The ongoing newsfeed search for “stickball” has turned up this gem today: a suite of “street games” for your Wii gaming console!

Go Play City Sports by Majesco Entertainment

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jKWJLU5lNg
Video courtesy of NintendoWorldReport.com; read their review of the game

I’m not sure whether this is great–keeping the games alive for future generations–or whether it’s just more fodder for the oft-heard argument that videogames keep kids indoors getting fat sitting on the couch.  And it’s true: this is at least the second street game-based videogame available (MLB Stickball is the first I know of). I don’t know my take on this yet: maybe this will encourage kids to go outside and play the games they rehearse on the Wii. And I love my Wii, so it would be a little duplicitous to say an ill word against it.  But I do wish that the “handball” depicted here were the Ace-King-Queen version, though (where the ball hits the ground before hitting the wall).  And where’s skully?

I mainly wish the milieu depicted by publisher Majesco Entertainment weren’t so shabby; it’s an insult to people who actually lived (or live) in the city as a child.  The implication is that the street is a dirty, ragtag place that (thankfully) the shiny white Wii box is saving you from having to experience firsthand.  Hey, when I grew up, that setting was my home, and it was the greatest place to be in the world.