The worst kept secret in the gaming industry (well, this week, at least) is finally official: Nintendo has cut the price of the Wii by $50 to $199.

The cut will be effective Sept. 27, as was hinted at in the plethora of leaked retail flyers over the past week or two.

The move by Nintendo, of course, follows price cuts by Sony and Microsoft and means that all three consoles should see a hardware sales bump in the short term – whether it’s enough to pull the industry out of its slump, though, is a bigger question.

You have to give Nintendo credit for being able to hold its launch price for almost three years, but this action is likely a little overdue. Certainly, the 3.5-day delay before implementing the price cuts is a baffling one. The company gains nothing by putting a “coming soon! Lower prices!” sign on its hardware – and risks angering consumers who will see the headlines and expect the lower prices immediately.

Nintendo has been the dominant leader in hardware sales throughout this generation. The introduction of a slimline PS3, which is expected to be a hot item during the holidays, is a threat to the Wii’s sales leadership this holiday season.

How popular is the new model? Sony has sold - and that is sold, not shipped - 1 million units in just three weeks. 

By dropping the Wii's price $50, though, Nintendo should be able to stay in the running for the best seller crown in the next round of NPD numbers. 

Amid all the hubbub over Nintendo’s decision to cut the Wii’s price, there was one piece of news that might be overlooked in the announcement.

“New Super Mario Bros. Wii” now has a ship date – and will hit store shelves Nov. 15.

The game is, arguably, the company’s biggest holiday release (with Wii Fit Plus – shipping Oct. 4 a close second). It’s a reworking of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NEWS) classic, but will allow up to four players to play simultaneously. 

That makes it a potential smash for families - the console's sweet spot. 

Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 owners have been able to purchase and stream movies from their game machines for years. Now Wii owners in Japan are seeing media center functionality as well.

The company has partnered with Sonic’s CinemaNow division to provide content from its 14,000 title collection. (That collection includes feature films, concerts and shorts for rent of purchase.) The service will be called “Everyone’s Theater Wii”.

It’s important to note once again that this service will be available in Japan only. But it’s noteworthy as this is Nintendo’s first real step at acknowledging that customers want more than just games from their game systems.

No U.S. integration has been announced, but today’s announcement is likely to fire up the rumor mill once again. (Netflix is the most-mentioned candidate for a U.S. streaming partner. Word came yesterday of a user survey soliciting feedback on demand for streaming video on the Wii.)

Netflix, of course, already has a game machine partnership with Microsoft for the Xbox.

(Thanks Gizmodo for the heads up about the press release.)

And then there were three…

Sony today joined the motion sensing controller club, unveiling the PlayStation Motion Controller, a new controller that works in concert with a video camera that it says it plans to launch in the spring of 2010.

It’s a controller that has a lot more in common with Nintendo than Microsoft’s “Project Natal”. A remote works in conjunction with the Sony EyeToy to reflect onscreen movement.

But where Nintendo is chasing the casual audience, Sony has its eye on the hardcore. The company showed several tech demos, including using the controller in a first person shooter context and as a mace, which takes out advancing demons with a swing.

Sony and Microsoft are both offering more advanced devices than the Wii, even when you take the Wii’s forthcoming WiiMotion Plus add on into account. But both are at least a year away from being available – and neither company has the current installed base of the Wii. The Wii, though, lacks the graphical power of the Xbox 360 or PS3. 

Should be an interesting fight when the three start slugging it out.

The Interwebs are abuzz today over Double Fine honcho Tim Schafer's rather cryptic comment when asked by 1UP about the rumor that there will be a Wii version of his upcoming heavy metal action game "Brutal Legend." "We are making an Xbox 360 and a PS3 version of Brutal Legend," he said.

He's telling the truth. Just not the whole truth. Double Fine is making "Brutal Legend" for the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. And Electronic Arts is engaging another developer to make a version of the game for the Wii (most likely with Double Fine consulting). I'm not sure who that developer is, but several good sources have confirmed for me that it's in the works.

I also don't know when "Brutal Legend" for Wii will be released, but I'd be surprised it's it's this fall along with PS3 and 360, given that I understand development started fairly recently. But I wouldn't be surprised if it follows the model of the upcoming "Dead Space: Extraction" and comes out a year or so after the original PS3/360 version

Strategically, this is a no-brainer. EA has said its turnaround plan involves fewer, bigger franchises and a focus on the no. 1 console in the market: Wii. If "Brutal Legend" is one of those franchises (don't tell Activision!), it makes total sense EA wants to get it on Nintendo's platform. Especially since the game's main character carries a big-ass axe that it could be fun to swing with the Wii-mote.

An EA rep declined to comment.

