A closer look exposes Nyko's Wii accessory success, revisits third-party representation, and provides sales insight for games like Shaun White Snowboarding, Call of Duty: World at War, and Personal Trainer: Cooking.

NOTE: This story concerns December NPD monthly sales. For whole year 2008 sales, click here.

Whenever the NPD Group's sales estimates are revealed for each month, the exact numbers for the top 10 charting titles are all that is usually provided. The charts for the top 20 games overall and top 10 games on each platform are typically devoid of numbers.

Players will control a miniature ninja on his quest to save the world from evil over-sized samurai.

Hitman creators Io Interactive have announced the upcoming release or their newest title, Mini Ninjas for the Wii and DS.

The player will control Hiro, a miniature Ninja who traverses a dangerous world full of evil samurai. He must confront and destroy the samurai warlord in order to restore peace to a world on the "brink of chaos."

The new downloads range in price from 200 to 500 Nintendo Points, and offer choices like city and transit maps, Wi-Fi enabled board games, and Panel de Pon.

Nintendo announced today that they are to release eight new titles for the DSiWare shop on January 28th. People who recently purchased a DSi will receive a free gift of 1000 Nintendo Points to spend as they wish.

Unless otherwise stated, all games are published by Nintendo.

Solitaire DSi (200 Nintendo Points)

After a reveal in Nintendo Power, Ubisoft has finally taken the turtle out of the shell and revealed Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle: Smash Up from Game Arts.

Ubisoft finally announced the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles fighting game that was originally unveiled in Nintendo Power. Their announcement also confirms the involvement of Game Arts, who most recently worked on Super Smash Bros. Brawl, but doesn't say anything about the ex-Team Ninja employees that Nintendo Power mentioned.

With only two releases this week, a Sega Master System classic and a WiiWare title that returns to classic gaming both grace the Wii Shop Channel.

This week's Virtual Console and WiiWare brings us a light week of releases with only one new game for each service.

Niki – Rock 'n' Ball, this week's sole WiiWare title, comes to us as a throwback to arcade classics where the only goal was to vanquish all of the enemies. Players will roll around... Read more...

A GameCube remake tops the charts, while the DSi begins to show that it may be more than just a quick fix for DS sales.

The Wii remake of Mario Tennis GC went straight to the top spot, probably thanks to a strong TV campaign emphasising its similarities to the tennis portion of Wii Sports (which is still the highest-selling Wii game in Japan). Last year’s number one seller Monster Hunter 2nd G got re-released under the ‘Best Of’ label, and shot straight back into the charts. Will the Wii versions see the same success later this year?

This week features EA's SimAnimals for Wii and DS, the long-awaited release of Ultimate Shooting Collection, and Southpeak's latest DS game, Big Bang Mini.

This quiet week features a few new releases, including EA's SimAnimals for Wii and DS, Tommo's Ultimate Shooting Collection for Wii, Southpeak's Big Bang Mini for DS, Dreamcatcher's Inkheart, and Majesco's WonderWorld Amusement Park.

In the downloadable content realm, Guitar Hero: World Tour... Read more...

Will Wright's Spore franchise debuts on Wii with the brand new adventure game Spore Hero. The DS will receive Spore Hero Arena, giving the custom 3D creatures a chance to duke it out.

Electronic Arts announced today that Spore Hero for Wii and Spore Hero Arena for DS will hit stores shelves this fall.

Will Wright, the creator of SimCity 2000, The Sims, and Spore, has long supported Nintendo with his games appearing on everything from the SNES to the 64DD. Since 2007, Wright... Read more...

The popular Newgrounds Flash game is coming to Nintendo's downloadable service as Super Meat Boy in 2009.

Earlier this week, Edmund McMillen, creator of the popular Newgrounds Flash game Meat Boy, opened a website announcing the enhanced remake of the game as Super Meat Boy for Nintendo's WiiWare service. The game is a platforming action game similar to the N series, which also started as a Flash game, and is now represented on the DS as N+.

After suffering a severe infection at a young age, Nicole Cahill was left with severe motor disabilities and a high probability that she might never walk again.

