Trauma Center: Second Opinion – Review

Trauma Center: Under the Knife on the Nintendo DS brought the stress of the operating theatre right into your pocket, and now Trauma Center: Second opinion on the Nintendo Wii does it all over again, but this time on the home console format.

As you can probably imagine, the Wii’s new innovative style of game control is superbly suited for the Trauma Center games, just as the touchscreen was ideal for it on the handheld format. The use of both the Wiimote and Nunchuk controllers as you perform delicate operations is both clever and intuitive—though not without a few problems. The game essentially revolves around you being fast and precise, and, as you’re no doubt aware, these are two things that generally find themselves at odds with each other. However, this does add to the overall tension of the title, and it does feel good to be able to switch between instruments with the Nunchuk and put them to use with the Wiimote pointer.

You start off playing as young Dr. Derek Stiles, fresh out of his residency only to be dropped smack bang into the middle of a strange conspiracy as the story unfolds. We won’t spoil the plot for you here as, let’s face it, there’s nothing worse than major narrative points being given away in a games review, suffice to say there’s more to the story than a little slice and dice and the overarching thread emerges as fairly interesting.

Despite the game’s rather gruesome premise, Trauma Center: Second Opinion isn’t really a gorefest. Sure, you’re opening people up, suturing, fixing broken bones, and more, but the style of the graphics tends to stray away from anything overtly realistic. You can still tell what you’re doing of course, but it’s all relayed with pretty pink and purple hues and waxy looking cadavers (okay, so they’re only cadavers if you totally screw it up). The Wii has taken quite a bit of backlash for its modest graphics when compared to those on offer from the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, but Second Opinion does the job it sets out to do and doesn’t really lose anything just because it’s not a high-definition and realistic jaunt into the tension of the operating theatre. The game follows a comic book style with regards to the storyline and the majority of it is portrayed via flat comic/Manga styled images and accompanying text.

Sound in a game can really add to the overall atmosphere of the experience, either via the orchestration or the voice acting. Sadly, Trauma Center: Second Opinion doesn’t really excel in either area, but again that doesn’t overly detract from the game either, other than repetitive comments such as, “Doctor! Doctor! Doctor!” That said, the voice acting is done well enough whenever it appears (there’s far more text than there is speech—which is handy for the deaf or hard of hearing gamer), though, as mentioned, you’ll sometimes wish there was even less. Orchestration pretty much consists of a standard track that plays throughout the operations and is heightened by the odd additional sound to dramatize proceedings when things get hairy—most notably through the fluctuating heart-rate monitor that accompanies each operation.

In Trauma Center: Second Opinion you’ll not only play as the Dr. Derek Stiles first encountered in the DS version, but also as a female doctor by the name of Nazomi Weaver. Along with Dr. Weaver there are the usual irritating nurses littered throughout the story. Why on Earth the doctors put up with their smart mouthing is beyond this reviewer, you certainly don’t see that in ER. Dr. Weaver’s story is actually more interesting than the one unfolding around Dr Stiles—at least I thought so—did I mention the whiny nurse?

At time of writing Trauma Center: Second Opinion is only available in the United States, which ranks as yet another case of European gamers having to wait who knows how long until it’s eventually released this side of the pond. Why that happens is beyond logic. However, as Wii launch titles go, Trauma Center: Second Opinion is exciting on a couple of levels. For one thing it’s a launch title and therefore things should (all being well) only get better. It also highlights just how clever the Wiimote can be when used in conjunction with the Nunchuk. If you’re looking for something different to the other Wii launch titles, and something you’ll need to concentrate on a little more than insane rabbits, super monkeys, and boys with bows, then Trauma Center: Second Opinion could be just what the doctor ordered (yes, I know, that was a bad one).

Review by Tracy

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