You have to consider the cost required to play Kinectimals to see that it WON'T be the success Webkins was. Even assuming the kid's family owns a 360, Kinect and Kinectimals would run them over $200.

This is the reason Sony and Microsoft won't see the success Nintendo has. They're offering too little, too late, and for way too much money.

I only wish this could also be slated for a WiiWare release. Scott Pilgrim's retro game charm owes so much to classic Nintendo that it's a shame it won't be playable on a sideways Wii remote. :(

Worried about Zelda? I think it's looking pretty good so far, and I like what I'm hearing about changing up the formula, but we'll have to see how far Nintendo will go with this.

Nice shirt, by the way. :p

You're right about Galaxy 2 not reaching NSMBW sales in the long run, but I think things are shifting right now. This whole "casual" move was all about selling hardware, the most expensive product. Each new piece of software aimed at the expanded audience was just another attempt to push the hardware on those who hadn't made the purchase yet.

Now, Sony and Microsoft are trying their hand at the expanded audience, but what they're offering is too little, too late, and too much (price-wise) for both the expanded audience and the traditional audience. Meanwhile, there are more Wii systems in homes than the other consoles, so now Nintendo is starting to focus on software to increase the slow but steady revenue stream we traditional game players have been generating.

I think we've come to the second half of this game generation and, for Nintendo, it will be more focused on software than hardware.

It sounds cliche to shower the new Mario game with so much praise, but this game really is deserving of it, especially considering that I thought the original Galaxy was pretty overrated.

Galaxy 2 still has some flaws, but the initial experience (and pretty much the rest of the adventure) is just so joyous and charming that it's hard to fault the

I can't wait for the DVD. Curious Village was my favorite game of 2008, and Diabolical Box was a contender last year. The games just have so much charm, which I'm sure the film is oozing with.

Chris, were the puzzles in the movie designed for the audience to solve, or were you just eager to try your hand at some more Layton-style riddles? :p

I totally agree. I was just wondering if Microsoft is content enough to make money off the people who bought the Wii for Wii Sports and never really stuck with the system. If so, I think adding more devices would only be a turn off for both parties.

I disagree about pointing being the future of genres, though, at least with the Wii's setup which simply does not work nearly well enough to compete with great FPS games like Modern Warfare, Bad Company, and Halo.

A remote of some sort would probably be a welcome addition if the menus are as cumbersome as you say, but that would go against the philosophy Microsoft is using to promote Natal, that controllers are confusing and keeping the expanded audience away from consoles.

I wonder, though, if the expanded audience even cares enough about menu control to warrant a remote. After all, Natal is all about them, despite how much attention the video game community is placing on it.

I doubt Medal of Honor will cause any more controversy that Call of Duty 4, set in a similar contemporary war zone, did when it first came out. The only difference I can see is that MoH explicitly states that it takes place in Afghanistan rather than CoD4's understood Middle Eastern setting.

The game we should be on the lookout for instead is Six Days in Fallujah, which takes place in a contemporary war AND tells the story of an actual conflict, a highly controversial one at that for numerous reasons. It got canned a while back only to be picked up again, so I'm not quite sure of its current status, but I think that's where the line will be drawn.

It's one thing to set a video game in a modern war, it's another thing to set a video game in an actual part of that war using real people who lost their lives under controversial circumstances.

Actually, I think I articulated those exact problems, and then some, within the article. Why not explain what I missed or how I'm wrong rather than simply stating so in a snarky tone?