Nintendo has revealed to Famitsu.com, at the company's recent press conference unveiling its financial results, that Wii would arrive in Japanese stores with a maximum price tag of 25,000 yen. After taking in account various factors, the conversion to other currencies comes down to a launch price of: 225 dollars, 225 euros, and 150 pounds.

Via Slashdot ...

Reggie Fils-Aime, Nintendo of America's Executive VP of Sales and Marketing, talks about what went wrong with GameCube and how Nintendo will not make the same mistakes when launching Wii. Reggie admits that the initial software lineup for the GameCube was simply not 'diverse and strong enough from a first and third-party perspective,' and by Nintendo's showing at E3 2006, the Wii will launch with a wide variety of games for may types of gamers

Via Slashdot ...

Lik Sang posted it was coming the other day and now its here, heres the info:



A voice-activated translation software application designed to teach English to Japanese PSP owners. Outside of pure translations, Talkman lets players play games to test their fluency of a language. This new issue is released for the World Cup in Germany and features 5 european languages : British English, French, German, Spanish, Italian in addition to the Japanese language already available in the first Talkman.

More info --> http://www.yesasia.com/?/info.php?pro...8&lsaid=219793 ...

A report from website GamesRadar claiming that it will be illegal to sell used games for the PS3 has been officially denied by Sony today, with a spokesperson telling our sister site, GamesIndustry.biz, that it is "false speculation."

GamesRadar yesterday reported that Sony was warning high street retailers that the sale of pre-owned games would be illegal due to the licensing terms of PS3 software, which would mean that discs technically remained the property of Sony.

However, a Sony Computer Entertainment UK spokesperson today outright denied that any such message had been conveyed to retailers - telling GI.biz that following conversations with the firm's European parent company, neither division has "any knowledge" of such a strategy.

"We have definitely not been communicating that," UK spokesperson Jennie Kong confirmed. "It's false speculation. We don't have any further knowledge about this topic - either officially or unofficially, to be frank."

It would appear that the report is based on the resurrection of a much earlier rumour in this regard, which surfaced most recently last November with claims that PS3 software would "bind" to the first machine it was played on, and would be unusable on any other system.

At the time, Sony completely debunked the rumour - telling UK newspaper The Guardian in no uncertain terms that: "PlayStation 3 software will not be copy protected to a single machine but will be playable on any PlayStation 3 console."

Speaking to us this afternoon, Kong confirmed that "there has been no official comment on this since the story that came up a few months ago - it hasn't changed since then, and we're quite surprised by why this has popped up again, to be honest."

However, this is one industry urban legend that just won't go away, it appears. Sony has been attached to various efforts to stamp out the second hand software market ever since a group of Japanese publishers failed in their efforts to have the used-software trade outlawed in that territory, but the company has consistently denied that it plans to use invasive DRM-style measures in this way.

With the firm already making massive gambles on factors such as the price point of the system and the popularity of the Blu-Ray next-gen DVD format, it's perhaps unsurprising that it's not keen on gambling on removing used games - often cited as a key factor in driving the mass-market acceptance of gaming - from the equation as well.

Via Eurogamer ...

Nintendo has revealed its next-generation console, the Wii, will retail in the US for $250 or less, and no more than ¥25,000 ($220/£119/€174) in Japan. It also expects to have shipped more than 6m of the machines by March 2007, the company said today.

That's as many machines as the total number of PlayStation 3 consoles Sony is expecting to ship in the same period. Sony's box is more than twice the price of the Wii. Both Sony and Microsoft have suggested consumers will buy a Wii alongside each company's more advanced console because the Nintendo machine is relatively so cheap.

Nintendo made the announcement in Osaka this morning after reporting a 12.5 per cent rise in full-year net profits to ¥98.38bn ($876.7m) but a 19 per cent drop in operating profits. The gain arose from the relative strengths of the Yen and the Dollar during the 12-month period, which ended 31 March 2006. Annual sales were down 1.2 per cent to ¥509.25bn ($4.54bn).

