I was approached by smiley360.com to do a review on RedBox.  For those of you who do not know what RedBox is…it is a small kiosk located outside of many retail stores where you can rent movies…and now Wii and XBox 360 games.  smiley360 gave me 5 free promo codes to rent some Wii games.

It’s actually pretty simple.  You browse the selection on the screen, pick your movies/games, and proceed to checkout where you swipe your credit card.  Movies are $1 per day and games are $2 per day.  Not a bad deal at all!

We went to a local RedBox to rent a Wii game.  The first RedBox kiosk we stopped at only had three Wii games available…and they were all checked out.  XBox 360 had more of a selection, but we do not have an XBox.

So, we went to a second location.  This RedBox had 5 or 6 Wii games available.  The first one on the list was Wipeout 2.  Ace is addicted to that show.  We DVR it and he will watch it at least 50 times before the new one comes out the next week.

We rented Wipeout 1 a while back and it was too complicated.  Even I had a hard time playing it.  But we took Wipeout 2 over to Grandma’s house where Ace and his cousin Olivia could give it a go.  They both picked up on the controls rather quickly and played it for a few hours before the Wii remote batteries died.    Otherwise I think they would still be playing.

We all played the Wipeout 2 game and everyone got a kick out of it!  It was so much like the TV show with it’s replays of your wipe outs and even has John Anderson, John Henson, and Jill Wagner as hosts with their funny commentary!

We were going to use all five free promo codes, but since it was my first rental I could only rent one game at a time.  Also the selection was limited (I’m hoping because it is such a new thing to rent Wii games).  So I will have to continue to check back and rent the four other games and post reviews here as well.

smiley360.com also sent me a free game called Go Vacation.  This game is amazing!  We have played it for hours and only touched the surface of the things you can do.

The whole point of the game is that you are on vacation and can roam around the resorts on your own and do the different activities that you find.  The box for the game says there are over 100 different mini games you can play.

Ace just liked hopping on the four wheelers and jet skis and cruising around the island.  We left the game at Grandma’s house one night and the next day Olivia played it for like four hours!!  We took it back home and she was quite upset that she could not continue to play…so, I think her Dad will end up buying it for her. 

All in all we had a great time.  We got the family together, made homemade pizzas, and played the Wii into the weeee hours of the night.  Much longer than the kids lasted.  I’m pretty sure the adults enjoyed it as much (if not more) than the kids. 

Note: smiley360.com provided me with a free sample game to play as well as five free promo codes to rent games from any RedBox location.  I was not paid to do this review and the opinions expressed are my own.