The Conduit finds itself in a difficult spot. For starters, expectations have been placed on it as the game to establish the Wii as a platform that good FPS games can be developed for. It also needs to prove that the developers behind it, High Voltage Software, can break from their usual track record and craft a good game.

For the most part, The Conduit fulfills these needs rather well. It certainly lays down a good framework and a solid foundation that can be built upon in order to craft a truly superb Wii FPS and the game also shows that High Voltage Software is indeed capable of making a good game. But while The Conduit is certainly a good Wii FPS, there are a few big problems that keep it from being the brilliant game Wii fans wanted.

The Conduit's story is simple and generic sci-fi fare. The game takes place in Washington D.C. and you play as Michael Ford, a member of the Trust, a secret government agency dedicated to taking out the Druge, an evil alien force that has invaded D.C. For the most part, the story is straight-forward although there some (predictable) plot twists to keep things relatively interesting. Generally speaking, the plot is not likely to catch your interest, although those who like their sci-fi plots with plenty of cheese will probably be satisfied.

Special mention has to be given to the ending though. To be frank, it's absolutely terrible. The ending is extremely open, and everything ends very abrubtly. In fact, the game leads you to believe you're going to the next level. Instead, you go directly to the ending credits. To say the ending leaves room for a sequel is an understatement. If you want to be more accurate, it leaves room for five sequels, a movie adaptation, a short novel, and a series of comic books.

The Conduit isn't very original in its gameplay either. To be fair though, that's perfectly acceptable. It's run-and-gun action in its purest form and without the Wii Remote, the game would not be nearly as fun. Indeed, The Conduit is one of the few games on the system to truly benefit from its motion-sensing capabilities. The controls simply work excellently. Not only do the controls work well at their default settings, allowing players to aim with accurate precision, but the game also allows players to fully customize the controls. You can change your bounding box, run speed, cursor sensitivity, Wii Remote sensitivity, turning speed, the list simply goes on and on. What's more is you can change all these variables in real time as you go through the game, allowing every player to find their ideal settings without going back and forward through the menus. After finding a setup that you're most comfortable with, the game controls like an absolute dream.

Unfortunately, The Conduit suffers from some glaring design issues. For starters, the game is pretty linear. You will find yourself going through corridor after corridor mowing down the same enemies constantly. It's fun, thanks to the controls, but you might find yourself wanting for even just a little bit of exploration. To make things even more linear, players can whip out the ASE, a floating, spherical tool used for finding hidden messages and switches, and press the fire button to make the device spit out a glowing trail to the player's next destination.

Speaking of the ASE, it is a good idea, giving players the ability to find secret rooms and buttons. However, the thing seems to hold your hand far too much. The device will emit a ping sound once you're close to a secret - even when you're not currently using it - and it will ping louder and faster the closer you get to it. The most effective way to find the hidden goodie is to go through the game normally and then just whipping the thing out whenever you hear its signature ping noise. There's just no actual strategy to it.

Additionally, there are few big set piece battles throughout the game. There are a few bosses but they usually consist of  just emptying clip after clip into them until they die. It would be nice if the game mixed things up every once in a while instead of seemingly repeating the same environments over and over.

Another thing is that the enemies constantly emerge from spawn points. The good thing is these spawn points can be destroyed and it's usually not much of a hassle to do so. The big problem is when there's a ton of them bunched together because that's when it gets really frustrating.

But despite these design flaws, The Conduit manages to be an extremely fun experience thanks to the controls. It's a delight to aim and shoot with such fluidity and precision and it cannot be stated enough how much the controls help the game. If you're like me and simply want a fun, but not especially original, game, The Conduit certainly impresses.

Once you're done with the single player, you can hop online for some multiplayer mayhem. The Conduit offers many online game modes from deathmatch to a variant of capture the flag. It is online where you are able to forget the flaws of the single player and the controls really shine through. The result is an extremely addictive experience that will keep players coming back for more. In my experience, the online works well. For the most part, anyway. While I usually have very enjoyable, lag-free matches, there are other times where an online match is unplayable with foes darting in and out of sight as well as some inopportune pauses.

Graphically, The Conduit is a mixed bag. The tech is certainly nice, boasting some very impressive (for the Wii at least) technical effects such as depth of field, bloom lighting, and other technical buzzwords. However, all this graphical wiz-bang comes at a price: a consistent frame rate. The game runs pretty well at times, but other times the game can really chug and grind to a halt. In my experience though, these times are rare enough to be almost a non-issue.

Additionally, the tech seems to outperform the art. All the environments look alike and there are plenty of bland textures and character models to go around. With better art, The Conduit could easily be one of the best lookers on the Wii but as it is, it simply can't stand up to Super Mario Galaxy and Metroid Prime 3.

Overall, The Conduit is a competent FPS. It proves that good Wii FPSs can be made and lays down the foundation for something great. While the game is bogged down by a few big design issues, it still manages to be enough fun to warrant a purchase thanks to the sublime controls and addictive multiplayer. It doesn't do anything new, but it also doesn't really need to.

Final Score: 7/10