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Retail Channel Has PS3 Availabilty, No Wii
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Nintendo, PlayStation 3, Wii,
American Technology Research’s recent stock check of the retail channel is showing PS3 availability but no Wii availability, according to a Reuters report. Analyst Paul-Jon McNealy found 28 of 52 stores had Playstation 3 consoles for sale; none of the 52 stores had any Wii consoles at all. Apparently most stores had single-digit availability, with one store having more than 60 machines in stock. Without further data, it is hard to judge what the stock situations actually mean. Nintendo could be trickling in Wii consoles as they try and sate demand for the game system worldwide. Sony claims that the recent pockets of availability are due to their continued efforts to fill their shipping channel. Future sales numbers will be the only way to determine whether Sony’s claims are correct or if demand is really softening.
Read More 
| Reuters
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A report a Wii Newz indicates that an experimental rip tool has been released for the Nintendo Wii. The tool is pretty limited at this point; according to Wii Newz, the tool requires one of three specific LG DVD-ROM drive models and takes approximately 50 hours to rip a single disc. While not really practical, one should never underestimate the ability of the Internet to find people with massive amounts of free time. Still, the tool is an interesting step towards getting Wii backups onto the Internet, and of course, some kind of hack on the Wii will be required to play these backups.
Read More | Wii Scene Newz
Nintendo DS Sells 1.7 Million In Europe
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Nintendo, Nintendo DS, Wii,
Nintendo of America celebrated the success of the Wii and the DS in North America, now Nintendo of Europe is doing the same in their territory. Sales monitoring company Chart Track has released their sales numbers for the month of December, and in the UK Nintendo sold nearly 200,000 Wii consoles and 500,000 DS handhelds.
In Europe, Nintendo moved more than 700,000 Wii consoles and an amazing 1.7 million DS handhelds. The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess nearly matched the attach rate in the US, selling 500,000 copies to 70% of Wii purchasers during December. With huge sales in Europe, Nintendo has basically stormed across the globe this holiday season.
Read More | Nintendo Europe
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WarioWare Smooth Moves: Yep, It’s Pretty Darn Fun
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Action, Nintendo, Reviews, Wii,
Those major, corporate-sponsored gaming news sites out there have posted their reviews of the highly-anticipated WarioWare: Smooth Moves for the Wii. The overall impression? Heckuva fun… with some reservations. IGN.com notes the similarity (in release date at least) to the WarioWare: Touched game for the DS. Both games are meant to introduce gamers to a new way of controlling a system, and in that respect, IGN gives Smooth Moves the upper hand - overall they found the design of the game to be much tighter, with a better-thought-out game progression and a much wider variety of tasks. 1up.com posted similar impressions, noting that controller issues may pop up for the novice gamer especially in those challenges where the Wiimote has to be pointed at the screen and be able to “see” the IR bar. Finally, Gamespot.com gives Smooth Moves the superb score of 9.1, giving the game lots of nostalgia points for its incorporation of minigames that resemble Nintendo classics, from the NES through Gamecube. Regardless of the scores though (8.2, 8.0, and 9.0, respectively), all the sites agree that WarioWare has a severely high fun quotient, and is likely to become one of the best games for introducing folks to the control possibilities of the Wii.
We’ll be getting our hands on this game shortly, picking up our pre-order first thing tomorrow when it ships. We’ll have our own impressions posted soon after - personally, I can’t wait to watch my non-gaming friends try out this one.
Read More 
| IGN
Read More | 1Up
Read More | Gamespot
This “Virtual Console” Monday brings three new classic titles online for the Wii. This week, gamers get two shooters, Xevious for the NES at 500 points, R-Type III: The Third Lightning for the Super NES at 800 points, and a racing game, Moto Roader for the TurboGrafx-16 at 600 points. Gamers will probably be most familiar with Namco’s Xevious and Irem’s R-Type series, but Hudsonsoft’s Moto Roader may be worth a look for the 5 player multiplayer racing.