For the current fiscal year, due to end on 31 March 2007, Nintendo said it expects to announce an operating profit of ¥110bn ($980.19m). The boost will come largely from sales of the Wii and ongoing demand for the DS, particularly now the redesigned DS Lite will soon ship in Europe and the US. ®

Via The Register ...

Via Engadget

Children will soon have a compelling new argument when begging their parents for an iPod, as the music, movie, and audio book player is about to take on a new role: educational tool. Pearson Education has just announced plans to release downloadable study guides (for use with Pearson texts, naturally) and audible review notes for exam preparation that may convince even the strictest parents to acquiesce and let the little white trojan horse into their homes. Not content with just the youth market, Pearson also revealed that it has purchased Apple's PowerSchool student information system, which is used by teachers and administrators to track student progress. No word yet on when kids can start using the "I'm studying!" excuse when told to take off their headphones in class. ...

Fears that Nintendo's Wii might be neglecting hardcore gamers in its bid to reach the mass market have been allayed this morning with the news that EA's Medal of Honor: Airborne may well be parachuting onto Wii in November of this very year - at least over in the US.

How do we know? Well Medal of Honor: Airborne has just been listed by US online retailer EB Games with a launch date of November 1, this year.

Perhaps even more significantly, it's been given a retail price of $49 which seems a fairly decent indication of what premium Wii games might cost you over in the good ol' US of A.

Of course prices and release dates are subject to change, especially in the heady world of online retail, but at least the listing gives a first indication of what we might have to cough up for Premium Wii titles - fifty bucks, which roughly equates to around 26.71 of our great British poundies. It looks like we're going to be getting some pretty decent value out of Nintendo on game prices.

Still financial considerations asides, it's the prospects of using the Wiimote and Nunchuck controllers in Airborne which have us most excited. Will be able to use them to steer our parachutes in some intriguing dropzone action? The running and gunning should certainly be a unique next-gen experience compared to PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Airborne.

The possibilities seem endless and perhaps you have few suggestions of your own to make in the comments below. Either way, we look forward to spraying some more Airborne Wii your way soon.

Via CVG ...

Speak to those who managed to worm their way into the Nintendo stand at this year's E3 and some of them will whisper the word "Elebits" breathily into your ear. Then lick your chin. You see, Konami's new Wii, erm, yank-'em'up was, for many people we spoke to, the surprise of the show.

Despite it's simplistic appearance, the game's a bizarrely transcendental experience. The basic idea is to roam the environments - in E3's case, a kitchen and garden - using the Wiimote to push, pull, yank and fondle everything in your path, in a desperate bid to hunt out the mischievous, titular Elebits. Once you've found them, it's possible to harness their electrical abilities to boost your own powers, meaning you can lift and shift objects of greater size.

Basically, it's a game about throwing stuff around. Hooray then! Konami has released a bunch of - it has to be said - not particularly inspiring shots of the game, but we've stuck them up mainly as a way of wedging Elebits into your cranium for later reference.

Disappointingly, none of the shots seem to have followed Nintendo's guidelines of whacking a gigantic picture of somebody playing the game in an excitingly frenzied manner alongside the screen.

Screenshots Here ...

Good news for anyone who's ever got mind-numbingly bored downloading from Xbox Live; the next system update will feature something called 'Active Download', which will let you download files from the Marketplace whilst playing games, watching DVDs or even building a small fort out of empty cereal boxes.

This is all according to a Microsoft Knowledge Base article, which details 'Active Download' along with several other features originally due for an update last Tuesday. Alongside the download feature - which according the Knowledge Base entry allows you to "stream music, play DVDs or CDs, play arcade titles, and play games while you download an item from the marketplace" - dashboard and DVD playback tweals are also detailed.

Apperantly you will soon have the option to boot directly to the dashboard without booting a game or DVD disc, which we're sure will please the legions of fans campaigning for the option. The ability to resume downloads is also talked of, along with some sort of update for the console's DVD playback.

The penned date for the update has obviously passed and Microsoft has since pulled the Knowledge Base article, but we think it'd be safe to assume the detailed updates will be streaming down our broadband pipes eventually. We'll let you know when Microsoft presses its big red button.

Via CVG ...