Punch-Out!! (Wii)

Punch-Out!! is a game released for the Wii in 2009 by Next Level Games, the developers of Super Mario Strikers and its sequel. The game stars Little Mac and has a cameo appearance of Donkey Kong. It is the fifth installment of the Punch-Out!! series.

Punch-Out!! was re-released on the Wii U Nintendo eShop in North America on January 22, 2015, and will arrive in Japan, Europe and Australia in the future.

Gameplay
The gameplay is similar to Punch-Out!! on the NES. It has the heart system for stamina and the 3 star system for Power Punches. This game has various controller settings ranging from the Wii Remote, Wii Balance Board and Nunchuk.

Development
The game started development in 2008, a 15 second trailer was shown. Nintendo wanted to make a new Punch-Out!! game like the original Punch-Out!! for the NES, so they asked Next Level Games to design the gameplay to be like the original game, and the characters to look like their original appearances. This led to the studio designing the game with classic NES-style controls by using the Wii Remote turned sideways. Pre-production started when the Wii was released. At the time, Nintendo was discussing the idea with the studio. Soon after that, the studio created a prototype of the game.

Trivia

 * Princess Peach was going to make an appearance in this game as a fighter but the idea was dropped because the thought of punching out women made Kensuke Tanabe give up the idea.
 * This is the second game in the Punch-Out!! series to include a reference to the Mario series, as the NES game had Mario as a referee.