The biggest news from Nintendo president Satoru Iwata's keynote today, without a doubt, was that the Wii will now work with high capacity SD memory cards. Why? Because now the most popular home video game console in the world -- which has shipped over 50 million units -- is a digital media gateway in the living room.

Sony and Microsoft built their current consoles with the goal of having a "trojan horse" to do the same thing. Microsoft, thanks to the excellence of Xbox Live and decent sales for its console, has made solid progress in that space. Sony, thanks to the problems of Playstation Network and its struggles to sell devices, has not.

Nintendo doesn't seem to have thought about that at all with the Wii -- There's virtually no built-in storage and no home networking capabilities. It doesn't even play DVDs.

 Playing online multi-player games has also proven to be a major pain on the device. But downloading casual and classic games on the console is easy. And popular. The only drawback has been storage -- the console comes with a miniscule 512 MB of flash memory and only works with 2 gigabyte storage cards.

Now with a system update coming today, it's compatible with 32 gigabyte cards. Which means the ability to store downloadable games is limitless. With just a few of those cards, in fact, Nintendo owners can get more storage than the hard drives on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 (both those devices work with storage cards, but the user interface doesn't connect as seamlessly as on the Wii).

Which means users can download unlimited numbers of games. And there's theoretically no reason they  need a size limit, at least in terms of storage. If gamers are willing to wait, they could download a title as big as a standard disc (9 gb) or even bigger. (see update below)

And remember when I wrote that the Wii might start offering movie and TV downloads or streaming soon? With unlimited storage, that becomes a lot easier.

Of course, most people probably aren't going to spend the money to do this. But the brilliance of Nintendo's strategy is that most people don't have to. The huge audience that just wants to spend $250 and play "Mario Kart" or "Wii Fit" can do that. But some who start with that mindset -- and thus buy into the Wii -- may find themselves interested in more. And now Nintendo can upgrade them to 360/PS3-size storage and beyond.

So yes, Iwata's description of Nintendo creative guru Shigero Miyamoto's design process ande philosophy was fascinating. The DSi (which I've seen before and will try to write more about soon) has some fun new features that will undoubtedly prove popular. And the announcement of a new "Legend of Zelda" DS game (photo borrowed from MTV Multiplayer) was cool (the last one, "Phantom Hourglass," was phenomenal).

But long term, I think we'll remember today as the day that the Wii became able to do much more than an underpowered videogame console with accessible games and innovative controllers. Nintendo is now poised to become the centerpiece of the digitally connected living room that Sony and Microsoft wanted to be. And it did it by focusing entirely on games for a couple of years and then adding the one missing element: storage.

Update: An astute reader pointed out to me that it may not be technically possible, at least for now, to play games bigger than 512 MB, because it would need to utilize the system's flash memory while being played.

One of Hollywood's top digital distribution executives thinks so.

In an interview I recently conducted with Curt Marvis, president of digital media for Lionsgate, for Variety's technotainment blog, he specifically mentioned the Wii as a huge opportunity for his studio to distribute movies and TV shows and said he thinks it'll happen this year:

While he certainly didn't say movies on the Wii are a sure thing, an executive in Marvis' position is the most likely to know what's being talked about and what's in the works.

Nintendo is already working on a limited video service for the Wii in Japan, with original content it's producing with ad agency Dentsu. But moving to the U.S. and adding Hollywood movies and TV shows would be a huge step.

If Nintendo does that, it could easily become a major player in the fast growing, albeit still small, online video business. Since they're connected to televisions, studios are counting on video game consoles to be a big part of that growth. Already, the Xbox 360's video marketplace is one of the biggest online movie distributors after iTunes. And Sony is aggressively trying to catch up, this week adding the last major media company that wasn't on board with its service, NBC Universal.

There are 16.2 million Wiis in the U.S. now, compared to 12.8 million Xbox 360s and 6.3 million Playstation 3s. So the Wii could effectively double the market. But it could do even more. Since the Wii is popular with so many non-traditional gamers, it's in more households that aren't as digital savvy as the typical 360 or PS3 household. So they're less likely to be downloading movies or otherwise accessing video from the Web. If the Wii's video service is exceptionally easy, it could bring millions of new customers to digital movie/TV distribution and prove a boon for Hollywood.

Of course, unlike the 360 and PS3, the Wii couldn't handle high definition content. More importantly, downloading a significant number of TV shows and movies would be difficult, given the console's lack of a hard drive (SD cards can only take you so far). A full video service would have to come with enhanced storage or be done via streaming (which would mean lower visual quality). It might not have been meaningless that Marvis said the Wii could soon "stream movies."

