The PR gals from Nintendo must be arching their backs and twitching with delight, at the sight of another BIG, round number to spice up their communiques. 20 million units - that's the latest figure announced by the company (via GI.biz), representing the number of Wii consoles sold in the United States as of May 2009.

Some 244,000 units were swooped off the shelves last month, which is still a decent figure despite the console's more solid average of 645,000 units sold / month since its November 2006 debut in the territory. Confident - if not outright cocky - about their retail superiority, Nintendo of America's Cammie Dunaway (executive vice president of sales and marketing) indulged herself in a subtly mocking comment with regard to Microsoft and Sony's motion-sensing technologies announced at E3 last week:

"The continued enthusiastic consumer response to our products shows that Nintendo has something for everyone. (...) For Nintendo, precision motion controls and social gaming are realities today."

Add to that the roughly 8 million Wiis sold in Japan, plus way over 20 million elsewhere, and you get 50+ million Wii consoles sold worldwide since launch. So yeah, I'd say that the Wii still kicks ass. If only more of its games would, too...

Reviews were never “that friendly” regarding LucasArts' latest multiplatform lightsaber mayhem, the game being, many times, valued as “mediocre”. Well, it seems that fans are doing the right thing for once (that being stop believing every little piece of golden bullshit that some “objective” game reviewers and game sites tend to throw at them), since this title sold no more than 5.7 million copies, since its September release.



Obviously, the fact that it IS a multiplatform game helped a bit - well, multiplatform minus the odd PC component – but heck, according to the numbers, it is the fastest selling Star Wars game in the history of... Star Wars gaming.

Ze Source.

Three new Need for Speed games were announced today by Electronic Arts, leaving the gaming world - or at least the part of it that still has some common sense - in a blissful indifference, at best. While some might find the idea of a NFS threesome quite exciting, we dare question how EA will be able to churn out three quality titles in less than a year, after years of pushing the franchise down a steady slope.



Well, no use trolling over spilt booze, so let's get on with the news. As they say in the announcement, "we listened to the gamers when they told us they wanted a wider range of experiences" (big mistake!), so they're now ready to pop the cork off their new NFS games: Need for Speed Shift, Need for Speed Nitro and Need for Speed World Online.

NFS Shift sounds like your run-of-the-mill racing game (think Race Driver: GRID for instance), and this first screenshot shows nothing spectacular, either. "A racing game built by racers for racers", "a level of realism never before seen in a Need for Speed title", "an incredible authentic and immersive driving experience", "a stunningly realistic first-person cockpit viewpoint", "an unrivaled sensation of racing at high speed" - the usual PR talk. The one true flicker of hope shines from the fact that it's being developed by Slighty Mad Studios, formerly known as Blimey (the guys behind GT Legends and GTR 2). NFS Shift is planned for release on the PC, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PSP in autumn 2009. (...)

 Continue reading 'Need for Speed Does A Threesome'...

The ladies at Capcom are calmly wrapping up their files with this new release schedule, published on MCV, pointing out to some of their most anticipated franchises and their new “dates of birth”. Surprisingly, but not equally that certainly, it seems that Resident Evil 5 has somehow, through mischievous and dark rituals, found a way to the PC platform along side its console little sisters, and will be released in the same day, March, 13, 2009. I personally doubt this, or at least, I hope that they will give the eventual PC release more time for… polish. Remember the disaster called Resident Evil 4 on the PC? I bet you do.

In other news, and from the same press thing, the “next winter” release for Street Fighter 4 (PS3, X360) has magically become 27 February. Oh boy, I can’t wait for this one, really. The full release list is as follows:

Neopets Puzzle Adventure – Wii, DS, PC – January 23rd
Bionic Commando – PS3, 360, PC – February 13th
MotoGP Wii – Wii – February 20th
Street Fighter IV – PS3, 360, PC – February 20th
Dead Rising - Wii – February 27th
Resident Evil 5 – PS3, 360, PC – March 13th

I would like to note that Capcom previously denied rumors about a PC version of Street Fighter 4, although this list… lists it.

Since we were previously talking about Japan, games, and various other things (actually, we always talk about Japan and various other things), let's take a look at some figures from the Tokyo Game Show, courtesy of Gameindustry.biz.

