Shawn Johnson Gymnastics for Wii features four different gymnastics events, and requires players to perform movements at specific times in order to complete a successful routine.

You’ll need a nunchuk hooked up to the Wii-mote in order to control Shawn Johnson gymnastics.  After you create your own character (or choose to play as Shawn Johnson), you’ll be able to enter a tutorial, training mode, or go straight to the competition.  The tutorial and training modes are somewhat similar, but in the tutorial mode you’ll watch a complete animation of a final routine before attempting yours.  We didn’t find it particularly helpful, because the gameplay is ultimately about moving your controllers (or body if you are using the Wii Balance Board) in time with the onscreen prompts.

The way the game has you perform routines is that the onscreen gymnast will begin moving, and prompts will appear onscreen, asking you to alternate moving the Wii-mote and nunchuk up and down, for example, to simulate running.  Then, at key intervals of the action, you must perform a series of movements in order.  We actually found the movements to be fun and have just the right balance between simplicity and quickness of the maneuvers.  A quick timer for each movement lets you know whether or not you have completed it, and the quicker you do it, the better you do onscreen.

There are four different events in Shawn Johnson Gymnastics – Floor Routine, Balance Beam, Uneven Bards and Vault.  Each one has the same general control system.

The best path to success in Shawn Johnson Gymnastics is by practicing your routines in training mode so you can anticipate what actions you’ll need to perform when it comes time to perform them in the competition.  This is a point that’s recommended by Shawn, and is actually a good life lesson – practice, practice and  more practice help make perfect.

The game makes fun use of the Wii Balance Board in the controls, if you have one, asking you to jump, shift forward, backward or onto one foot at various times.  Before every event you do, the game asks if you’d like to use the Wii Balance Board, so it’s an option that can be turned on or off.

We did have some technical problems with Shawn Johnson Gymnastics in that the game has a very confusing menu system, coupled with a very confusing pointer.  So not can it be difficult the first few times you play to even know what you are trying to do, but the game uses a five-pointed star as a point, and although intuitively we saw many players try and use the center of the star as the selection, the game actually want you to use the top point of it.  Our first time playing, we almost quit entirely because we though the controls were broken, but we finally figured this out.

The game features a multiplayer mode, where up to four different players can compete in events, using the same Wii-mote and nunchuk.  So players will need to pass the controller around.  The events they compete in and the routines they use are the same as in the single-player game.  After the completion, medals are awarded for highest score, but also for various successes that players may have had within the completion, such as who was the fastest runner.

Shawn Johnson Gymnastics is a fun way to play videogame gymnastics, it’s just a little tough to get there with the game’s confusing menu system and navigation.  The game makes great use of the Wii Balance Board, and it does feel right to practice landings and other movements in a game like this.  We think that kids and tween girls who are into gymnastics will love being able to practice their routines as they compete to be the best, and dads might even catch themselves performing the victory pose for the judges after they nail an onscreen landing.