Review
By
Joao Lopes - 10th February 2008 13:08
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"But it’s not just the near perfect implementation of Wii’s unique controller that makes this game so great, it’s the way they perfectly complement the noggin breaking puzzles..."
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Wii owners have been tortured with such lackluster 3rd party titles, it’s not even funny and even the good ones fall flat on their face compared to the polish present in Nintendo’s games. Zack & Wiki is here and ready to change the rules.
Zack and his mysterious companion Wiki are rookie pirates in search of treasure and fame. One day, they stumble upon the talking skull (a nudge to Monkey Island perhaps?) of the legendary pirate Barbados, who promises them his legendary ship and treasure, which is the pirate Holy Grail (One Piece says hi) if they can help him get his body back. So, here begins the journey of Zack & Wiki, searching far and wide for the remains of the pirate Barbaros.
The game uses only the Wii remote: point the cursor to where you want to look and press A to pick up, grab, push, poke, you name it, the sky’s the limit. Holding B allows you to survey the area and pressing a small icon makes the camera zoom out completely, so you can see the whole map at the same time. The flying monkey Wiki can use some odd magic that turns him into a bell when you shake the remote, transforming most enemies into an item and vice versa making room for some very interesting approaches at certain puzzles, most of them less obvious than expected. When interaction with something is possible, a picture shows up to tell you how to wield the controller. Next? Think, think and think some more. With no item in hand a simple poke or shake usually does the trick, but with an item, you only need to move the remote the way you would with the actual item in hand. But it’s not that simple, you may need to turn it on its side, shake it furiously, examine it closely for hidden functions or twist it among many, many other things.
But it’s not just the near perfect implementation of Wii’s unique controller that makes this game so great, it’s the way they perfectly complement the noggin breaking puzzles that remind older players of the mostly gone point and click genre that was striving on the PCs years ago. Very early on, you’ll find yourself scratching your head with no idea on how to get to that blasted treasure chest, there’s just no solution in sight! Alas, the old trick of trying every possible action everywhere won’t get you very far due to a scoring system called HirameQ- every failed attempt makes you lose points, making your ascent to pirate legend much, much harder. Some actions (a lot of them), will actually lead our heroes to their demise, so you’ll need to think hard before doing something and after some frustrating minutes or even hours, you’ll figure something out; sometimes it will be something that’s devilish tricky, others it will be something so simple that you’ll be left wondering how you didn’t think of it before, but you’ll have a big grin on your face, feeling like the smartest person on the world.
For the weaker of will, or who simply are desperate you can buy some “get out of jail free cards” that give you some hints on how to advance further or that make you go back in time, before you did something that proved to be fatal. Doing this, not only goes into your record, but takes all the money and some of the HirameQ you got on that stage away, so use it wisely. Nevertheless, Capcom managed to create a balance between levels that leave you stumped for quite some time and levels that only tickle the brain, but aren’t overly easy.
The main game alone will keep you busy for about 15 to 20 hours, depending of course on your ability to solve the puzzles, which is pretty long for this type of game, but with the scoring system that challenges you to go back and prove you’re smarter than the game, the secret maps, treasures and unlockables like music, retro trinkets and character biographies among dozens of other things will make you sure you’ll invest a lot of time in the game, making it worth your money.
As usual with the genre, comedy is a big part of the game, with lighthearted enemies and slapstick violence making sure the game doesn’t get too serious when Zack is crushed by a boulder or frozen to death. The graphics are very beautiful, with great character designs, lots of crisp and sharp colors, beautifully made levels and overall very good looking, putting to shame most Wii games.
The sound stays in tone with the cheerful nature of the game with entertaining tracks that despite not being memorable do their job well. The voice acting sticks to only a few typical Japanese voice samples, but they’re very cute and funny, fitting the respective characters like a glove and making the game even more charming. Do yourself a favour, buy this game and don’t use a guide as it would dilute one of the greatest experiences available on the Wii and in fact, any other console.
© Copyright by N-Europe
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