to their home gaming consoles: this is your game. Activision has done a decent job bringing the feel of real-life paintball to home consoles with NPPL Championship Paintball 2009. But, is it enough to captivate the casual paintball fan or the gamer looking to lose him or her self in an immersive first-person shooter?

NPPL Championship Paintball 2009 is easy to dive right into, all you'll need to do is select a character from a list of real-life professional paintballers, each with his own base attribute package, choose your team and dive right in. You'll want to jump into Career Mode, where you'll begin your career as a lowly Division 2 competitor with standard equipment, but after winning a few tournaments you'll have plenty of points to spend on upgrading your gear and attributes.

Playing through Career Mode is certainly fun, but it gets repetitive real fast. Although the game is packed with authentic paintball tournaments, each played on their own unique field, it doesn't do much to alleviate the feeling that you're executing the same operation over and over again. Yes, gamers can customize their "breakout" strategies before each game, but it doesn't feel at all necessary and doesn't seem to have a significant impact on team success. Once I figured out that my AI opponents had almost no chance of hitting me while sprinting and strafing I was able to dash up the sides of each field and infiltrate their ranks with ease, picking opponents off at close range as they were occupied dealing with my bunker-hugging teammates.
And, although the credits you earn with each tournament win in Career Mode can be spent on fresh, powered-up gear, your gear doesn't seem to have an impact on the in-game experience. I played through several tournaments and spent my earned credits on the best markers, hoppers and barrels available to me, but didn't' notice any appreciable difference on the field.

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