Thus far Nintendo Land has been billed as the Wii U equivalent of Wii Sports. To some degree that comparison is fair, as Nintendo Land is a collection of smaller games, and it also operates as a key demonstration of the potential of Wii U. You'd also be forgiven for equating the two titles, as Nintendo has done so in the past - though it now admits that was a mistake. Yet playing Nintendo Land for more than just 30 minutes reveals something significant - there is a lot packed into this game. Were it not for its general presentation, gamers might be thinking about this game in a very different way.

The Return of F-Zero... Sort Of

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Collecting Fruit With Yoshi

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Dancing in the Sea - With an Octopus

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Chasing Mario - With Yoshi

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Busting Ghosts in Luigi's Mansion

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There's So Much Candy in Animal Crossing: Sweet Day

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Battling Olimar's Pikmin

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Waging War With Takamaru's Ninja Castle

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Hunting in Zelda's Battle Quest

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The Remaining Games - And Details

Today we're going to walk you through some of those key ideas, and show you a lot of Nintendo Land footage along the way. Though some other games (like ZombiU) are higher on our 'Must Have' list, we're not at all dismissing Nintendo Land. It might not be as revolutionary as Wii Sports, but it will likely be the better game.It's interesting to see Nintendo avoid using the F-Zero label for Captain Falcon's Twister Race, despite the fact that this game recreates that experience, albeit with some Wii U twists, and a bit of a slower speed. Tilting the GamePad from a vertical position steers your craft, and rather than race against opponents, you simply aim to survive. (Your previous attempt will be displayed in ghost form, giving you some gauge of your performance.) Though you can watch the TV as you steer, your better bet is to use the Pad's top-down display to navigate the course's twists, turns and obstacles. Entering tunnels will block your view, however, forcing you to look up at the more traditional racing view on the television.Here's the game in action:Yoshi's Fruit Cart impressed us a great deal during our time with it. Your goal is simple - get Yoshi to a door that will only unlock once you've collected all of the fruit that's set out on a map. But doing that is more complicated than you might think. You control your 'Yoshi Cart' by drawing a path on the GamePad's screen. When your path reaches the door, the game prompts you to let Yoshi begin your dictated journey. But on the Pad doesn't display the fruit, just the basic map, and your television won't show the path you've sketched out.Achieving your goal is a matter of coordinating and reconciling each screen's missing information, using textures and shapes that exist on the map's background to guide your path. If you reach the door without all of your fruit, it won't open, and you'll lose a life. And just in case you think this might be completed rather easily once you get past the first few areas - there are about 50 stages to complete, and things get complicated quickly, with moving fruit, holes and numerous other obstacles quickly appearing. The game does feature a system to 'fast travel' to later levels once you've reached them, but saying Fruit Cart will be a formidable challenge is an understatement.Here's a quick clip:Octopus Dance is a pretty basic rhythm game for one player. You use the GamePad's analog sticks and gyroscope to match the Game & Watch diver's movements. Fairly basic, while set to some catchy music. Things escalate quickly, and the diver will also shift your Mii's position, constantly changing your frame of reference for movement.Check out the dancing madness:The competitive games of Nintendo Land (Mario Chase, Luigi's Ghost Mansion and Animal Crossing: Sweet Day) have one fascinating feature in common - their levels scale depending on how many players are present, ranging from two to five. In the case of Mario Chase, the three different stages will retain their general theme, and since they're all circular, they're able to effectively eliminate 'rings' to keep things competitive. Even better - if you're just playing with two players, the 'chaser' (a regular Mii) will be accompanied by two AI-based Yoshi carts, who can spot the Mario Mii - or detain him long enough to be caught.Here's a clip of that smaller scale concept in action, and note the cool stage, which features numerous slides for quick