Helix attempts to put gamers in a trance with mesmerizing music. But will the gameplay get you dancing or put you to sleep?

Helix hits the Wii full force with one of the most ambitious WiiWare games to date. Jumping feet…or rather arms first into the rhythm and music game genre, this daunting downloadable title from Ghostfire Games combines their music and your motion to give players a unique game experience.

First off, Helix is one of the largest game downloads I’ve had so far. Be prepared to possibly delete data or copy a number of games to your SD card because it takes up over 300 blocks of memory with additional blocks necessary to save your game. I ended up having to get rid of the Internet Channel, Nintendo Channel and a game save or two just to make room for this musical beast. Once downloaded, gamers are treated to a mix of Techno/Trance/Euro Dance Club beats and a start screen that reminds you of the visualizations from a music player or DJ screen projections. I must say that the music is bangin’! I absolutely loved it right from the start. And seriously, isn’t that what you want from a rhythm/music game?

Helix’s gameplay is pretty innovative since it consists of using two Wii remotes (one in each hand) and moving your arms to match the movements of the onscreen robot avatar. The game can be played with one Wiimote, but where’s the fun in that? A timing bar floats above the robot’s head and it’s your job to hit the marks with some degree of accuracy. Well, at least that’s the way it’s supposed to work.

Frankly, you could jump right in and begin playing Helix, but this title does offer a tutorial for new players, not that it really matters much. You’re probably asking yourself why it wouldn’t matter. That’s because the game really doesn’t seem tuned to detect correct motions to quite the degree you’d expect from a game like this. This is definitely not DDR or Pump It Up where every misstep is the road to a low score or the dreaded “Game Over”.

To start, I did do the moves exactly like the robot to try and get a good score. The game movements consist of punches, arm swipes, arm raises and side-to-side arm movements. They also throw in some over-the-head arm motions, arm circles and back fists for variety. Some motions registered, others didn’t. Playing more songs got me better scores and then I decided to see just what doing wrong moves would get me. I was able to score a B on one song doing my version of the trippy glow-stick rave dancing I always love seeing.

That was a major disappointment for me since I really love games like this. I was able to simply sway the Wiimotes back and forth to the beat without doing a single thing the robot was doing and get a B? Doing the right movements did get me an A, but I at least took solace in the fact that not moving the remotes at all will cause you to fail. Yay, movement!