I admit it: I’ve been a sucker for point-and-click adventure games for years. From Loom to Monkey Island, from Myst to the recent Sam & Max, I’ve played a huge number of these, and liked many of them. Some suck. Some are pretty good except for one bit or another – which sucks.
Anyway, since about November 19th last year, I’ve been saying the world really, really, needs a point and click adventure for the Wii. It has one. Capcom is now shipping a game called “Zack & Wiki” which is a sterling example of the genre. Its design is built around set pieces – each level is a shortish scene with a couple of interrelated puzzles. No more trying to sort through a thirty-item inventory, or walking across fifteen slow-loading scenes to pick up an object you should have picked up but didn’t notice. It’s all within visual range.
And, speaking of visuals, it’s gorgeous. Utterly beautiful. Cel-shaded, but it puts games like Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker to shame. It looks like a well-animated cartoon, utterly smooth, beautiful to watch, with a slick combination of detailed textures and visual effects.
If you like point and click adventures, get it. Yes, it’s worth getting a Wii for this game – there’s more where that came from. If you have found point and click adventures frustrating, at the very least give it a try; it seems to reduce the frustration factor noticably, without turning the game into a boring series of obvious “puzzles” that don’t make you think at all. If you’ve never tried point and click adventures, find a friend with a Wii (or get one) and rent this or buy it, because there is no better introduction out there.
Between this and the new Phoenix Wright (the games that it is worth getting a DS to play), it’s a great time to be a gamer. (This is not even including the astounding gameplay videos for Super Mario Galaxy.)
Comments [archived]
From: rone
Date: 2007-10-25 01:17:04 -0500
Have you played The Longest Journey and its sequel Dreamfall? Those were pretty good. And of course Grim Fandango, but you probably played that one.