escapes. It's the third of the three Mario Chase stages.Luigi's Ghost Mansion follows some of the same rules as Mario Chase, in the sense that it features three scalable stages and AI-controlled partners if you're simply playing one-on-one. In this case, Nintendo Land's robotic master, Monita, who generally explains the rules and concepts for all Nintendo Land games, grabs a flashlight and enters the fray. Monita will only patrol basic routes, and will turn off its flashlight if your Luigi Mii approaches. Still, the floating robot is more than capable of damaging the ghost.Check out the third stage of Ghost Mansion below:Animal Crossing only features two levels to play in, but they scale as well. The core gameplay will also shift with just two players, but instead of simply giving one character some AI assistants, Sweet Day's rules actually change. By default, this attraction tasks 'animals' with collecting candy, simultaneously competing with each other for a cumulative total while evading two guards, who are both controlled by the GamePad. Just 1-on-1, the GamePad player instantly gains an advantage, having two characters to the other person's one. This advantage is even greater when you consider that the animals become slower with every piece of candy they collect.To balance this, the gamer seeking candy no longer retains his prizes, but deposits them in various bins around the map. The entire flow of the game changes - and for the better. In some ways Sweet Day, much like Mario Chase and Ghost Mansion, are even better when fewer players are involved. The versatility of these games is quite impressive, and they're just one quarter of the attractions offered.Check out some footage of two-player Animal Crossing:Nintendo Land's competitive games tend to have a wider range of player and controller requirements, plus more variety in the quantity of modes and levels. Pikmin Adventure, for example, features a 16-level Challenge Mode (1-5 players) and a 3-level Versus Mode (2-5 players). The below footage is from Versus mode, where Mii-based Pikmin compete with Olimar and his real Pikmin to collect the most candy.Takamaru's Ninja Castle. You've probably read my E3 2012 preview of this attraction already, but this time I was able to advance in the game more, discovering the use of scrolls to give you extra abilities - like clay bombs - and fighting one epic boss. Check out the battle below, and let's move on to the next attraction!Zelda's Battle Quest is yet another competitive attraction. Up to four players can trek through the main quest mode, taking on the roles of warriors with swords or bows, while battling familiar Zelda foes and bosses in nine levels. A Time Attack mode is meant for a single player, with three archery-based levels to master. You can see the third Time Attack level below:I've detailed nine of Nintendo Land's attractions, and there are still three more. That means I'm not even touching on the 20 levels in Metroid Blast's core 1-5 player Assault Mode, or its more competitive-aimed Surface-to-Air or Ground battles that each have their own five stages designed for multiple players. That means there's only so much space to describe the Pachinko-esque Coin Game, where you spend coins earned in attractions to win prizes that will populate the plaza of Nintendo Land. And some of those prizes can only be won when you've unlocked them by playing their respective attractions.I want to tell you about Miiverse, and how it apparently will tie to Nintendo Land with some form of online leaderboards, though Nintendo has yet to truly dive into those details. (That's literally all I know.) There is the game's wide range of in-game achievements (called 'accomplishments') as well, which appear in a variety of ways, such as criteria-specific stamps, high score trophies in the single player games, or 'Master Rank' stars, which signify that you've mastered a particular attraction's challenge.Here's one important detail - only two modes within Nintendo Land require Wii MotionPlus - controlling a ground-based character in Metroid Blast, and controlling a sword-wielding character in Zelda: Battle Quest. Anything else involving a Wii remote involves basic button commands (like Mario Chase, for example). Many of you have been asking this - so there is your answer.There is so much to Nintendo Land that it's a challenge to suitably detail it all. Brief descriptions and quick, 30 second videos don't do all the modes and features justice. The game might exist in segmented, separated experiences, but that doesn't mean there isn't a whole lot packed into one disc - and that's something Wii Sports could never claim.

Rich is an Executive Editor of IGN.com and the leader of IGN's Nintendo team. He also watches over all things WWE, Resident Evil, Assassin's Creed and much more. Follow him on Twitter, if you dare!