Fancy an ice cream partner?

I'm sure many in the PAL/NA territories will be green with envy and I've got to say I'm going to have a hard decision to make here.

You see amongst the three WiiWare releases coming to Japan next week is Bit.Trip.Beat. Given that there's no projected release date for Europe whatsoever, can I resist temptation, especially when the game is only 500 points and appears to have had no alterations for localisation? Probably not! The other two titles appear to be aimed squarely at the kiddies. In fact it strikes me as interesting that in Japan there are many child-oriented WiiWare titles whilst in the West we see very few...

Anyway here's the full list:

  • Bit.Trip.Beat 500 points published by Arc System Works
  • Children's Educational Television Wii 700 points (that's a price you don't see often) from Media Home -- this appears to be a collection of educational mini-games with more to download for 200-400 points targeted at a variety of age ranges.
  • Harvest Moon - Farm Store 1500 points from Marvellous Entertainment -- this is a Harvest Moon virtual Shop game which has a paper cut-out look to it.

On the Virtual Console we have three releases as well:

  • Kirby's Dream Land 3 Super Famicom 800 points

...and two Namco arcade games for the VCA also for 800 points each:

  • Numan Athletics -- kind of a futuristic track-and-field game with events like surface-to-surface missile javelin throwing...um yeah.
  • Youkai Douchuuki -- an action platform game that's already been released on the PC Engine (and was featured in the Game Center CX VC Special). This makes the higher price for arcade games more clear as it means the VC ports are cheaper if you decide to go that route; I expect this to be replicated in NA/EU -- if we ever get another VCA release in those territories!

Finally it should also be noted that the Wii no Ma Channel is launching next week and will be a video download service that also allows for videos to be transferred to your DSi for on-the-go viewing. Rather than being commerical releases these videos appear to be tailored for the service and are family oriented.