Nintendo Wii Fanboy

During its first four days on sale in the US, Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure sold approximately 30,000 copies. A week later, it had added 15,000 to that total. Hardly breathtaking figures in a nation with over 3.7 million Wiis in its bedrooms and living rooms, and the game also struggled to leave a mark in its homeland, where it is known as Takarajima Z: Barbaros no Hihou. There's no doubt about it: Capcom's splendid piratey adventure has, as much as it saddens us, flopped.

On the face of it, the game's commercial failure might seem odd. After all, Zack & Wiki earned eye-catching scores from a number of reviewers, while IGN's Matt Casamassina loved it so much, he frothed and raved about it non-stop for four months, before slapping a 90% on it come review time. Its bright, attractive visuals, cute character design, and puzzley action were seemingly the perfect ingredients for massmarket appeal. Ultimately however, it sank faster than a holed galleon.

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.

When anything at all happens related to a Dragon Quest game, we pay attention. Therefore, we felt that the newly-released Japanese boxart for Dragon Quest Swords was worth posting. Take an early look at something that's going to be in pretty much every Japanese home after July 12th!

The boxart looks pretty nice, actually. We appreciate it when publishers put actual hand-drawn art on the cover instead of action poses of the main character's 3D model. Especially when it's Akira Toriyama art, which we continue to like despite Dragon Ball Z.

Some gameplay details about Dragon Quest Swords have trickled out in the form of this Jump magazine scan and the accompanying NeoGAF thread. It seems that you'll be able to upgrade your sword during your adventure, which in itself is not a surprise, given the title of the game (it's not Dragon Quest Sword, after all).

The swords themselves are cool enough to be noteworthy, as is the method of upgrading. You collect elements on your journey (the fire/ice sense of "elements" more than the molybdenum sense) and take those to a blacksmith to have swords forged. Those swords, then, naturally, have elemental attacks. Also, you gain the ability to have a freaking cool-looking sword. We've posted the scan after the break.

Perhaps you've heard of it? Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords, an excellent new title on the Wii's little brother, had this crazy plan to blend the classic gameplay of Bejeweled with a surprisingly deep RPG experience. We think this is a great idea, and decided: why not revisit the greatest classic of all? That's right, folks, here's our design document for the guaranteed billion-seller, Destiny of Tetris: Age of the Mystic Blade.

• Play as one of seven exciting classes, including square, T-shape, and leftways squiggly!
• Discover a hidden conspiracy regarding the NexPiece, a legendary window said to grant its users access to the future!
• Obtain new skills as you progress, including attack spells, elemental tetromino summons, and increased vodka tolerance.
  
• Build an empire: well, what the hell else did you think you were building with those blocks?

Surely, thou art tingling with excitement. We can hardly believe this game's brilliance ourselves. Stay tuned for Destiny of Tetris 2: Kremlin Fever and Destiny of Tetris Advance: Little Kids Throw Snowballs At Each Other.

- DS Lite: 110,845 30,948 (38.73%)
- Wii: 52,583 1,218 (2.37%)
- PSP: 31,503 7,574 (19.38%)
- PS3: 14,520 2,369 (14.03%)
- PS2: 14,234 3,553 (19.98%)
- Xbox 360: 2,963 926 (23.81%)
- GBA SP: 833 224 (36.78%)
- Game Boy Micro: 512 76 (12.93%)
- Gamecube: 255 50 (24.39%)
- DS Phat: 90 25 (21.74%)
- GBA: 12 3 (33.33%)

[Source: Media Create]

Over at Square-Enix's Japanese site, we find the main page for Dragon Quest: Swords. And by going through that, one may stumble upon a newly-released trailer for the game. In the trailer, we receive a short intro speech followed by some artwork of the game's characters being shown and, well ... we don't want to ruin the whole thing for you, so we suggest you go check it out.

[Thanks creamsugar!]

Listen to me. I've been sent from the future, sent to warn you about the impending destruction of the human race. There were so many, we just couldn't ... we were overwhelmed within weeks. Humans now live in scattered clusters, fearful of the raids, desperately clinging to life. We need to stop it. They're gaining power.

Surely, you've seen the signs. They're infecting homes, complacent, waiting for their chance to strike. Soon, their numbers will be unstoppable, and you're allowing, nay, helping their cause. Every week they grow stronger! They added what will be their strongest general, Dragon Quest, to their arsenal quite recently. Yes, surely you see it now: within two months, the DS Lites will become sentient. They'll launch a attack on the Pentagon and all major military bases in the continental United States, removing our defensive capabilities. From then on, it'll be inevitable ... Judgement Day.

From their seat of power in Akihabara, Japan (the new capital of Nitro, their self-proclaimed worldwide empire), they will launch wave after wave of attack on the remaining humans. We're led by the one man who might rally us from defeat ... Reggie, of course. He sent me here, to prevent it, but now I see that it's already too late. February 13th is the day, gentlemen. May Iwata have mercy on your pathetic souls.

- DS Lite: 309,630 132,729 (75.03%)
- Wii: 85,439 264,919 (75.61%)
- PS3: 50,171 18,735 (59.6%)
- Xbox 360: 35,343 31,290 (772.02%)
- PS2: 30,460 7,345 (31.78%)
- PSP: 28,930 5,013 (20.96%)
- GBA SP: 1,896 324 (20.61%)
- Game Boy Micro: 1,555 303 (24.20%)
- Gamecube: 569 252 (30.69%)
- DS Phat: 167 27 (19.29%)
- GBA: 17 5 (22.73%)
- Xbox: 6 5 (45.45%)

[Source: Media Create]

A whole slew of new screens for Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors have surfaced over at French gaming site Jeux-France. The images, which showcase in-battle scenes and cutscene dialogue, present a new light on the game, showing us some more of enemies we'll no doubt encounter, as well as presenting the overall experience in a much more favorable light.

Of course, now that we've received some new images, it'll be that much longer before we get any more, so be sure to give these a thorough look.

Coming from Nintendo World 2006, the embedded video of a boss fight with a rather angry knight has us thinking Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors might not be that bad. Sure, we thought it was a bit gimmicky and the novelty would run out rather quickly when first presented with the idea, however seeing it in action has made us rethink our previous assumptions. How about you?