It’s no surprise, after seeing the 2008 NPD numbers, that the videogame segment of Sony’s earnings today were pretty dismal, while Nintendo’s were pretty fantastic. Just as in the U.S., Playstation 3 worldwide sales declined during the quarter ended Dec. 31 -- 9 % to be exact, to 4.46 million -- which is decidedly not good for a two year old console. Nintendo Wii sales, meanwhile, surged 50% worldwide to 10.41 million. (Microsoft, we previously learned, sold 6 million Xbox 360 consoles last quarter, up 28%.)

However Sony did point to one positive: a 57% jump in PS3 software sales. But software sales only matter compared to the total number of consoles (a ratio known as the attach rate). And after working that out, we find that the PS3 has virtually the same attach rate as the Wii. Meaning Sony really has nothing to brag about.

By Dec. 31, the PS3’s worldwide install base was 21.39 million, about double what it was last year. The Wii’s grew 123% to just under 45 million. On the software side, Nintendo and other publishers sold 82.4 million Wii games in the quarter ending Dec. 31, up 74%, while Sony et al sold 40.6 million PS3 games, up 57%. The comparative software sales growth rates for the quarter almost exactly mirror the comparative growth in the two consoles’ install bases.

So if software sales compared to hardware sales are growing at the same rate, are they ending up anywhere different? Nope. Sony says 40.6 million PS3 games were sold last quarter, or 1.89 for every console on the market. Consumers bought 82.4 million Wii games, or 1.83 per piece of hardware. Almost identical.

(Microsoft, alas, doesn’t reveal its worldwide software sales. And while it has traditionally had a very strong attach rate in the U.S., it’s tough to know how it all ads up when you combine that with the weak Japanese market and Europe.)

Playstation 3 owners might be willing to shell out more for a console, it turns out, but they’re not buying more games (though they are, to be fair, spending about $10 more per game). Microsoft has the advantage, in the U.S. at least, of a much higher attach rate than its competitors. Sony doesn’t have that. It’s third place in consoles and tied with its biggest competitor in comparative software sales. And compared to Microsoft, it’s not making nearly as much money online (since Sony doesn’t charge for subscriptions or run ads). Which means after two years, Sony still has a fundamental problem to solve: What is the business advantage of the PS3 over its competitors?

(Sony also has a problem in common with Nintendo: the devastating impact of the strong Japanese Yen on earnings. That's one of several reasons why struggling Sony has had to cut earnings forecasts, but the only reason why otherwise prospering Nintendo did the same.)

A few realizations I had while taking more time than I have had in a while to play videogames over the holidays...

Grand Theft Auto IV is better than I remembered, probably because the recent mini-backlash amongst some videogame writers has had me focusing on the flaws, particularly the weak writing later in the game (a feeling emphasized when all three of Variety's freelance critics listed it as either "disappointing" or "overrated"). But as I got to know Brucie and Roman and the McCreary brothers again, went on a motorcycle chase all over the city (including through the subways), and got in a car accident on a bridge that sent Niko hurtling through a windshield and into the river, then simply swam to the other side of the river without the game losing a beat, I remembered all the amazingly awesome things about this game that nothing else in 2008 matched.

The World Ends With You, which I gave a try on the recommendation of several critics, including one of our own, is not my kind of game. Given what a hard time I had with the old school RPG elements of "Fallout 3," perhaps I shouldn't be surprised that I really couldn't engage with the old school JRPG elements of this game. And the new stuff, like the d-pad rhythm based combat, really didn't work for me. I can't even say the game is bad, since I spent only an hour with it, which I found unbearable.

Nintendo's Wii is not such a dust collector after all. I admit I didn't engage with a lot of the best selling Wii games this year -- "Wii Fit," "Mario Kart," "Super Smash Bros. Brawl" -- so I thought I was of the "there's nothing good left on the Wii" camp that seems to be growing. But then I looked at my top ten list and realized three of the titles, including my no. 1, were Wii exclusives, and a fourth was also on PC, but I played it on the Wii. And then I played some more of them all and realized that while I still play 360 the most, the Wii has at least as much to offer me as the PS3.

It was a good November for Nintendo and Epic/Microsoft Game Studios, but a bad one for the industry, especially Sony and, to lesser extent, the makers of "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band."

The latest sales data from NPD shows overall sales growth was 10%, which in the midst of a recession is pretty good, but is still down a LOT from last year. That shows the videogame biz is hurting, on a comparative basis, just like pretty much every other sector.

NPD points out that this November had seven fewer post-Thanksgiving shopping days than last on its calendar, which is a fair point. But even still, the growth rates are down by such a huge amount that that can't explain the whole difference. Total growth, for instance, plunged from 52% to 10%. Hardware sales growth fell from 41% to 10%, which is somewhat expected since we're now later in the console cycle. But software sales growth plunged from 62% to 11%, which isn't what you'd expect. Seems like software sales should be further increasing now that the console install base is so much bigger.