Read More | Nintendo
Rayman Raving Rabbids & Red Steel for $29.99
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Hot Deals, Internet, Ubisoft, Wii,
Spoofee.com is reporting on some good deals for the Nintendo Wii. According to their site, Circuit City is currently offering in-store pricing of $29.99 for Ubisoft’s premier Wii efforts, Rayman Raving Rabbids, and Red Steel. While people who love Red Steel are few and far between, Rayman is a pretty nice collection of fun mini-games that’s a decent deal at $30. Of course, with WarioWare: Smooth Moves releasing an a matter of days, Rayman may pale in comparison.
Read More | Circuit City.com Raving Rabbids Listing
Read More | Circuit City.com Red Steel Listing
Read More | Spoofee.com
Rumor: Mad Catz to Release First 3rd-Party Wiimote
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Accessories, Hardware, Rumors, Wii,
A user over at the Gametrailers forums recently posted some photos he allegedly took with his camera phone showing what looks to be the first 3rd-Party Wiimote, made by Mad Catz. While the shell of the Wiimote itself has a contoured grip that mighty be comfy (or perhaps, bit more than comfy), the flat trigger buttons on top of the Nunchuk attachment just look plain-old painful. Hopefully this Wiimote iteration will have a non-slip grip too, so that we don’t have to go out and buy all new controller gloves.
Click the jump for more pics…
Click to continue reading Rumor: Mad Catz to Release First 3rd-Party Wiimote
Read More | Gametrailers.com forums
Japanese Hardware, Software Markets Show Massive Growth
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Hardware, Nintendo, Nintendo DS, PlayStation 3, PSP, Wii, Xbox 360,
Japanese publisher Enterbrain has released the software and hardware sales totals for 2006. According to a report from Gamasutra, the publisher is claiming that Japanese video game hardware grew year over year 160%, while software sales grew 125%. The best selling hardware for the year was, of course, the Nintendo DS, moving over 7.5 million handhelds. Software sales charts were also dominated by the DS, which represented 8 of the top 10 titles of the year. Leading the list was Pokemon Diamond and Pearl. The top non-DS title was Square’s Final Fantasy XII for the PS2. Wii Sports made the top 100 in the 21st position, but no title for the Xbox 360 or the Playstation 3 were represented on the list. Nintendo managed to completely dominate Japan this year, and so far there are no signs of this changing any time soon.
Read More | Gamasutra
The Zelda: Twilight Princess Completion Calculator
Posted by Michael Cardiff Categories: Action, Activision, Mods/Hacks, Nintendo, Wii,
We’ve all heard about just how big the latest Zelda installment is - Nintendo earlier reported that the land of Hyrule takes about 45 minutes to get across on horseback, and the company also estimated that the game would end up with about 70 hours of play time for most gamers. So you’re probably feeling pretty high-and-mighty, having completed the game in only 35 hours, right? Well, here’s something to cut you down to size - the Zelda: Twilight Princess completion calculator. Simply enter the dungeons you’ve made it through, the number of hearts you have, and some other vital stats, and it’ll spit out a number telling you exactly how close you are to truly doing everything that can be done in the land of Hyrule.
Having not had a lot of time to play recently, I’m still only at about 25% after 16 hours of play time, so the 70 hour mark is looking pretty accurate for me. Anyone else have some especially good (or especially bad) numbers?
Read More | Zelda Completion Calculator via digg
Nintendo Again Raises Year End Profit Forecasts
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Corporate News, Nintendo, Nintendo DS, Wii,
Nintendo last raised its profit forecasts for the fiscal year in October, when it adjusted its estimates upwards based on better than expected sales of the Nintendo DS. Recently, Satoru Iwata hinted that another adjustment might be in the future. Today, Nintendo of Japan again raised its profit forecasts by 20% to 120 billion yen, again based on stronger than expected sales of its DS console. The DS and software just continues to surge in popularity; a report on Bloomberg News indicates that the company now expects to sell roughly 23 million DS consoles for the fiscal year with related software sales of 100 million. While Nintendo did not raise its Wii sales projections, the general belief is that the only reason this was not adjusted upwards is that the company does not believe it can manufacture any more units. Overall, the success of the DS worldwide has been nothing short of amazing, allowing Nintendo to build up a war chest for the console wars.
Read More | Bloomberg
Read More | Nintendo News Release (PDF)
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