20 Years Later, Wii Sports Remains One of the Greatest Games

Twenty years after its launch, Wii Sports remains one of Nintendo's most recognizable and influential titles. Bundled with the Wii at launch, it became one of the best-selling video games of all time, at around 83 million copies, and helped the console become a household staple.

The game packages five sport modes—boxing, bowling, golf, tennis and baseball—into an intuitive multiplayer experience. Using the Wii Remote and sometimes the Nunchuk, players swing, aim and throw in ways that mirror real sports, whether they face AI challengers like Matt or compete with friends and family, and many players found the physicality part of the appeal.

Nintendo later expanded the concept with Wii Sports Resort, which offers more mini-games and modes and is considered by many to be superior, and has since revealed Nintendo Switch Sports as a modernized, spiritual successor. Both follow the same idea of accessible, motion-based play that made the original so widespread.

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