It’s a shame this game is called “Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros’ Treasure” and also that its presentation is so childish. It’s not that either is particularly bad, I just fear that they misrepresent the game, as the puzzles that make up virtually all of its gameplay are often quite difficult - it’s definitely not a game for kids. I’m worried there will be more than a few disappointed and confused youngsters on Christmas morning with parents that bought this for them, not knowing any better.

Much like Portal before it, and most Zelda games, the puzzles are the good kind of hard though; challenging without being frustrating. Everything you need to beat the level is right in front of you, and often you’ll spend up to an hour sitting there staring at all of it. The game will likely make you feel like an idiot, but I think that’s what people who like puzzles want. The puzzles are very clever in design for the most part - I’d even call some of them ingenious, but once in a while one will lead to trial and error, which is not the genre’s strong point.

This is a tailor-made Wii game, and one of the few truly defined by its control. Using the pointer to guide Zack around stages and using the remote to saw, throw, grab, scoop, etc. feels really good, and puzzles based around the motion control could not be replicated on any other platform.

There isn’t a whole lot to complain about when playing Zack & Wiki. If you don’t have a certain item and you die, you need to start the level over from the beginning. It’s not so bad though, because once you already know how to solve the puzzles in the level it, only takes a minute or so to get back to where you were, but a checkpoint system similar to the one in Portal, saving after every little breakthrough you make, would have been appreciated. And the multiplayer, which has one to three extra players drawing hints (or just scribbling) on the screen is pretty useless, but sitting around with friends trying to solve puzzles is very fun. The story is also bad, and sometimes gets in the way, but it’s far from a deal-breaker.

Zack & Wiki isn’t quite the revelatory experience some reviewers would have you believe, but it’s a welcome change from the majority of third party efforts on the Wii so far, and if you like puzzles, it’s a steal at forty dollars.