Beijing 2008

In now-classic events such as sprinting running and swimming, instead of mashing the power buttons as soon as the starting pistol is heard, the player has to control a bar with the trigger buttons, where the player jumps from the blocks when it is completely filled and has to be careful not to fill the bar too soon (resulting in a false start) or too late (losing precious time).

Other events also have their share of gameplay innovations in the genre, such as the Javelin, where the analogue stick is used to set the throw and accurately define the angle accurately.

In the most off-beat events, diving and rings requires the player to follow the on-screen cue with the analogue pads, while others such as the the floor exercise and beam require the player to follow the button queues - there are three difficulty levels, mostly changing the looseness of the timing - in higher levels, the player will have a much harder time hitting "perfect" moves and some of them will require much faster combinations.

One of the most novel events is Judo, where the player must react quickly to the on-screen cues in order to gain advantage during the grappling phase - once there's an opening chance for an attack, the player can press one button to initiate a throw, and if the mis-match was large enough (a "Perfect" against a "Very Good" won't allow for an Ippon throw, and the defending player with block the attack, starting another grappling sequence).

The player being thrown must bash the appr