Blast - Pre-launch: Midway’s Game Party 2

Midway’s Game Party 2 is another in a long, long series of mini games and party games that every developer has released to capitalize on the motion control of the Nintendo Wii.

This game is different for one reason: It’s the first game that we know of that let’s you play beer pong (or Beirut for your New Hampshire folk) — though they don’t call it by any sort of alcoholic name. They cleverly call it ping cup so that the parents don’t get mad.

You don’t need me to tell you that you’ve probably played most of these games before. In fact, you can play most of these games for real at any drunken men’s social club outing, including bet the bean bag toss, horseshoes, shuffleboard, darts, and puck bowling. But somehow that makes us like the game more.

The graphics aren’t very good, and we note that this doesn’t use Nintendo’s new Motion Plus accessory. But who cares. Game Party 2 doesn’t game itself very seriously, and that’s why we like it so far.

Plus, it’s got beer pong!

Game list: horseshoes, bean bags, shuffleboard, skill/skeeball, arcade hoop shoot, puck bowling, lawn darts, baseball bar darts, QB challenge, trivia, and ping cup (beer pong).

Game Party was Midway’s top-seller with 1.3 million copies sold since last year.

Game Party 2 is $20 and hits shelves today.