The Nintendo Wii’s Virtual Console has been a great way to revisit an impressive selection of vintage games, not only for past Nintendo systems but for one-time rival consoles like the Sega Genesis, Turbografx-16 and Neo Geo.
But while Wii owners have been able to enjoy some of their favorite old games again, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 gamers have been treated to virtual shelves full of new titles, some of them great.
WiiWare aims to fill that gap, and its online shop is stocked with original games unavailable on the other two consoles.
Here are a few of the 20 or so WiiWare games available so far; all of the games are rated E, for Everyone.
Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King
***
Publisher: Square Enix
Price: $15 (1,500 points)
Players take on the role of a young king who must rebuild and repopulate a barren kingdom with resources gathered by adventurers he dispatches to dungeons around the land. The pace is brisk, the controls are simple, and it’s quite a bit of fun to see the town grow as the heroes whom the king has hired and nurtured clear dungeons the player will never see. It’s an odd inversion of role-playing-game norms, but it works.
LostWinds
****
Publisher: Frontier Developments
Price: $10 (1,000 points)
A platform adventure game with a twist, LostWinds is the most intriguing of these early WiiWare offerings.
The nunchuk stick controls a young boy named Toku; the Wii Remote manipulates the wind in various ways to lift him up to platforms or over gaps, direct fire streams or waterspouts where they’re needed, slow Toku’s fall and so on. There are enemies to defeat, but the game is focused most on simply exploring, finding the next wind-based ability and solving puzzles to get to new areas.
Toki Tori
***
Publisher: Two Tribes B.V.
Price: $10 (1,000 points)
Finally we have Toki Tori, a puzzle game with hints of Lemmings. Players control a chubby yellow chick named Toki in his quest to gather all the eggs from each stage.
Toki can be moved with the nunchuk stick, or players may opt to simply point and click where they want the bird to go; either way, the stages are perilous and often have only one solution.
Thankfully, Toki has a selection of tools, like bridge lengths and teleporters, to help him make his way through each level.
