Final Fantasy.

Mages, potions, heroes, quests, battles, and presumably somewhere down the line, a boss that can only be fought after several hours spent grinding. Oh, and moogles, chocobos, and a hundred other recurring themes and ideas that the series is frequently notorious for. Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King, undoubtedly the posterboy for the launch of Nintendo's answer to Xbox Live Arcade that is, WiiWare, thankfully tries to move the series forward while still retaining it's roots and incredibly deep conventions. This is one RPG where you're not going to be adventuring.

The plot is immediately throwaway, but is best being summed up as follows: you are the king's son and heir, returning to the home realm with hopes of restoration and success accordingly. The game's objective follows hand in hand with this, and the game as a whole is very sim RPG, a Theme Final Fantasy if you will. Against your best wishes and recurring desires to do the opposite, all your time in-game is spent within the realm building houses and restoring your once was home-town, speaking to the residents and keeping everyone happy. As King, this is somewhat obvious, but adventurers can be hired and dispatched to numerous dungeons around the gameworld to do your bidding, return with treasure, and wipe out any villain that remotely poses any threat to your empire.

Okay, so it might sound a little tedious, but the game's surprisingly addictive, and the micro-management of your adventurers is for the most part, pretty interesting. As the game progresses you're able to train them as black/white mages or thieves, while building armouries and weapon shops allows them to tool up before departing, perhaps increasing their success in battle. They're battles you don't see, but Life as a King goes back to the origins of RPGs by being entirely text based. Your decisions following these battles will be the agenda for the next day in-game, be it allowing them to rest, head out somewhere else, or, umm...grinding to take down that boss. But with one in-game day only lasting a few minutes, the gameplay is surprisingly fast. Being confined to the city however does become slightly frustrating, and before long you'll realise your input to the game is only marginal, but it's fun while it lasts, and seeing progress and the development of the realm take place in front of you is pretty rewarding.

Easily the big-name title for the WiiWare launch, My Life as a King is big, both visually and in design. Waggle controls are thankfully kept at a minimum, but the game is immediately a far better choice than half the licensed crap on Xbox Live Arcade, and more interesting, the Wii itself. It's no killer-ap, but Life as a King is enjoyable, fun, and most importantly, a good indication of what the Wii's new service is capable of.