Implementing the use of Wii Fit has become an increasingly popular trend in the world of physical therapy. It has even been used to help people walk again, as is the case with ten-year-old Nicole Cahill from Marshaltown, Ireland.

In June 2008, Nicole Cahill traveled to Beth Israel medical center... Read more...

The Japanese developer that recently finished Blue Dragon Plus for DS would "like to try making games for the Wii" and would bring Mother 3 to DS if asked.

The President of developer Brownie Brown, Shinichi Kameoka, recently told Siliconera that, since the company is done with their latest DS game, Blue Dragon Plus, he would "like to try making games for the Wii." Brownie Brown, famous for portable games such as Sword of Mana, Magical Starsign, and Mother 3, has yet to tackle the console realm. However, Kameoka is "optimistic about [the Wii]."

Phantasy Star Universe producer's latest game will feature 8-bit platforming and a charming sense of humor.

Thanks to Famitsu, Sega's teased project has been revealed to be Pole's Big Adventure, an 8-bit platforming game for WiiWare. Produced by Phantasy Star Universe producer Takao Miyoshi, Pole's Big Adventure is a classic platformer as you travel from left to right avoiding or shooting enemies.

In... Read more...

The survival horror exclusive remained grounded because of publishers who "don't want to stick their necks out" and "[are] still trying to figure out the Wii" two years after the console's release.

For more than a year, IGN has been hinting at the existence of a "dark" and "mature" game for the Wii and its failure to procure a publisher to bring it to fruition. That game has finally been revealed as Winter, a survival horror project that developer n-Space has been shopping around since GDC 2007.

Nintendo World Report starts off 2009 with a change at its highest level.

The only constant in this world is change. There is no better example of this in action than the video game industry, and the fortunes of Nintendo in particular. During the GameCube years many were questioning Nintendo’s relevance in a market that was being increasingly dominated by Sony and upstart... Read more...

As expected, High Voltage's Hot Rod Show has arrived along with an air hockey simulator, and a 16-bit shooter.

This week's Virtual Console and WiiWare release brings us two new titles for WiiWare and one for the Virtual Console, each representing a different genre: shooting, racing, and table top sports.

The single Virtual Console release of the week comes to us from the 16-bit era, specifically the Sega... Read more...

New type of card could mean motion controlled DS games in the future.

Nintendo recently entered some new items into the Japanese trademark database: one of which we know about, the other a complete mystery.

The 'Wii Golden Handle' sounds peculiar at first, buts fans of Club Nintendo Japan will remember that as being the special edition of the Mario Kart Wii Wheel, available to platinum members of the online points-for-prizes service.

Rock Band 2 joins the DLC ranks while Personal Trainer: Math and Mastiff's Moon lead another quiet week of releases.

This week's releases contain one Wii game and three DS games amongst a lot of downloadable content for rhythm games. Wii's lone release this week is THQ's Neighborhood Games which features neighborhood games with Wii controls. The DS gains three games with the releases of Nintendo's non-game Personal Trainer: Math, EA's Lord of the Rings: Conquest, and Mastiff's sci-fi first-person shooter Moon.

The DS, not the Wii, breaks the PS2's hardware sales record and a game released in 2005 returns to the top ten.

Given the astonishing 2.04 million Wiis sold in November, many sales watchers were wondering if the Wii would break the PS2's record for units sold in the month of December: 2.7 million units sold in 2002. It didn't. However, the Nintendo DS did.

December 2008 U.S. Hardware Sales

DS – 3.04m

Consumers are at risk of becoming "pissed off," Carnival Games would have it "much tougher" today, claims Cristoph Hartmann.

2K Games President Cristoph Hartmann didn't mince words when describing the difficulties of the Wii marketplace. "There are too many crappy games on Wii," he complained to MCV.

Going into detail, Hartmann talked about how game makers were mucking things up. "They're treating the Wii like the... Read more...

Producer Ryozo Tsujimoto describes his quest to create the best graphics on the Wii, a better networking system, and the possibility of an overseas release.

Monster Hunter, first released in Japan on the Playstation 2, was a widely appreciated title throughout the country. While there is a single-player mode, much of the game's allure spawned from its extensive online multiplayer mode which contained rare monsters and items only attainable through online... Read more...