Don't worry, I'm a doctor (on my Wii)

In the set of games that we bought with our Wii, this was one of the first to catch my eye. Honestly, who hasn’t thought about being a surgeon? I’ve never played the DS version of this series, so I didn’t know what to expect; but, thankfully, Trauma Center: Second Opinion didn’t disappoint too badly.

The game offers a unique way of delving into the intricate medical field, though is simple enough for most people to sit down and play. Although it’s recommended that you have a slight knowledge of medical terms beforehand (because knowing your scalpel from your forceps can come in pretty handy), the game offers about two pages of surgical-related words in its instruction booklet to help you out. If nothing else, I can guarantee that this game will help you catch up on some medical terminology.

You play through the game as Doctor Stiles, a rookie surgeon with a bad habit for carelessness. Seriously; a good portion of the game revolves around your character getting yelled at for being an idiot. Sometimes, the mistakes he makes will even have you complaining; what kind of doctor doesn’t care to look at the results of his patient’s blood test? Unfortunately, you have no way of controlling what messes he gets himself into, unless you’re performing surgery on one of his ill-fated patients.

Stiles later learns that he has a miracle-working ability called the “Healing Touch,” in which a doctor’s concentration will rise tenfold, making it seem as if time has literally slowed down. With this in mind, he’s sent off to cure numerous diseases once thought impossible.

Generally, the story is nothing special, nor is it made better by the blocks of text flashing across the screen between operations. There are little to no voiceovers; you’re expected to simply read through the sometimes lengthy bits of story. The only time you’ll hear a voice is when Stiles declares that he’s “starting the operation,” or you make a mistake during surgery and your assistant starts yelling “doctor!” (which gets very annoying, very fast). The images consist of two-dimensional cutouts of anime-looking characters; the only time they change is if the expression on their face turns with their mood.

But who cares about the story, right? You bought this game because you want to cut people open! Fear not, all those who are squeamish; despite that the game focuses on surgery, Trauma Center is not at all gory. It manages to have decent, to-the-point graphics rather than flooding the screen with gruesome images of someone’s insides. Regardless, there were a few points where I cringed -- most notably, during the first few minutes of the game, while attempting to pull glass shards out of someone’s chest and arms. That poor guy.

They don’t waste any time briefing you and throwing you into the examining room to fix someone up. In fact, their explanation of how to work with your tools in the game was rather lacking. I wasted about a minute on the first mission trying to figure out how to get my tool and keep it there, but once you understand it, it’s pretty easy to control. You use the nunchuck to select what you want to use by tilting the analog stick toward one of eight octagons, all corresponding to a different device. You then use the wiimote to use that utensil in your operation by placing it over the area at need and (usually) pressing A.

There are some tools that you’ll always have at your disposal during every operation, even if they’re not all required. In your doctor’s bag is some antibiotic gel to disinfect and instantly heal small cuts, a syringe to inject your patient with medicine, stitches to sew up incisions, a drain to get excess liquid out of your way, a surgical laser to burn off growths, an ultrasound to find hidden tumors and objects, a scalpel to cut through things, and a forceps to pick up delicate objects. Sometimes, your assistant will give you other tools that you’ll need during your operation, like bandages or a defibrillator.

Some tools require different methods of placement. For example, when you’re using the stitches to suture a large cut, you need to hold down the A button and draw a zigzag-like pattern over the wound. If you’re using your forceps, you hold both the A and B buttons to grab onto something -- and, if you’re removing an object from your patient, you need to make sure that it doesn’t touch the sides of the gash, or else it’ll fall back in and his vitals will drop. Some surgeries will even require you to turn the wiimote in your hand, which will rotate the item that you’ve picked up.

Trauma Center is something like a puzzle game. You need to figure out what tools to use at what moments, and you need to do it fast. About halfway through the first chapter of the game, I wondered: “Am I supposed to feel like I’m actually performing the surgery?” This game is tense, no doubt about it. From the edgy music during each procedure to the patient’s vitals constantly ticking away on the top of the screen, I’d be surprised if anyone playing Trauma Center hasn’t been forced to pause the game and take a deep breath. And if it’s not from stress, it’ll be from frustration; some of the tools are ridiculously hard to maneuver, like the defibrillator. You’re supposed to move the wiimote and the nunchuck forward to press the paddles against your patient, then press Z and B simultaneously once the meter at the top of the screen hits a certain level, showing the voltage of the shock. Sounds easy, right? No. If your hands just twitch, the paddles will rise and your assistant will start yelling.

Then there’s activating the extremely useful and extremely annoying Healing Touch. While holding down Z and B, you continuously draw a star in the center of the screen until time starts to slow down. Unfortunately, the wiimote is horrible for drawing, and you’ll often find that waiting for the game to pick up on your amazing star-sketching skills leaves room for the disease you’re curing to spread so far, that the mission has become impossible. Plus, you can only use the Healing Touch once during an operation, so all of that wasted time goes nowhere.

At the end of each operation, your points will be tallied up and they’ll give you a rank (either C, B, A, or S, with S being the highest). You can get bonus points for completing certain tasks during the procedure, such as keeping your patient’s vitals over a certain level, finishing quickly, or not making any mistakes. It’s harder than it seems; B and C ranks are flooding my story mode screen. But, that isn’t necessarily a bad thing -- this is one of those few games where you’ll actually feel inclined to try to raise your rank by using different tools and techniques.

Despite some of my complaints, I can’t deny that this game was fun and addictive. If you’re looking for a challenge, Trauma Center: Second Opinion is definitely a game to pick up.