Original Release: Nintendo, 2009, Wii
Kind of a teaser for the full Wii Punch-Out game, but (at least initially) you had to reach a certain tier in Club Nintendo to get it
Doc Louis’ Punch-Out (Wii, Nintendo, 2009)
Where to Buy: No longer officially available; may be found on the hard drive of a used Wii
How to Emulate: Wii Emulation Guide
Review by: C. M0use
Doc Louis is one of the rarer digital releases on the Wii, only made available in a couple of limited ways during the system’s run. For years you had to be a Club Nintendo Platinum member and take it from a one-time choice of either this game or a Mario cap; in 2015, when the shop was being officially shut down, they made it available to everyone for 250 points in the final months.
It really isn’t anything special, especially if you already have the main Punch-Out game for the Wii. This resembles the teaser shareware of old PC games, where you’d just get like a limited level set for free to entice you into buying the full game. In this case, it’s some pretty intense sparring with Doc Louis. Who Nintendo did some nice character work with for this revamp btw, he feels like something out of the Rocky universe without actually ripping off anyone specific.
Since all you do is fight Doc, it gets pretty difficult pretty quick to pad things out. You go through three modes: Warm-Up, Training and Sparring, with Sparring only unlocked after you complete the other two modes. Warm-Up is a bit of a challenge but a reasonable introduction, Doc calls his moves a second ahead and has a limited repertoire. In Training mode he calls most of his moves, but not all, and only gives you like a split second to react, also adds a few moves. Sparring sees him go all out, with a few surprises that can be uncovered (like costume changes).
I don’t really mind the game being hard from the jump, that’s kinda the whole thing of the series, but it seems mean-spirited to give you no way to learn the buttons beside getting pounded in the face repeatedly while you experiment. Seemed like they expected you to already be familiar with the main Wii Punch-Out before playing this. Training is also a huge jump in difficulty from Warm-Up, again because there’s just so little overall content here.
It emulates just fine but maybe isn’t the best choice given how tight the timing windows are, any kind of button lag is killer with this game. And it insists on using Wiimote motion for the menus, which can be an emulation annoyance.
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