The performance of Monolith Soft's Disaster: Day of Crisis on Wii in Europe may well determine whether it receives a US release, but then again Reggie really does not like it, so chances of the fantastic adventure arriving on US shores seems slim at best.
Nintendo of America's President, Reginald Fils-Aime, recently spoke with IGN's Matt Casamassina about the highly anticipated Wii game that fuses traditional third-person action with first-person shooting, a little driving, plus lots of inventive uses of the Wii motion controls, all wrapped up nicely with a stunning blockbuster movie-like experience where players help protagonist Raymond Bryce in his fight against terrorist organisation SURGE, as well as stuggling against the wrath of Mother Nature herself, all in an effort to save his dead friend's little sister. Tense action and lots of cheesy script lines are the order of the day, with plenty of extras thrown in for good measure. Cubed3's recent review of the game explains why Wii owners definitely should not miss out on the truly exhilarating experience.
However, despite C3's praise of the game, in IGN's new edition of its Nintendo Voice Chat podcast feature, the following was said:
"We hung out with Reggie, and basically, he doesn’t think Disaster is a $50 game. Especially in terms of audio, which he said is laughable. He said he’s going to watch it and see how it performs in Europe. If it does well, you’ll probably get it in America, and if it’s a bomb, you probably won’t."
It certainly seems quite out of character for Mr. Fils-Aime to be so negative about a Nintendo-published game, especially considering Monolith Soft is now Nintendo-owned. It also seems very unusual since Disaster is such an enjoyable game.
The game hit Japan on 25th September, following a last minute delay from its original July launch, and has so far struggled to amass sales of even around 50,000 units. Its European launch on 24th October has not been much more of a success, with little-to-no major advertising, according to readers, and hardly any strong Press coverage. The result was that Disaster: Day of Crisis could not scrape its way into the UK's Wii Top 50 chart in its first week.
But this situation needs to be changed. Just as Dragon Quest: The Chapters of the Chosen, probably the best RPG on DS so far, has been unfairly overlooked in the UK, so has Disaster: Day of Crisis. Be sure to read C3's in-depth review of the game, do not forget to Digg It to get more coverage for the game and go buy this unique Wii experience...