How long is a piece of string?

...and how long does Europe have to wait for Kirby?

A while ago I was musing on Portal 2's latest delay I mentioned how frequently Nintendo hold back their games for reasons that have nothing to do with making them better.

Anyone wanting a recent example of this need look no further than Kirby's Epic Yarn, a game which is by all accounts totally rad and awesome and that came out in Japan and the US just shy of 2 months ago.

Europe, on the other hand, has been a naughty boy and won't be getting Epic Yarn in time for Christmas.

Or the New Year.

Or Valentines Day.

No, we have to wait until Feburary the frickin' 25th to play it. That's close to 5 months between it's US and EU release! Obviously I haven't played Epic Yarn, but I'm guessing it's not the sort of game that has a lot of dialogue or voice acting in it that needs translating. Even if it did, most other developers (even ones with a fraction of Nintendo's resources) seem to manage near-simultaneous worldwide releases for their games just fine.

This is clearly a calculated decision by Nintendo to hang on to Epic Yarn until well into the first quarter of 2011 to plug a hole in their lackluster European Wii schedule. While I'm sure it makes perfect sense from a business point of view, as an EU gamer it once again feels like we're getting everyone else's sloppy seconds.

Honestly, I think the dust on top of my Wii must be close to an inch thick by now.