It seems that this here event is set to break tons of records, including the number of games exhibited – no less than 879 titles, for every platform available. To get into even more details, we have around 19 percent DS games (actually, 18.7, but who's counting), 18 percent mobile games, and around 17.5 PC games. The top of the bottom is gloriously held by the Playstation 3, with a mere 3.5 percent.



And while we're here, let's get into genres. Most of the titles (around 20 percent) will obviously be action-adventure oriented (no wonder, kids seem to like easy stuff these days), with the roleplaying awesomeness of true gaming reaching only 9 percent, followed by simulation and puzzle titles.

And they say cheap whores don't sell. Well, I beg to differ, in my country at least, cheap is the actual true meaning of a good marketing and sales department. Microsoft seems to be learning a bit from this, since they recently announced that their X360 sales have gone up faster than a horny teenager browsing his porn magazine, increasing with 62% in good ol' Europe.



While Microsoft's console is also becoming a good hit in Japan (the place you want to check out first when it comes to games and jail-free loli porn), it still hasn't managed to top down the Wii – no matter, though, the (high school) girls in charge of the company are estimating good sales for the Japanese 360 titles, up to 1 billion USD until the end of the fiscal year.

Ah well... They are doing good so far, even if the X360 is starting to become of age. But with the upcoming titles that will probably make many a gamer droll, things are looking shiny and pink fo Microsoft.

Poor Jimi, he must be twisting and puffing in his grave right about now, to see what became of his musical legacy. As it turns out on CBC News (via Eurogamer), two of his songs - "The Wind Cries Mary" and a live version of "Purple Haze" - will be playable in the upcoming Guitar Hero: World Tour game, when it's released this autumn. And more will be added through downloads at a later time.

On the other hand, it was about time! Having several Guitar Hero games without the legendary Jimi Hendrix was a bit of a paradox. Even though, as EG points out, a cover of "Spanish Castle Magic" was previously featured in the series' first installment, and Guitar Hero III also had an avatar which looked a lot like him. Now, at last, he's officially denigrated.


Hey Joe, where you goin' with that Guitar Hero peripheral in your hand

A very interesting move from Nintendo – the fellows of Kotaku just received a press release wich states that the Japanese company will be kindly skipping Leipzig’s Game Convention this year. The reasons are plenty – and not that, God forbid, GC would somehow totally suck ass, but because, well, “the country where the sun shines” (to quote an illiterate and extremely retarded ex-colleague of mine, who, sadly, is not dead yet) already hosts too many similar events that Nintendo has attended so far. And will probably do so even more, as the time casually passes by.

And the results, being the positive results they are, convinced Nintendo to skip this year’s most awesome European gaming gathering. So, after E3, they will stick their heads back in their asses and return to Japan and their daily routine, because:
1. Japanese girls are the best.
2. Japanese girls look the youngest.
3. Local legislation is many times tolerant regarding doing various things to Japanese girls.
4. Akihabara.

This decision should only last one year though.

Yep, it's official. The Suzumiya Haruhi Wii game that was announced last year - along with that PS2 game and a PSP game, both released back in winter - will be a dancing game, and it could come out later this year. Shock and awe.

A random Japanese blog posted a couple of Famitsu scans showing images from the game - see them here and here - and based on them, Sankaku Complex has a brief description of what it will play like.

"The latest Haruhi game for the Wii will be a dancing game, involving timing Haruhi and company's dancing with the Wiimote. (...) there will be a story mode advanced by skilful dancing, a free mode in which you can freely choose costumes, music and stage, and the dancing will be accomplished with three characters, so Kyon is unlikely to feature with Haruhi, Nagato and Mikuru on hand. Apparently, there will also be a version packaged with a figure."

Moar Haruhi dancing? In 3D? With booze? Hell yeah!

Taking a cue from the hollywoodian habit of milking games from movies before they even premiere, the Japanese anime and gaming industries are coming together in the production of a Wii game based on the upcoming The Sky Crawlers animation film. The project was revealed in the pages of Famitsu (via Gamersyde), who say that the Wii game is being developed by the Namco Bandai team responsible for the Ace Combat series.

The only reason I give a damn is that the Sky Crawlers anime is directed by Mamoru Oshii, who made a name for himself by directing the Ghost in the Sell animation film and its sequel Innocence (among other anime and live-action stuff). It's based on a novel series which follows a group of young fighter pilots involved in dogfight warfare, during an alternate historical period, and it's animated by Production I.G. The film premieres on August 2 and, by the way, I lied: I don't really give a damn about the game.