Quarterly Report: The 25 Best Wii Games

by Jason Dietz, Metacritic Features Editor
Publish Date: December 31, 2012
Comments: ↓ 10 user comments

Our "Quarterly Reports" provide a handy list of the 25 best games for each platform, both for the current year so far and for all time. There's a separate report for each platform, and they will be updated again during the first week in April.

Best-reviewed Wii games of 2012

Games released during the last three months (if any) are marked with a symbol.

	Game		Publisher	Metascore
1		Xenoblade Chronicles	Nintendo	92
1		If you want to get technical, this JRPG is actually one of 2011's best Wii games, but thanks to a belated American release in April of this year, it's now 2012's best, too.
2	La-Mulana		EnjoyUp Games	87
3	Rhythm Heaven Fever		Nintendo	83
4	The Last Story		Xseed Games	80
5	Skylanders Giants		Activision	78
6	Project Zero 2: Wii Edition		Nintendo	77
7	Pandora's Tower		Nintendo	74
8	Just Dance 4		Ubisoft	74
9	Mario Party 9		Nintendo	73
10	PokePark 2: Wonders Beyond		Nintendo	60
11	Inazuma Eleven Strikers		Nintendo	59

Includes games released between January 1, 2012 and December 31, 2012 with at least seven reviews in our database. Note that games are ranked by Metascore prior to rounding. The Metascore is a weighted average of critic reviews on a scale of 0 (bad) to 100 (good). All scores are from December 30, 2012.

Best-reviewed Wii games of all time

Games released during the last three months (if any) are marked with a symbol.

	Game	Publisher	Metascore
1	Super Mario Galaxy	Nintendo	97
2	Super Mario Galaxy 2	Nintendo	97
3	The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess	Nintendo	95
4	World of Goo	2D Boy	94
5	Super Smash Bros. Brawl	Nintendo	93
6	The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword	Nintendo	93
7	Rock Band 2	MTV Games	92
8	Xenoblade Chronicles	Nintendo	92
9	Rayman Origins	Ubisoft	92
10	Rock Band 3	MTV Games	91
11	Metroid Prime Trilogy	Nintendo	91
12	Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition	Capcom	91
13	Okami	Capcom	90
14	Metroid Prime 3: Corruption	Nintendo	90
15	The Beatles: Rock Band	MTV Games	89
16	Cave Story	Nicalis	89
17	Guitar Hero 5	Activision	89
18	DJ Hero 2	Activision	88
19	Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10	Electronic Arts	88
20	Art of Balance	Shin'en	88
21	La-Mulana	EnjoyUp Games	87
22	New Super Mario Bros. Wii	Nintendo	87
23	DJ Hero	Activision	87
24	Donkey Kong Country Returns	Nintendo	87
25	Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure	Capcom	87

Games with fewer than 7 reviews are not eligible for inclusion.

For a complete list of all Wii high (and low) scores, visit Metacritic's Wii section.

We're sorry, but comments are closed for this article.

Comments (10)

First to Last
Latest

your mother
- May 31, 2011 5:58AM
well, the wii may be falling liike a rock on a hill, but the Nintendo Stream (it just SOUNDS cool) will rise on top.
The games MUST be, as Nintendo has declared, hardcore.
Now, I'm not much of a fan for hardcore games, but those kids--on a Nintendo console!?
But, the only thing is is that many of the developers won't comply with Nintendo's factual statement, thus making them think that they'll just throw in shovelware and such.
So, in order for the new Nintendo home console to rise on top once more, they need to be:
"Stern and Firm!
That way,
NINTENDO
WILL
WIN.
Noel
- Apr 14, 2011 4:21AM
Ahh people people. Love how they talk bad about the games without playing them. I have an xbox 360 as well but I still own much more wii games the xbox titles. Metroid prime wasn't comftable for me on gamecube control but on wii its brilliant! Brawl is ten times better than melee, kirby epic yarn is innovative. Gee now lets see killzone, crysis, call of duty again dumb war shooting games, that may be fun but after a few days gets old too quickly.
giddi
- Apr 12, 2011 3:59AM
@OXIDE, what kind of sense is that? I can say this about the other lists .. uncharted 2 kill zones LBP just sequels.. same call of duty modern warfare garbage every year (also on the Wii by the way), the rockband music (also on the Wii), nothing original...
but you forgot:

11 Metroid Prime 3: Corruption Nintendo 20 Donkey Kong Country Returns Nintendo 87 8.3
21 Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros’ Treasure Capcom 87 8.8
22 Kirby’s Epic Yarn Nintendo 87 8.2
23 Little King’s Story Xseed Games 24 Sin and Punishment: Star Successor 25 LostWinds: Winter of the Melodias Kirby’s Epic Yarn

World of Goo is also on the PC? Every game on the Ps3/360 is multiplatform and also on the PC, almost. LOL. Also on the gamecube is the most silly comment. RE4 is a masterpiece because of the Wii controls and so is Okami and others.
Kevin
- Apr 10, 2011 11:00AM
@ManaReaper
Really? So the functional online gameplay, diverse online functions (movies, games, tv shows, music), HD graphics, better processing, and more good games doesnt matter, all because Nintendo lets you pay absurd amounts for games that came about 15-20 years ago? If you say so....
Mark
- Apr 9, 2011 4:04PM
Truly shocking. Time for Wii owners to upgrade to a PS3.
ManaReaper
- Apr 9, 2011 3:11PM
The Wii is worth sitting on top of a PS3 or 360 just for Nintendo's games and VC. I do question how much longer the console will last though.
Peter Robinson
- Apr 8, 2011 11:55AM
The Wii happens to fit my purchasing habits perfectly. I tend to buy (at most) one of the Nintendo-made titles each year, and I was able to catch up on a lot of games from older consoles thanks to the Virtual Console and the Wii's backward compatibility with GameCube games. However, it has become painfully obvious that the Wii is not a viable console for serious gamers. I'm unsure as to whether that's a good or bad thing, really. To me, it almost makes sense for each console to have its own specialty rather than having three or more companies compete for dollars from the same exact demographic. Certainly, though, the complete lack of third-party support for Nintendo's console is disappointing.
OXIDE
- Apr 7, 2011 12:56PM
World of Goo is also on the PC, Okami belongs to the PS2, RE4 belongs to the PS2 & GC, Prime 1 & 2 belong to the GC, Twilight GC, Cave Story PC, NSMBWII is the sequel to the game on DS, Melee was outstanding there was little need for Brawl i mean...what kinda console is this?The WII is a travesty, the only thing that belongs to the WII is the Motion Controller & SMG1 & 2...which of course, are sequels to SM64 & Sunshine, there is nothing original-WORST CONSOLE EVER!
David Craig
- Apr 7, 2011 12:48PM
the amount of wii games released so far this year is pitiful
kevin
- Apr 7, 2011 11:25AM
damn, they sold alot of them but the wii looks dead.

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