EA announces that it will create Nintendo DS games during today’s investor conference call.

When discussing the company’s future during its Fourth Quarter Fiscal 2004 Results conference call this afternoon, publisher giant Electronic Arts confirmed rumors that it will develop games for the “Nintendo Dual Screen.” [Section 3, time stamp 35:40] However, EA seemed much more excited about the PlayStation Portable, and will be “aggressive and prolific” to get a large market share of the Sony portable, which the company hopes will be as successful as the GBA over time.

Not only are all current GBA emulators flirting with copyright laws, they're now violating a Nintendo patent.

Nintendo has recently been awarded a patent for "a software emulator...emulating a handheld video game platform," or in English, any and all Game Boy emulators. Those listed in the patent give the examples of cell phones, PDAs and the video screens found in airplane seats, but in effect, the patent refers to just about anything that duplicates or enhances the Game Boy line's hardware via emulation.

Read all about how someone gets into this line of work, from inspiration to production.

The New York Times today has published a fascinating article, detailing how Spencer Seim found his true calling, becoming part of a band that plays nothing but songs from the great games of NES past.

The name of the band is The Advantage, and they recently released their first album. Much like game songs were back in the day, all of their tracks are pretty short, at about two minutes each, but that's how the band wanted them to be. In addition, the band used some professional tools to breakdown the NES beeps and boops, so they could more easily identify what instrument should be playing what part of the track.

A new Spyro game will come to the GameCube this fall.

SPYRO THE DRAGON RETURNS THIS FALL IN HIS BIGGEST ADVENTURE EVER FOR PLAYSTATION®2, XBOX® AND GAMECUBE™

Currently in development, this new 3D action platformer from the popular video game franchise will feature five playable characters and powerful new Spyro abilities

LOS ANGELES, CA (April 27, 2004) – Vivendi Universal Games (VU Games) today announced the development of Spyro™: A Hero's Tail for the PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system, Xbox® video game system from Microsoft and Nintendo GameCube™, scheduled to arrive at retail in Q4 2004. Developed by UK-based Eurocom Entertainment Software and scripted by Emmy Award-winning writer J. Stewart Burns, this new 3D action platformer will feature five fully-playable characters and brand-new Spyro breath attacks, power-ups and moves.

Now that we know more about the PSP, people seem to think the smart money is with Nintendo stock.

A Bloomberg report is saying that now that the videogame industry has more information about the Sony PSP, investors have started to realize that Sony might not swoop in and take a chunk of Nintendo's 95% global handheld stake quite so easily.

In large part due to the expected PSP price range and features the unit will have, analysts have figured out that the PSP is more directly targeted to the adult pocketbook, while Nintendo's handheld audience is spread out across all age groups. This means that even if Sony does do well with the PSP, it's likely that they'll only be affecting half of Nintendo's audience, those above the age of 16. Since parents are the main source of games for the young'uns, and no mother or father with intellegence would be willing to fork out $250-400 for a portable game system, it would seem that Nintendo and the $99 Game Boy will be fine in the short term.

If you're too old to remember the games from the first compilation, then maybe a few of these newer ones will ring a bell.

Midway Set to Deliver Another Feast of Old School Delicacies with Midway Arcade Treasures 2

Midway® Arcade Treasures 2™ Brings Back More Than 20 Arcade Classics Including All-Time Favorites Such As the Original Mortal Kombat®, NARC®, Cyberball 2072™ and Arch Rivals™

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 26, 2004--Midway Games Inc., a leading interactive entertainment industry publisher and developer, today announced Midway Arcade Treasures 2, a compilation of classic Midway arcade games together on one disk. The sequel to the successful 2003 launch of Midway Arcade Treasures, Midway Arcade Treasures 2 is currently in development and scheduled to ship Fall 2004 for the PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system, the Xbox® video game system from Microsoft and the Nintendo GameCube™ with a suggested retail price of $19.99.

Believe it or not.

According to Slashdot.org's Games section, those clever folks at Ahead Games have figured out a method to overclock the Game Boy Advance. By tweaking settings on the GBA's processor, they have managed to double the system's speed.

Of course, the real question is why anyone would want or need this extra power. It seems that it will affect your games somehow; the Ahead Games rep mentions that F-Zero will play faster, and presumably other games will be affected in a similar way. But the real applications seem to lie in playing homebrew software and emulators.

The Olsen twins claim Acclaim neglected their games and their royalties.

The two identical starlets are no push-overs! On Celebrity Justice, Mary-Kate and Ashley announced they are suing Acclaim for abandoning their game franchise and skimping out on promised royalties.

According to entertainment litigator Chuck Kenworthy, the twins are suing to protect their image and assert their dominance in the entertainment industry.

"It's not surprising that the Olsen twins are taking things to court, enforcing their rights -- they need to do that," Kenworthy told us. "The word gets out on the street that a performer is not enforcing his or her rights and you're going to get taken advantage of sooner or later."

In case you missed it too, here's the English trailer for GameCube's first truly major RPG.

This beautiful movie somehow slipped by us last week, but here it is in case you still haven't seen it. The trailer is 45 seconds long and depicts cutscenes and gameplay footage from the English version of Tales of Symphonia. There's no English voicework featured, but the text has been translated. This is definitely one of the most beautiful GameCube titles yet, so it's worth checking out even if you aren't otherwise interested in the game.

Tales of Symphonia - English Trailer (4.9 MB, Windows Media format)

The ultra-secretive Zoonami finally proves it is a game developer with the announcement of Funkydilla.

IGN reports that England-based developer Zoonami is hard at work on Funkydilla, a music game Zoonami describes as for “all game platforms.”

Zoonami’s music and rhythm game takes a different approach to the genre: instead of using predefined patterns players much match, Funkydilla lets players create their own music by combining vocal lines and phrases at their own discretion. The game lends itself to a variety of popular music styles and can be played two-player either cooperatively or competitively.