Tis the Season to be Jolly -not commit robbery! Poor Billy has lost his Game Boy...Doesn't life just SUCK sometimes?

So how was your Holidays so far? On this end, not so good. I was home in Milwaukee for less than 12 hours, got all my Christmas shopping done, and wham, the sh#$ began to hit the fan. Most I won't get into, to spare you the details. But part of it is Nintendo related.

To make a long story short, I went out with some friends, got back to my car after bar time, and my rental cars passenger side window got smashed, and most of the contents stolen. This would have included a couple hundred dollars worth of Christmas Presents, and a backpack containing a bunch of personal crap, including my Gameboy Pocket, and all of my games. It truly is a sad world when someone could steal someone's Christmas Presents (all of them, except one), as well as their FREAKIN' GAMEBOY on Christmas Eve. Sad. I am hoping insurance will cover all of this. As one person told me, (and not surprisingly in an evil mean way) Merry Fu*%ing Christmas. Yeah. Heh. At least it gives me an excuse to finally get a Color Gameboy. Maybe the Pikachu Edition if I can still find one. :)

Mmm presents.

Damn! Did Christmas just sneak up on you like it did with me? Boy! We have a big holiday update here for you to read, as well as our first Christmas special...Mario Christmas Wishes. It's a look into what we would like to see next Christmas in a Mario Dolphin game. Just a little present from us to you. :)

Outside of that...the Planet may be a bit quiet for a couple of days. For me, it's back to Brewtown for a little Christmas break. I still haven't decided if I will update from there or not, but if something breaks, we'll be on it. If you need to get a hold of me, e-mail me at agentcooper@nconnect.net.

Some big news on the Game Boy Advance & Dolphin front! Nintendo has given us a preview of the two systems for the holidays! YAY!

Well we expected Nintendo to release some info before the year was out and it did. But did they really? On its homepage Nintendo has created a Y2K Forecast where they tell the world their plans for the big 2000. The preview covers everything from N64 to Gameboy Advanced and even yes Project Dolphin. It says "the most powerful console to surface in 2000", and where we'd expect some major announcements we only get a rehash summary of what we already know. Interesting to note though they mention that the hardware is "ready to rock" but the games aren't and that the completion of software will determine the release date of the console, so in other words same old Nintendo. Below are some excerpts...

First information & screenshots of Promethean Designs' exciting title Piccassio.

Thanks to reader Brian for this tidbit of information concerning a future Dolphin game. If you liked Thief, like I did then you should be interested in this modern day version. 3DNews.net has posted a Q&A with Russell Ritchie, managing director at Promethean Designs, talking about their upcoming game of art thievery, Picasso, a virtually violence free adventure, that forces you to think about how to disable your enemies instead of killing them. Look below to see that Dolphin is mentioned first!

Eurocom have Dolphin on its horizon and add a small smidgen of info to the mystery.

In an interview with Daily Radar, Eurocom spilled very little information about their Dolphin plans and remained as tight lipped as anyone would expect when talking Dolphin. But even so they did say "Definitely, yes" when asked if they were looking into Dolphin development, "Nintendo have always been a strong competitor, and we'll certainly be supporting Dolphin." But do they have dev kits? Well if they answered that they'd probably have to answer to the big N but they conveniently responded with the cryptic "I couldn't talk about anything like that. We guess everything will come clear in time ... we'll let you know ... "

Capcom President Bill Gardner speaks his mind on the state of the industry and "the Big 3." It isn't all nice either...

Capcom president Bill Gardener seems to have woke up on the wrong side of the bed as he issued the public with his views on the next-gen console race. Without anything nice to say about Sony, Nintendo and Sega he just dishes out negative comments about each company. I mean dissing Sony is great, Sega ok, but Nintendo?! Below are excerpts from FGNonline.

Gardener on Dolphin: As for Dolphin, Nintendo's highly secret console project, Gardner thinks more information should be provided to developers to garner significant third-party support. The console is scheduled to launch worldwide in fall 2000, and Gardner says, "From our perspective, we've got to be a little skeptical on [a Dolphin launch] next September, because unless some information comes quick, we won't have a product ready for them."

Looks like that recent Factor 5 interview we told you about was just a sham. Lame!

Figures. Put up a story that's on NintendoNext and it's bullsh$#. Typical. The one FINAL time I gave NN a chance and they choke. Never again. I apologize to you the readers for lowering my defenses. I am turning my BS detector back on full. This is the e-mail I got from Mr. Duck. You silly punk ass.

Hi Billy,

I appreciate you posting a story about the interview, but should inform you that it turns out Factor 5 was never interviewed, and they are going after the guy that gave me the interview. There have been many other online and magazine publications that have been tricked by this guy, and I think they're finally going to get him.

Believe it or not, Nintendo Next landed an interview with Factor 5. We think they did anyway...

Maybe. I am actually going to post something about NintendoNext! Yes wacky Monday stuff. The only reason I am posting this is 1.) It's real (possibly) and 2.) Don didn't write it! Heh Heh! Anyhoo, NintendoNext seems to have had an interview with Factor 5. 2000 a possibility? After reading this, I think it could be.

Birthday wishes to Planet's current handyman, Chris Wiser!

A big Ol' Happy 23rd Birthday to our resident problem fixer Chris Wiser! Obviously you haven't seen much of him news wise, but if it wasn't for him most of this site wouldn't be working or look right! So feel free to e-mail him one of those crazy flaming umbrella drinks here!

Thanks to the Nintendorks, we have some info on Saffire's preparation for Dolphin.

Nintendorks talk to the main man at Saffire. Pretty tranquil guy too. Les Pardew comes clean with SAGE and projected Dolphin games.

The Dork-goodness is as follows:

Last month the boys upstairs, Casamassina & crew more specifically, reported a major announcement revealing Saffire is already in early development stages of a Dolphin-bound shooter. Considering Saffire just wrapped up three major N64 titles: Xena, Rainbow Six, and Top Gear Rally 2, it's surprising to learn that this relatively small developer of only eighty employees has had the time to think about Dolphin. Late last week we sat down with Les Pardew, Founder and CEO of the five year-old company, to find out just how ready they are for Nintendo's next home console.