|
| 
| From: Capcom
Category: Video Games
List Price: $19.99
Buy New: $13.73
You Save: $6.26 (31%)
New (29) Used (16) from $12.89
Avg. Customer Rating:  58 reviews
Sales Rank: 305
Platform: Nintendo Wii
ESRB: Everyone
Media: Video Game
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Batteries Included: No
Age: 5 - 20 years
Operating System: Nintendo Wii
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 7.5 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: 35001
UPC: 013388350018
EAN: 0013388350018
ASIN: B000P297ES
Release Date: October 23, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
|
| Customer Reviews:
 This is supposed to be a kids' game?! June 24, 2008
4 out of 7 found this review helpful
40-plus hours of gameplay is no exaggeration, but you're a better person than I if you can get more than an hour or two into it without wanting to spike your Wiimote into the TV.
Zack & Wiki is a puzzle/adventure game with a heavy anime flavor; although the tiny amount of voice acting is in English, it's obvious that the actors are speaking their lines phonetically ("Sea Rabbits" becomes "See-Rabito," for instance). Not that I mind, except that it's sort of incongruous with the written dialogue. Other reviews have compared the gameplay to old-fashioned point-and-click adventures, but honestly, I don't think I would have made that connection if I hadn't read it beforehand; there are inventory items, but you don't keep them from one level to the next, and there's almost no plot to speak of.
To be fair, there are good things about the game; it's certainly original, and aside from the issue with the voice acting, the characters are pretty endearing; Zack's facial expressions are a hoot, and Captain Rose is adorable, in her anime-girl way.
Unfortunately, the thing that cripples Zack & Wiki is the gameplay itself. The designers made it possible to die, for instance; that wouldn't bug me, except that way too often, the thing that kills you is something that you never in a million years would have seen coming unless you either worked on the design team or you possess the gift of second sight. (Occasionally, especially in the "Flute of the Growlin' Goblins" level, the thing that kills you is the Wiimote misinterpreting the motion you're trying to make, or not make; in this level, there's a crank-operated gondola thing that sometimes keeps going even when you've stopped flailing your Wiimote.) What's worse, the game seems intent on punishing you, and punishing you dearly, whenever you do get killed; not only do you lose all of your money and points, but unless you've got an expensive "platinum ticket," you have to go all the way back to the beginning of the level. There's a hints system, but not only are the hints even more expensive than the platinum tickets, they seem to have no bearing on the progress you've made; if you've made it halfway through the level and you buy a hint, you'll most likely be told something that you figured out for yourself twenty minutes ago. (Plus, as you already know if you're reading this, we have an "internet" nowadays; why screw around with in-game hints when you can get all the hints you need from GameFAQs or any of a million other places? I'd maybe understand if Zack & Wiki was made back when there was no internet to be had, but the thing's only a year old. It's especially dumb when you realize that you can access that very same internet right from your Wii.) And yeah, you can go back and replay levels to recoup your losses if you want, but why not make it reasonably possible to get through them on the first try instead of artificially lengthening the gameplay by making you repeat everything?
To be honest, I have no idea who the designers had in mind with this one; the overall tone suggests they intended the game for younger players, but I'm a full-grown adult and I can't even get through more than five minutes with my sanity intact. I haven't beaten the game yet, and I'll probably keep trying, but at this point, it's more like a vendetta than anything else. (Plus, it seems a shame to waste the money I spent on it, although I have a feeling that ship has already sailed.) I should point out also that I totally saw the "plot twist" coming. Be smarter than me, and avoid Zack & Wiki at all costs.
 fun, but frustrating controls at times June 12, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The game is entertaining and clever. I often find myself stuck in a level for a long time, giving in and searching for help online, and realizing that I would never have figured that out without help. It's definitely challenging. There's a lot of gameplay here... many, many hours. The humor and writing aren't terrible either.
There are a couple aspects of this game that are particularly frustrating. The controls aren't amazing responsive, this becomes a big issue later in the game (especially swordfights) and in the musical mini-games (which sometimes seem to be offbeat to the music playing, but as a musician/percussionist, I'm never happy with the accuracy of music based games).
 This Game Made Me Buy My Wii! April 17, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I had wanted a wii for a while, but when I had the chance to play Zack & Wiki on my brother's, I was hooked. It's such a great game! You'll wake up at 2:00 in the morning having finally figured out how to make it through the level you've been working on for hours. You really need to think and it uses the wii remote in a very intuitive way. I'm close to beating the game, and almost don't want to because I don't want it to end.
I love this game because it is so fun to play, and even more because it was the deciding factor in me purchasing my wii (which brought me some other great games like Mario Galaxy). I highly recommend this - especially if you are like me and suck at the 3-D PS games where I can't stop running into walls, let alone figure out what I'm supposed to be doing...
 Q: How many ways is there to kill Zack? A: Not enough!! April 12, 2008
1 out of 9 found this review helpful
I didn't enjoy a single minute of this horrible point and click puzzle game, not just because it is so insanely difficult but also because there are seemingly a million ways to die in this game and you will likely die every single conceivable way before you actually clear a mission. For example, did you know that you can actually get SWEPT to death in this game?!
I have no idea why everybody else is praising Z&W. The graphics? Underwhelming cel-shading. And the story? Some pirates are doing what pirates do, looking for booty. Pirates are supposed to add a certain coolness factor, but just LOOK at Zack. To say the least, he is no Captain Jack Sparrow.
The Wii remote seems to have the catastrophic flaw of only occasionally doing on screen what you actually did to it in reality. Here's how a typical stage goes: You randomnly aim your Wii remote around the screen trying to find objects to interact with or enemies that you can turn into items. That's the easy part. Then you have to rack your brains trying to figure out how to solve the puzzles the way the game WANTS you to rather than another way which makes more sense! For instance, don't bother to try hopping on a block to get to an out-of-reach item--that would just be too simple! Rule #1 in Zack & Wiki is that even if a puzzle has an incredibly simple solution, you HAVE to do it the hard way anyway.
When the game isn't completely insulting your intelligence, it is making you scream in disgust because of all the ways you can screw up a puzzle without even realizing it and then your only option is to start from square one again. This game also threw in a hint system which is (like everything in Z&W) horribly executed. The first hints are always something incredibly obvious and are so expensive to buy that you're way better off just checking out an FAQ that you WILL need at some point. The game is what some may call too short at only about 20 levels, but I call it MERCIFULLY short. The amount of time you spend replaying stages will artificially increase the length of the game and there are no sidequests or reasons to replay Z&W anyway. Buy at your own risk.
Stuck on the Music challenge April 8, 2008
0 out of 5 found this review helpful
My five year old son and I played this together (he has to have my help because there is a lot of reading). We had a good time progressing through the challenges until we got to the musical bone guy. I spent three hours trying to get past him with no luck (my son fell asleep he was so bored). We can't progress any further. The tips online all say to practice, but I don't want to waste anymore of my time. This game is essentially worthless to us now, and we've only had about two hours of game time out of it.
|
|
|
Web Hosting & Domain Registration | |
