Nintendo Wii Fanboy

We didn't know much about the story for Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure except for the obvious ("Hey, treasure! Dude, let's quest for it!") Thankfully, Capcom detailed some of the plot in a press release about the game.

Zack & Wiki involves a young pirate named Zack who happens upon the talking skull of the legendary pirate Barbaros. And, like anyone who finds a magically animated skull, Zack decides to do what it tells him. Luckily, it tells him to go on an adventure leading to treasure, which is courteous for a hallucination/undead pirate.

The full press release is after the break. The skull says READ IT! And the animated skull of Matt Casamassina says BUY THE GAME!

He goes on to say that the last time IGN shattered the illusion of objectivity to promote a game (our words) was for Eternal Darkness. Because Zack & Wiki is such a competent and fun game, reminiscent of the classic PC adventure games, it is absolutely worth buying and evangelizing, in his opinion, but it may need help getting noticed.

Bafflingly, Casamassina thinks that the game could be in sales trouble because it's cartoony and doesn't depict realistic, gritty violence. That may have been the case a couple of years ago, but ... has he heard of this "Wii" thing?

Capcom's adorable treasure-hunting adventure Zack and Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure uses the Wiimote in context-sensitive orientations and movements to solve puzzles. Different items use the Wiimote in different ways. The trick is that it doesn't seem to tell the player how the Wiimote is to be used in a particular situation.

In this example found on GAME Watch, players are asked to insert a crank handle into a mechanism and then operate the crank. How you get the thing in there is a matter of figuring out which side goes in and then manipulating the Wiimote in some way to make that happen. Rather than just telling us how to do it, GAME Watch gave readers the choice above for the proper method. We're guessing temporary swinging. This example seems simple enough, but we can see how not knowing how to use the Wiimote will amplify the difficulty of some puzzles.

We've also filled our gallery with new treasures from the game. Yarrr.

Capcom has announced the official name for their fun-looking pirate adventure, formerly known as Project Treasure Island Z. It's still got "Treasure" in it, so it's still vaguely pirate-esque, but we just aren't sure. The new name is Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure.

As if the bright, colorful graphics didn't do the job, the title drives home the point: this is a game for children. We hope you don't dismiss it based on the name alone, since it's gotten positive impressions.

[Via press release]

Over at the WikiCharts Top 100 for the month of August, Nintendo's Wii is ranked number 13. Not too bad for the console, managing to be beaten out by only two sexual phrases (this is the internet, after all). With a 27,750 views-a-day average, the Wikipedia entry for the Wii could stand to do better.

Maybe we should seek the aid of one Stephen Colbert?

[Thanks Andrew Yoon!]