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Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure

Written by DM on Monday, November 12 2007

Zack and Wiki: Quest For Barbaros’ Treasure is not your typical game. In fact, it is exactly the type of game that gets overlooked by many gamers. It really does not matter how good certain games are, they will always fall through the cracks because of one reason or another. In this case, it is because of the long and quirky game title. This is a shame, because Zack and Wiki is a fantastic Nintendo Wii game.

Think of Zack and Wiki as the little game that could – the game turned out much better than I ever thought it would be. The premise behind CW is a fairly simple puzzle game setup. You play Zack, a boy who aspires to join a league of pirates commanded by the nefarious Captain Barbaros. Wiki is your companion, and he is, well, let's call him a flying golden monkey. If you ask me, he looks more like a koala bear, but I digress. The two of you progress through the game level by level, and each map is a self-contained puzzle. The locales range from jungles to ice fields, to rocky cliffs, to fiery volcanoes. Your objective is to collect all the pieces of Captain Barbaros, and put him back together so that he can take his rightful place as leader of the Pirates.

You can think of the games mechanics as being similar to old school games like Monkey Island, and Grim Fandango. The way Capcom has utilized the Wii remote is impressive. It does take a bit of getting used to, but once you do you will realize the game could not have been published on any other platform. He would not be able to do things like ringing a bell using a bell ringing motion, or saw something in half using a sawing motion. Both of these motions will be used on many levels in the game. The levels themselves are difficult, there is just no other way to say it. They are not difficult because the puzzles themselves are hard, but they difficult because until you learn the game well, the solution will not be readily apparent to you. For instance, at one point I was stumped and had to call for a hint. I had completed half the puzzle, and all that was left to interact with was a snake. Well, it took me a long time to figure out that you can morph objects just by ringing your bell. These are the type of things that you will have to learn in order to complete the puzzles in Zack and Wiki. When in doubt, ring it out – your bell that is (a helpful tip from me to you).

The graphics in the game are some of the better graphics you will find on the Nintendo Wii. The game does only run at 30 frames per second, but this is sufficient for a game of this type. The lushness of the colors, and the cel-shaded animation style work together to create an atmosphere that goes perfectly with the game’s subject matter. On top of this, there is not even much of voice acting to speak of. Almost all of the games messages and story are conveyed via text boxes. So much so, that you would will notice a distinct absence of voice over in this game -- whether that is a good or a bad thing, is up to you. Either way, the game gets its point across.

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