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(Editor’s note: If you haven’t read my little piece on Fritz Chess , please click here, or just scroll down a few posts…it’s not that difficult.)

OK, so in between my April 25th post on Fritz Chess, a witty back-and-forth banter with collectors on digitpress.com (if your a member, just head to the forums, go to Modern Gaming and find the title header “Rare” wii games, the discussion has really been quite enlightening for me as a casual collector) and now – eight days later, I’ve been digging up little hints here and there about what could very well be the first truly rare game for the Nintendo Wii. Heck, the only way I stumbled onto this game was when I was assembling a feature on recent board/card game simulations and how the stack up in the market.  

The first hint of obscurity comes from a Deep Silver press event held in New York. I found two websites where writers attended the event (which showcased games like Risen for the Xbox 360 and Cursed Mountain for the Wii). The company let the attendees check out Fritz Chess for the DS, and while availability for the PS3 and Wii was mentioned, nothing was released from the company. So, it seems the PS3 version was planned (it’s easy and cheap to find in Europe) but never released, while the Wii version was hardly promoed and may have stumbled off the blocks for whatever reason.

One reason might be the economy. Deep Silver Vienna, the producers of Cursed Mountain, was forced to close its doors last fall. The company also reorganized, as I could easily tell when I e-mailed Cathy Tische, the former VP of Sales and Marketing for Deep Silver, and got an automated message that she no longer works for the company. However, I was able to get ahold of Senior Producer Jon Schutts, who, while not answering my specific inquiries regarding production numbers, did admit to the game being hard to find…

“Fritz Chess was released last summer on the Nintendo DS and Wii. It is difficult to find in retail now and if I had a copy in the office, I’d send you one (unfortunately I don’t). I see Amazon lists it through other vendors, but they are asking $39.99. The game originally retailed for only $19.99.”

It’s easy to jump the gun after reading that and come up with a million reasons why the game must be rare. I have three. One, Schutts openly admits to it being difficult to find at retail. Two, he doesn’t mention the numbers (likely out of policy) because it would be compromising to the company - and those beholden to its success – to give out specific (possibly embarrasing, but, then again, who knows) reasons for the game being in short supply. Three, he doesn’t even have a copy.

But the naysayers will say this. No numbers = no proof. The potentially embarrasing admission of mass liquidation of 10,000-15,000 copies  wouldn’t make sense to go on record with. Also, the fact that you can still find the game at particular stores in Los Angeles (at least – according to a fellow collector on digitpress).

To counter though, I would say this. 10-15,000 copies, while generally scarce, is not quite that rare. However, that’s if we’re assuming all first production runs of Wii games are at least 10,000-15,000 units. Yes, it is likely more expensive per unit to have a smaller run, but if the company can’t afford a large run – and (just throwing this out there) if the company decided to halt production to save money, one could argue that they liquidated stock to major markets and decided that was it.

One last note. I did procure a copy of the game from an amazon seller when I first stumbled upon the title. The collector in me doesn’t want to open it yet, though. As of today, those three used copies Schutts mentioned being on Amazon are the only three North American versions available right now – to my knowledge – on the WWW. The lone ebay seller from last week actually moved his price up to $142 before it expired and Yesasia.com sold out whatever stock it had (or didn’t have).