…is a sorry state indeed. But there is hope.

I want to start off with some rhetorical (and not at all bitter) questions for Nintendo.

Where are the new, must-play online games from Nintendo on DS?

If NST could do voice chat, lobbies, and rivals in Metroid Prime Hunters a year ago, why isn't it in any other games from Nintendo?

If Nintendo WFC has been up and running for a year and a half, why aren't first-party Wii games like Excite Truck and Mario Party 8 online?

Avoid missing Wii for high score.

Soon, there will be an important videogame anniversary to celebrate.

It's not the GameCube's five-year anniversary. Well, it is the GameCube's five-year anniversary (it launched on November 18, 2001), but that's not what I'm going to reminisce about. Nor will I be discussing the Super Famicom's sweet sixteenth (released in Japan on November 21, 1990), so put that copy of Kirby Super Star away.

After finally getting some hands-on time with the Wii, am I a true believer?

Only being 17, I wasn’t able to attend E3 earlier this year and get my hands on the Wii. Furthermore, I wasn’t invited to the Miami Wii Party, and when the Nintendo Fusion Tour passed through Florida, I didn’t make the trip. Being one of the only staffers not to have grasped a remote in my hands, I was sufficiently dissatisfied.

With the Wii almost here, we’ve got to know: is the Wiimote actually better than a regular controller?

In a recent interview with Nintendo Dream, Shigeru Miyamoto revealed that GameCube games may be getting facelifts for the Wii. While the question of how extensive the improvements would be still hasn’t been answered, it brings up an interesting question: is the Wii remote so powerful an asset that its mere inclusion can drastically improve a game?

An open letter to Nintendo.

Dear Nintendo:

There is a high level of frustration among Zelda fans right now, which is itself a feat that you should note. We are, after all, a very resilient bunch. We have put up with Twilight Princess' repeated delays and stylistic changes while patiently ignoring the dearth of official... Read more...

But without Wii, does anyone care?

PAX is “in the can", as they say, and if you’re wondering why we didn’t talk much about it, it’s because there isn’t all that much to say. Nintendo showed off about nine games for the Nintendo DS, including the fantastically quirky Elite Beat Agents, and the Lemmings-esque Mario vs. Donkey Kong 2, but the Wii was nowhere to be found.

How the Wii remote's speaker may change the way we listen to games.

The big secret feature of the Wii controller, eagerly anticipated for months ahead of E3 2006, was in fact quite small. The Wii Remote's built-in speaker left most of us scratching our heads. Nintendo gave only a brief mention about the feature at their press conference, and there was no practical... Read more...

Rick Powers comes out of his months-long siesta to wax poetic about The Console Formerly Known As Revolution.

I haven’t seen this many people with their heads buried in the sand since the “Cartoon Wars" episode of South Park.

Of course, I’m talking about Nintendo’s Public Relations team, who were tasked with the unenviable duty of not only justifying the new name of their next console, but stretching... Read more...

Jonny explains which past E3 was most like the one coming up, and why that is so exciting even to a jaded veteran of these events.

This year's E3 will be my seventh trip out to Los Angeles to play and write about video games. When you've been as many times as I have, some years blend together and just aren't as memorable. Some were special because of fun times spent with the staff, even though the show itself was rather bland.... Read more...

The Nintendo World Store: they’ve got the games, but can they deliver the goods?

Somewhere out there, like some mythical creature, there exists a store just for Nintendo. The close cousin of other such decadent shopping fantasies as wholesale cupcake shops and free computer giveaways, an all-Nintendo store seems to promise decades of classic-title fun, packed into one high-energy,... Read more...

Looking at the effects of society, media, and big business on the cultural presence of video games on either side of the Atlantic.

As American gamers, it’s not so unusual to stop and think about what gaming culture is like in Japan. Japanese top-ten charts, reports of “wacky” products, and stories of extreme fanaticism often make our video game news. On the social ladder of the gaming world, Japan still stands, if precariously,... Read more...

Kids today are spoiled. In my day we didn't have these fancy hard drives and memory cards. We wrote down passwords and we were just fine with that.

Have you ever heard those stories from your grandparents about how candy used to only cost a nickel, or about how they had to walk three miles in the snow and back to go to school and they liked it? I think that is where we are at right now with video games. Us twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings,... Read more...

When you can feel a character, not just play as him. It's all about that moment.

I was recently going through some long-untouched games in my library, two in particular. First was Resident Evil 4 (not that old, but I haven’t played it in around four months). As I traveled along the path of Leon’s adventure, I eventually found myself at the cabin that left all who played it... Read more...

Despite games becoming more mainstream, gamers are still left to feel like outcasts with the broader culture.

What are your hobbies?

Almost everyone has been asked this—perhaps on an application or when first meeting someone. It is also my least favorite personal question and has always made me squirm. I can't leave this space empty... What, you want me to stretch the truth? Hmm, well, I play golf... Read more...

How much will lack of HD really hurt Nintendo, and what can they do about it?

Note: a lexicon of technical terms can be found at the bottom of this article.

According to recent statements by Nintendo officials, Revolution will apparently not feature HD support. There are still many questions such as whether or not this also excludes 480p. However, there’s little doubt... Read more...

Inspired by Sony’s “The Quest for Antonia” model search, Bonnie asks what it means when real women fashion themselves after on-screen characters.

In the gaming world, real women aren’t easy to come by. Game developers spend a lot of time and energy making sure their female characters appear realistic, endowing them with the looks and the “physics” of true-to-life beauties. So what happens when that dynamic gets flipped on its head, when real women start trying to look like video game characters?

Nintendo’s press conference manages to both stun fans and under-deliver at the same time, despite showing off not one, but two new hardware devices.

Nintendo’s had a rough few years. It’s never quite managed to live up to the expectations that its most rabid fans have for the company that brought video games back from the brink of extinction. When the biggest game Nintendo unveils during a press conference is a Pac Man “connectivity” title, you know the company is struggling to inspire its legions of followers.

Booth babes: What’s not to like? One girl gamer attempts to tackle the issues without spoiling the party...

Alright, you’re almost there. She can see you coming and she’s smiling. Suck up that bead of drool, wipe the sweat off your forehead, and try to take some deep breaths. Ready? Now your buddy’s got the camera poised and she’s putting her arm around your waist. Do you think she can tell... Read more...

Is it the puzzles? Is it the collectibles? Is it the chance to watch your Sim take a shower? Just what makes a game attractive to girls?

Discuss it in Talkback!

I have a friend who’s addicted to The Sims. Okay, that’s a lie. I have multiple friends who are addicted to The Sims. They spend hours at their computers, or at their respective consoles, totally hooked. Even after months or years of addiction, they’re still... Read more...

Jonny takes a look at the role of touch-sensitive input in DS games and how the feature can be used effectively in game design.

Four months into the life of the Nintendo DS, and one month before the launch of the competing PSP system from Sony, I’m going to go out on a limb here: touch input sucks for video games. Or at the very least, it’s being poorly utilized in the first generation of Nintendo DS games, and we’ve... Read more...