Nintendo Wii Fanboy

This time Nancy Drew will be sleuthing her way onto the Wii in a port of The White Wolf of Icicle Creek. The same developer that handled the PC version (Her Interactive) will be porting this one, unlike the DS games which were made by Gorilla Systems. While the original didn't blow anyone's socks off their feet, it did get respectable reviews. Let's just hope for some refined point-and-click goodness with the Wiimote, and we should be all set.

[Via GoNintendo]

Here's a slightly random announcement: this September, those of us not in Japan will be treated to a Detective Conan (or, as it's known outside Japan, Case Closed) game, after publisher Nobilis snagged the rights to publish Marvelous' Meitantei Conan: Tsuioku no Gensou "all over the world."

Case Closed: The Mirapolis Investigation will see pint-sized manga detective and bespectacled, precocious sod Jimmy Kudo return to locate clues, attend crime scenes, collect evidence, and tackle mini-games. His aim? To finally catch a shadowy figure who crashes the opening of a new theme park with a series of crimes.

Truth be told, this is one for the kids (much like the Japan-only DS game), but Nobilis is doing what it can to keep the hardcore fans happy: the original Japanese anime voices, for example, will remain intact. Grab your magnifying glass and sleuth your way past the break for both a TV spot and trailer for the Japanese version.

Sniper Studios has chosen the worst possible time to release a trailer of its next project, a mysterious, untitled Wii game for which only the footage above exists. The trailer itself looks fantastically moody and noirish, and in any other week we'd be raving non-stop about this, but the recent reveal of Platinum's visually similar MADWORLD means the impact of those stark, black and white visuals was certainly lessened.

But hey, this still looks totally awesome and stylish, and we're dying to know more. Sniper's only past experience has been in developing Crazy Taxi: Fare Wars on the PSP (the studio become an official Wii developer last November), so we've no idea which direction this will head in.

When Agatha Christie's novel And Then There Were None was first adapted into an adventure game for the PC, reactions were all over the place. Some people hated the look, criticizing everything, whereas others found the environments detailed and suitable to the story and setting, while admitting the character models could use some work. Some loved the gameplay, puzzles, and voice acting, and others criticized those same elements. Reviews on Metacritic swing from 90 down to an embarrassing 31, and the user ratings vary even more wildly. However, one thing that was generally lauded was the immersive story, and that should be complete when the game hits the Wii next month, along with all-new motion controls for the port.

This blogger actually recently picked up the book after many recommendations, and must admit a small amount of interest in the budget title based on being about a third of the way into the novel. It seems like the sort of thing that might interest the wider Wii audience, certainly, but if the reaction is similar to the one the PC game garnered, there's no telling whether or not this game will disappear immediately. Until then, however, we'll just have to check out the screens, which we've got in the gallery below.

Welcome to our weekly feature, Virtually Overlooked, wherein we talk about games that aren't on the Virtual Console yet, but should be. Call it a retro-speculative.

Last week, I asked for reader suggestions for this week's Virtually Overlooked. One reader suggested The Guardian Legend, and I thought that was a perfectly reasonable suggestion. The Guardian Legend was one of the biggest sleeper hits of the NES era, and something that is definitely worth checking out, especially for fans of Ys and Faxanadu.

It was only later that I realized that I was thinking of Legacy of the Wizard. I get those two mixed up a lot. They both fall into that "sleeper" category, they were both published by Brøderbund, and they both have "Leg" in the title. They're practically the same game, except that one's a hybrid vertical shooter/Zelda-style adventure developed by Compile, and the other is a side-scrolling action RPG from Nihon Falcom. But other than that, the same game.

Inspired by my inability to keep two similar things separate, I thought this week we could look at some more NES games I get confused about, either because they're so similar or because I'm so dumb.

Seems like everyone finally picked up on the idea to port their PC adventure games to the Wii! Console players are starved enough for pointing and clicking that we'll gladly take leftovers. The Adventure Company has announced that Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None, an adaptation of a novel of the same name ("The World's Best Selling Mystery Novel," according to the game's website), will be released on the Wii in November.

Maybe a game based on the work of a popular mainstream author will bring the Wii even more attention from the non-traditional audience that Nintendo's after. And then we'd see an adventure boom like the one we're experiencing with minigames! Okay, maybe not-- but maybe it'll at least be kind of fun?