We only have a handful of Wii games, because I'm not a fan of gimmicky games tied to new movies and such - I've been very picky about what I've purchased since we got our Wii for Christmas '08. After reading the reviews for this game, I felt the amount of play and appeal to all ages made it worth spending my money on. Wow, am I glad I did!The first night after it arrived, after my kids went to bed, my husband and I tried it out for the first time - we wanted to give it a run before the kids got ahold of it! We had so much fun, we played until our bedtime!The next day, our oldest (age 9) got into the game right away and really enjoys playing against her dad. My youngest (age 6) was more cautious and just watched, not wanting to compete against everyone older than her... then about two weeks later, we found the mini teaching segments where you learn the basic skills of the game in short levels - it will pause during the level and explain how to work with specific obstacles. She asked to try when she figured out there wasn't as much pressure with this section, and worked her way through all of these segments rather quickly, which gave her the confidence to play a "real" level. Now she gladly plays the whole game with us without hesitation!We don't own the balance board, so I cannot comment on that aspect of the game.However, I can tell we are going to get a LOT of use out of this game, and for that I feel it was completely worth purchasing for the whole family.
