I've got a reason for the sales of Little King's Story.

You can't buy something if you can't find it.

Walmart only sells it online, it is not in stores.  Target's website says they will have it in 2 to 4 weeks.  I couldn't find it in a search of Best Buy's website.  It goes on and on like that.

Retailers just didn't stock this game for whatever reason.  Most likely, it was the fact that Xseed is a small time publisher.  Retailers probably didn't trust them enough to take a big order from them.

Since it was not in stores, that means there are virtually no impulse buys of this game.  Parent's looking for a game for their kids would not see this on the shelf.  Kids looking for themselves are no going to see it for themselves.  That's a shame because I think the cover has some serious shelf appeal.

Lack of marketing hurt it too.  The only people who knew about this game were core gamers, and there just are not enough of those to effectively provide enough word of mouth to really get the game going.

So combine the fact that this game is pretty much nonexistent on shelves, and no one knows about it, and you have a really bad situation.  I just don't think that many people send much time browsing for things online, and certainly not enough to find this game.  When they do want to buy something online, I think they already have a good idea of what they want, they just want to find it for as cheap as possible.

Why are you comparing MadWorld to God of War?  Let's try comparing it to other beat 'em ups that the same developers have made.  Remember these are the same guys from Clover studio.

Viewtiful Joe (GC) - 0.12 million (Japan data only)

God Hand (PS2) - 0.07 million (Japan data only)

MadWorld (Wii) - 0.40 million (no Japan data, 0.26 Americas, 0.14 Others)

Bayonetta (360) - 0.18 million (0.09 Japan, 0.09 Americas, no Others data)

Bayonetta (PS3) - 0.26 million (0.21 Japan, 0.05 Americas, no Others data)

Obviously, Bayonetta was just released in the Americas, so we need to compare just the first week of sales for each game.

MadWorld (Wii) - 41,339

Bayonetta (360) - 90,112

Bayonetta (PS3) - 52,149

Not much difference.  This style of game is just niche.  There is no way around it.

Little King's Story looked like a kids game.

The trailer on the Nintendo Channel looked like something off Nick Jr. It was marketed wrong, but due to the artstyle, I'd find it real difficult to sell to anyone. I knew what the game was about and the trailer was still repulsive.

Any game looks niche if you only use data from one region -- particularly Japan.  Check out God of War sales in Japan:

God of War (PS2) - 3.21 million (0.02m in Japan)

The comparison, using Japan only data, is so laughable that it kinda makes your post look... spin, doesn't it?  Also, some of these folks made Devil May Cry, and Bayonetta is really just a modern DMC.  Calling that niche too, are you?  Viewtiful Joe was a 2D side scrolling game.  Not the same genre as MadWorld -- not even close.  God Hand was wierd, and frankly not that good.  It didn't deserve good sales for quality reasons.

I think MadWorld should have done well, if the demographics were present on the platform.  They aren't.  End of MadWorld story.

Believe me, Madworld has nothing to do with God of War. Also, the art style makes this game a niche title, not the genre.

You may want to check your facts before spouting off like that.  VGC only has data for Japan for the first two games.  There is no spin.

Here are apparently the sales for Veiwtiful Joe in North America and Japan (275,000).  This would suggest that it sold about 155,000 in North America which is a fair ammount worse than Madworld.  The link mentions God Hand, but says that even though there are no known sales, they were "poor enough that the studio's life was on the line".

Edit: At least I think those are North America and Japan sales.  The article mentions Okami's sales as being only North America and Japan and then goes straight to the sales for Veiwtiful Joe.  I king of just assumed the sales would be for the same regions.

games like zack and wiki and little kings story also sold poorly somewhat i think due to the huge overabundance of shovelware that was being put out on a weekly basis at the time. to the average passer by, who must be a big part of the wii audience they would be after on those games - it looked like a pretty shoddy game - one in a million, i think mainly because of box art.

whilst i thnk the box arts were fine by their own rights, i think that surrounded by the rubbish that they were, they would be so easily written off without even being picked off the shelf.

shelf space for the good wii games has been a HUGE issue because of shovelware, and i think its had just a big an effect on "good" game's sales as poor marketing campaign.
particularly for these titles, as they were like chameleons on the shelf inbetween other colourful, kiddy, but crppy titles

edit: oh yeah, but i think the OP is also majorly right.

there are so many problems wii games face when selling face it unreal, but unless it can be proven that good games consitantly dont sell on wii, devs have to look at themselves first.

and by good games, i meanuniversally accepted games, not ones that divide the community like madworld etc...

My conclusion:

if a game divides the intenet forum community in half, then they also divide their target audience in half.

simple!

so make a game that doesnt divide the internet!

I'm personally starting to think that the Wii audience has been let down too much (3rd party wise) to bother investing in the system anymore.

You've got a percentage of the casual audience eventually realizing that what they're buying is crap (tired minigame shovelware whatever)

Then you've got the core audience just always eagerly awaiting something only to realize it's a spin-off, port, niche, on-rails or whatever.

It comes to a point when after years of rubbish (or perceived rubbish), ppl are get so burnt that even if 3rd parties start producing commercial high quality products, it might be too late.

Just a thought.

It is a thought I have had as well.