Treasure Talks Sin & Punishment, VC Success, WiiWare Future

Treasure President Masato Maegawa recently spoke with 1UP about various subjects related to Nintendo, such as the recently announce Sin & Punishment 2 for Wii. Prior to the Tokyo Games Show, Maegawa-san sat down to talk about how the sequel to the Nintendo 64's Sin & Punishment: Successor of the Earth (Cubed�³'s review can be found here) will indeed be a full retail release, rather than a WiiWare game. However, he does express interest in going down the digital download route at some point, despite his company's preferrence for full disc-based releases. After hinting at the possibility of a Sin & Punishment 2 last year, Maegawa states how he was 'thrilled' at the sales of the N64 game once it hit Virtual Console. Clearly sales were stronger due to the game getting its first Western release following the disappointment of the N64 original being resigned to life only in Japan due to the system's early death overseas. Fans should also rejoice in the fact that the original character designer is back on-board for this new shooter.

As well as seeing strong sales of Sin & Punishment, Treasure has also been pleased with just how well its back catalogue released so far on Virtual Console has sold in general, with the exception of Dynamite Headdy from the SEGA MegaDrive, a game he personally worked on and wishes more people would try out. Of particular note, Gunstar Heroes has been very strong so far, thus it is hoped Treasure has a better stab at a sequel, overlooking the shaky GBA title 'Advance Guardian Heroes'. Back on the WiiWare-front of the discussion, Maegawa-san has been closely watching how well XBLA, PSN and WiiWare games have been selling, and especially likes the direction Capcom took with the recently released Mega Man 9. Yet for now, whilst downloadable games will come from Treasure, the company's primary focus will remain on disc-based titles as many of the team feel a game is undervalued unless it hits retail.

The full interview can be found here.