Sports games seem like a natural fit for the Wii, combining the excitement of the actual activity with the natural exertion involved in using a motion-sensing remote as a controller. Wii Sports shipped with every Wii console in Europe and the United States, meaning that the vast majority of Nintendo gamers worldwide have played it - so it's no wonder that other companies want a slice of that tasty, tasty mini-game pie. Once such company is THQ, whose Big Beach Sports features a budget selection of six sports themed mini-games. It's a very mixed bag and the company seem to be working on the principle that if they distract you with enough mini-games then you'll forgive the patchy hit rate. They must not remember how the majority of gamers found Monkey Ball's menagerie of sixty mini-games akin to donating bone marrow without an anaesthetic.

Nonetheless, Big Beach Sports chooses a more manageable six, and at a budget price point that's acceptable to even the most scrimping saver - it's easier on the wallet than starting a virtual Rock Band at least! What you get in the package is beach variants of football, American football, boules, cricket, disc golf and volleyball. Cynics may notice that three of those are very similar to Wii Sports' bowling, baseball and golf - and they're right, as the controls and feel are remarkably similar. Unsurprisingly, these are also the games that are the most fun to play. Everything's relative though, and Soccer in particular makes Mario Strikers feel like Pro Evo!

I must admit, the game did surprise me upon booting it up for the first time. Not for the quasi-racist tribes-people running around on the beach (that bit was tiresomely predictable) but for the character customisation. You have limited functions to change skin tone and clothes on the Wii, but for those with the inclination and the hardware, you are allowed to download the face-editing tool to the DS and make changes there. Although it's surprising to see such innovation in a budget, third party title when Nintendo themselves have shied away from linking up with the DS, don't get too excited: the tool is still remarkably limited and giving my character a bright blue "strongman at the circus" moustache was about all I could manage to do convincingly.

As an unashamed admirer of Wii Sports, Big Beach tries to do everything by mimicking sporting movements and actions with movements of the Wiimote. This is a mixed bag in terms of effectiveness but for the most part it involves you holding the Wiimote like a cricket bat, moving it up in your palms to flick a virtual volleyball and moving your arm in an arc when throwing a golf-disc. Again, like Wii Sports, for the most part the onus of moving characters is left to the AI, which would have been sensible if the game could create avatars with a semblance of intelligence, but will at least work well for young children taking their first steps towards becoming the foul-mouthed, squeaky, inhabitants of Xbox Live we know they have the potential to be.

The sports themselves are a mixed bag, so let's examine them in order of entertainment value. Disc-Golf is the best in the package. Modelling itself almost identically on Wii Sports' golf model, the flight of the discus is controlled by how hard you move the Wiimote, while you can change the trajectory by moving the d-pad. You can perform trial throws (just like in golf) to see how far up the metre you go. Next we have Boules, which works a bit like bowling in that game I keep mentioning that's bundled with every Wii. You throw your boule down and the nearer it lands to the jack, the more points you get. One problem I encountered with this one is that AI players seem to be able to throw farther than I ever managed using the Wiimote, making an automatic win for them if they go for range - so either the game is faulty or my noodley-arms need to spend more time on Wii Fit. Regardless, the game is simple and semi-enjoyable. The last of the better games is Cricket, which works a bit like baseball in "that other game." You bat and bowl by mimicking the actions with the Wiimote, and you play shortened rounds where if someone goes out they lose four points rather than losing a player. While this is really a simple test of reflexes, there is still plenty of satisfaction to be found in knocking out fours and sixes.

Now, call me cynical, but all three of the above games - the ones that offer a semblance of enjoyment - closely resemble titles in Wii Sports. To their credit, THQ must have realised this, because the next three take something of a departure from the tried and tested mechanic, but as they do, watch the praise go from muted to non-existent.

American Football I shall give the benefit of the doubt to, as my frustrations could be down to not understanding the sport (though this suggests that the two lines of tutorial might have been insufficient.) With two-a-side, you arc the Wiimote over your head to carry out throws and thrust outwards to tackle or shoulder barge. This is fine, but a little too limited for serious play, while being too complicated for the clueless. Then there's volleyball, which is simply an exercise in hitting the ball up to your teammate and then into the opposition's side until they miss the return. It's true that this isn't THQ's fault, but it feels far more mundane than Beach Spikers for example; it's very easily mastered and quickly becomes an exercise in repetitive boredom. Finally we have Soccer, the one title with no redeeming features to speak of. It's a thoroughly lamentable three-a-side tournament that involves no skill whatsoever as the players' runs are controlled by the AI; all you have to do is choose who to pass to (A or B) and occasionally shoot. The AI is poor, you have very little control, the animation is horribly clumsy and getting to the end of a game (let alone a tournament) is a real chore. I wasn't expecting Pro Evolution Soccer, but a dumbed-down version of Mario Strikers would have sufficed; instead you have this soulless, dull and crippled abomination.

Multiplayer brightens things up a little, but don't expect it to last a whole evening. It's local play as expected and the game does allow you to enjoy its better titles (the turn-based disc-golf and boules) using a single Wiimote, which is useful for those without a full compliment of controllers. Multiplayer can't disguise the horror of 'beach soccer' but it does make the occasional frustrations of the better games easier to swallow when you have the banter and ceremony that front-room multiplayer brings to the table.

Graphically, Big Beach does the job. Your mileage will vary depending on your tolerance for cutesy visuals (which I'm assuming is high if you've ever bought a Nintendo console), but in general the bright colours fit the mood perfectly. I'd have preferred integrated Mii support but it's obvious that would have made the parallels with Wii Sports just a little too much to bear. It's not jaw-droppingly beautiful but there's nothing here to make you hide your eyes in horror. The sound, on the other hand is pretty poor, but blissfully not the type of poor that can't be ignored. It's a mix of clichéd calypso and soundbytes that do little to draw attention to themselves - and that's fine by me.

When Big Beach Sports first arrived I smelled mediocrity a mile off - the worst trait for a reviewer. You don't get a great game and you don't get the fun of venting your spleen on a truly dreadful product. Big Beach Sports will provide you with some entertainment, provided your friends are willing to join you, but there's a reason why it's a budget release and you shouldn't expect to still be playing this limited title by Christmas when the beaches are deserted.

Reviewed by Alan Martin for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).