Drum Master Wii, New Tales RPG for Nintendo DS

Bandai Namco has revealed some of its future plans in a recent disclosing of its financial data in a new report released. Fans of rhythm games on Wii and RPGs on DS in Japan should definitely take note. Following the success of the first Drum Master on DS (400,000 units sold in Japan and the game is STILL lingering around the Top 50 to this very day) and the strong start of its portable sequel of 'Taiko no Tatsujin' (to give it its Japanese moniker; the game has sold 150,000 copies in just four weeks on sale), Bandai Namco has decided a Wii version is long overdue. This will be the first home console edition since Taiko no Tatsujin: Doka to Oomori Nanadaime on the PlayStation 2 in 2006 and looks to herald a new home for the once Sony-only series on Nintendo formats.

In other news, there was also mention of a third Tales RPG for the Nintendo DS. Sadly neither Tales of the Tempest or the fantastic Tales of Innocence have been announced for a Western release so far, despite both selling over 200,000 copies in Japan, but it can only be hoped that this new version does get a translation. Whereas expectations for Innocence were considerably lowered after the sales disaster of Tempest (which only accrued its decent-sized sales thanks to a price collapse, with new copies reportedly being sold now for mere pounds), the response to Innocence thanks to good word-of-mouth means Bandai Namco is expecting 400,000 sales from the new, currently untitled outing in the long-running RPG franchise.

Finally, there is a Dragonball game coming to DS this year. Shocking? Not really, but notice the lack of a 'Z' there? Yes, this will be based on the original series...and it is indeed coming to Europe this year, as well as Japan.

Good news all round? If Drum Master and Tales come to Europe, then definitely yes...