NCL is now only behind Toyota in overall Japanese market value.

The Wii-sponsored car finishing in second was an appropriate event given this new information out of Japan: Nintendo is now the second largest company in all of Japan.

Due to a 2.6% increase in Nintendo's stock prices at the close of Tuesday's trading on the Osaka Stock Exchange, the company now has a market value of 8.34 trillion yen, or 72.7 billion dollars. The latest corporation to be washed away by the wave of Wii and DS success was Canon, maker of high-end cameras, printers and other optical devices.

It looks like the only place Wii takes second is on a NASCAR track.

As NASCAR fans already know, Greg Biffle and his No. 16 Wii-sponsored Ford Fusion raced to a solid second-place finish Sunday at Dover International Speedway in Dover, Delaware.

Finishing just behind Carl Edwards, the win moved Biffle up to fifteenth place in the overall Nextel Cup standings. More importantly, he made Wii owners and Nintendo fans proud.

If you want to see the Wii car racing around the track for yourself, Biffle's next race is the LifeLock 400 at Kansas Speedway on September 30th (1pm, ABC). You know who Nintendo World Report will be cheering for!

The special Pokemon Manaphy, not usually found in the Diamond and Pearl DS games, will be available from hotspots this Saturday.

For the first time in the US, a Pokemon download will be available from hotspots in Toys ''R'' Us stores. To get the legendary water Pokemon, Manaphy, you will need a DS with an English version of Diamond or Pearl with at least the first Pokedex obtained, meaning you can't buy a copy of the game at the store and immediately start downloading. Also, you must not have more than two Wonder Cards. Selected Toys ''R'' Us stores across the US will have the Pokemon for download between 12pm and 3pm on Saturday September 29th. Manaphy can be received through the Mystery Gift menu.

X-OOM Media Center for Wii is priced at GBP 29.99 and will be available from www.X-OOM.com and Amazon.co.uk

X-OOM Software Launches New Media Centre For Wii

NINTENDO Wii NOW A FULLY FLEDGED PERSONAL ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM USING BUILT IN WI-FI TO ACCESS DIGITAL MEDIA FILES ON PC

X-OOM Software, part of bhv Software, a leading publisher of digital media software for media devices, will be releasing its X-OOM Media Centre for Wii in late October 2007. This ground breaking product turns your Nintendo Wii into a fully functional media centre, accessing all digital media on a PC via the Wii’s built-in Wi-Fi capability, allowing users to access their music, view photos and watch films on their Nintendo Wii.

An item, a Pokemon, and a character we already knew about were all announced this week.

This week's news was topped off by a three announcement Friday about Snake's presence in the game. Also, on top of the normal Dojo announcements, keep reading for some bonus tidbits from Konami's Metal Gear 20th anniversary presentation.

New Item: Golden HammerComing right out of Wrecking Crew, the Golden Hammer will act as a variation to the standard Hammer from past Smash games (which was also confirmed as returning in this update). It is more powerful and swings faster than the normal hammer, but it will also malfunction. When this happens, instead of dealing damage, it will just squeak away. That'll end up being quite frustrating. The special features of the Golden Hammer don't stop there though. You can also levitate while using it by tapping the attack button. This should solve a lot of the terrain issues that surround the standard hammer.

This and more revealed in an interesting conversation between Nintendo's president and Earthbound's developer.

Earlier this year, Nintendo President Satoru Iwata and famous Japanese essayist/game designer Shigesato Itoi sat down for dinner. Itoi recorded the conversation, and has recently posted it on his website in 11 installments. While the talk mainly centered on the philosophical, there were some topics discussed that might interest Nintendo fans. Here are some highlights:

-- The two discuss Shigeru Miyamoto and praise his philosophy on game design and team management. According to Iwata, there are many problems that arise when working on a project. Miyamoto's style as a designer revolves around finding a single ingenious solution that solves multiple problems at once. He looks for "one single inspiration that makes so many things work. That's what you call a 'great idea', and finding that moves things forward, moves it towards the goal. Mr. Miyamoto thinks that it's the game director's task to find those."

The Japanese-developed titles from TGS include another Mystery Dungeon game and something called Dinosaur King.

SEGA OF AMERICA ANNOUNCES NEW UPCOMING TITLES

Japan Developed SEGA Titles Destined for North American Release

SAN FRANCISCO (September 20, 2007) - SEGA® of America, Inc. today announced

three titles to be released in North America that will be added to its

release roster coming out in 2008. These titles are:

Yakuza 2 (PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system): The sequel to the

critically acclaimed Yakuza, released in North America in 2006, continues

The Wii game first shown at E3 2006 is finally coming in January, along with a DS sequel. No mention of online modes.

HUDSON ENTERTAINMENT BLASTS BOMBERMAN LAND ONTO WII™, Nintendo DS™, AND PSP® system

Experience Triple The Fun With 3 Full Fledged Game Modes

REDWOOD CITY, Calif – September 20, 2007 – Hudson Entertainment, the North American publishing arm of Hudson Soft, today announced Bomberman Land, the award-winning series, is coming to the Wii™ and PSP® (PlayStation®Portable) system, and BOMBERMAN LAND Touch! 2 is coming for the Nintendo DS™. Published by Hudson and distributed in North America by Konami Entertainment, all three versions are planned to release in January 2008.

European gamers may meet with a game-freezing glitch. Nintendo of Europe is offering an exchange.

European gamers may want to avoid a certain gameplay situation in Super Paper Mario if they want to avoid a game freeze.

In Chapter 2-2, a character named Mimi will tell you to go and meet another character named Merlee. Enter that room, press the green switch, and a spiked ceiling will drop over Mario's head. If you flip to 3D, you can avoid the iron maiden and find a key. If you pick up the key, then use it to open the locked door near Mimi, you will avoid the glitch. However, should you fail to pick up the key, then talk to Mimi without it, your game will freeze.

Grasshopper Manufacture's stylish Wii game is finally on its way stateside.

Speaking to IGN on Wednesday, Ubisoft revealed that it would be localizing Grasshopper Manufacture's No More Heroes on Wii. Saying that, "Ubisoft is excited to be bringing Suda 51's latest adventure to gamers in North America," VP of Publishing Jay Cohen assured fans that the United States would be able to play the game in February.

Purists can also rest easy, since Cohen also remarked that, "The game Ubisoft publishes in North America will have all of the content that its Japanese counterpart does. We wanted to make sure that gamers here would not miss out on any of the action or storyline details created by the talented development team in Japan."