In what's rapidly becoming a Wii mainstay, Wii Play is yet another collection of casual games designed to level the playing field for casual, serious and aspiring-to-be-serious gamers alike. And seeing as Wii's clever, motion-sensitive, magic-wand-like remote is essentially totally new to all who play with it, the 9 games Wii Play offers are each wide open for domination; each player's learning curve starts at zero. Problem is, you also have to like them to bother trying to dominate.

Assuming you need one, Wii Play comes bundled with a Wii-mote controller of its own, thereby promoting the 2-player competitive fun of each game found therein, as if you hadn't bothered picking up a second Wii-mote already, which cost $40 - $50 when sold separately (depending on where you shop)... but if you did, here's a spare for the next time you're lathered in butter and letting the thing squirt away to smash the chandelier -- plus a $0 - $10 disc full of game fluff that is, ultimately, a bargain.

The games themselves consist of a target shooting game much akin to a modern-day Duck Hunt (with a hefty dose of UFO-abduction hilarity); a variation of "Where's Waldo" (Find Mii); a spacey neon game of table hockey; cartoon fishing for flat, floating, cardboard cutout fish in a pond no bigger than a bathtub; shape recognition bubble-popping shenanigans; a cow driving game (yes, you read that right); 3D ping-pong; 3D billiards; and a deceptively clever game of toy tanks having at it in a variety of clever little wooden mazes.

None of the games are particularly complex, but each are engaging and perhaps even addictive, depending on your bent or fondness for berserker bovine and Waldo wannabes. At any rate, you'll most likely find yourself gravitating to two or three of the titles to play over and over, maybe more if there's always a second player handy.

And though Wii Play games are positively homely when compared to the razzle-dazzle definition of other new-generation console games, realize that even a lowly, thoughtful black and white sketch can be more pleasing to the eye than a vivid splattering of high definition color. To wit, it's not always graphical horsepower that makes a game look good, but often the judicious implementation of tools from a sparser toolbox; in the context of casual, Wii Play games look just fine. Great, even. Same can be said of how they actually play.

Of course, if you're not in need of another Wii-mote, then, well, $50 freebie is something of an oxymoron, isn't it?

• TIP: In the laser hockey game of Wii Play, you can change the shape of the paddles from flat to round by pressing A and B at the same time as the start timer counts down. English and ricochet physic will behave appropriately.