Without a doubt the company in the most trouble is Sony. Forget about declining growth rates. Playstation 3 sales were actually down 19% in absolute terms from November 2007. Considering that Sony has some very high profile exclusive games out in the past two months, like "LittleBigPlanet" and "Resistance 2," that's downright disastrous. Looks like people just aren't willing to pay $400 for a videogame console right now. (PSP sales were down an even worse 26%, but at least that has the excuse of launching 3.5 years ago, not two).

Also suffering are "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band." 1.5 million "Guitar Hero: World Tour" units have been sold so far this year by Activision, off 55% from "Guitar Hero III" at the same moment in 2007. "Rock Band 2" has sold 809,000 units for MTV and EA. It's tough to compare to last year, since this sequel launched in September, but only for 360, and the original launched last year in late November for 360 and PS3 and added PS2 in December. But consider this: Last November Rock Band sold 382,000 units on its two launch consoles, followed by 463,000 in December for 360 alone, for a total of 845,000. December's always the biggest month, of course, but one week for two consoles and one month for one, compared to a month on one console and a month and a half on two sounds like a more than fair comparison. And "Rock Band 2" is losing to the original.

I'm almost as confused as you are, so here's a cleaner stat: According to UBS analyst Ben Schachter, combined "Guitar Hero" and "Rock Band" revenue was down 12% in November from last year. And keep in mind that the "Guitar Hero: World Tour" band kit costs $100 more than the highest priced version of "Guitar Hero III."

"Gears of War 2" had a huge month, as expected, though. And "Call of Duty: World at War" launched almost exactly even with "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare," a start that Activision has to be very happy with. The only new original game in the top 10 for November was "Left 4 Dead," which debuted with a strong 410,000 units.

There is one other company I'm forgetting... Oh yea, Nintendo. It seems that recessions don't impact them. I'm not even sure if the law of gravity is in effect at Nintendo HQ. Thanks to more supply and growing demand, Wii sales more than doubled to 2 million last month, the biggest ever for any console outside of December. No doubt Nintendo will break that record next month. Meanwhile, two of its games continue to show what the movie business calls "legs." "Wii Fit" was no. 4 and "Mario Kart" no. 5 six and seven months after their debut, respectively (I'll exclude "Wii Play" because of the free controller issue). Every other new game seems to come and go from the top 10 quickly, but "Fit" and "Mario Kart" keep being snatched up by all those new Wii buyers. Even the much maligned "Wii Music" came back from a weak October launch to sell a solid 297,000 units in its debut.

Notable new games that sold less than that -- though I can't tell by how much and so it's hard to evaluate whether they're bombs or just not quite big enough -- include "Quantum of Solace," "Tomb Raider: Underworld," and "Mortal Kombat vs. DC." There's also "Mirror's Edge," but we already know that one is a bomb.

Here's the complete set of NPD November data. At the suggestion of a smart reader, I've added release dates, so you can fairly compare games that came out earlier or later in the month. I've also added percentage growth from last November for each console, just because I think it's interesting.

Game                      Console     Publisher     Units sold in Nov.  Release date

Gears of War 2         360           Microsoft       1.56 million        Nov. 7

Call of Duty 5            360           Activision      1.41 million       Nov. 10

Wii Play                    Wii           Nintendo        796,000            Feb 12, 2007
Wii Fit                      Wii           Nintendo        697,000            May 19
Mario Kart                Wii            Nintendo        637,000            April 27
Call of Duty 5            PS2           Activision       597,000            Nov. 10
Guitar Hero: WT       Wii           Activision       475,000            Oct. 26
Left 4 Dead              360           EA                  410,000            Nov. 18
Resistance 2            PS3           Sony               435,000             Nov. 4
Wii Music                PS3            Nintendo        297,000            Oct. 20

Console       Nov. unit sales  Growth from Nov. 2007       Lifetime-to-date
Wii              2.04 million                108%                           15.5 million
DS               1.57 million                 3%                              24.6 million
360             836,000                       9%                              12.5 million
PSP             421,000                      -26%                           13.2 million
PS3             378,000                      -19%                            6.1 million

Category             Nov. revenue   Change  Year-to-date revenue  Change
Total industry     $2.91 billion        10%       $16.04 billion             22%
Hardware           $1.21 billion        10%       $5.93 billion               14%
Software            $1.45 billion        11%       $8.21 billion               31%
Accessories        $255 million         7%        $1.91 billion               17%

As the first information about sales in November -- the most important month of the year for videogame sales -- starts to creep out ahead of Thursday's official report from NPD, it's looking like amidst recession, gamers are going for the familiar and the cheap.

To wit, Nintendo prexy Satoru Iwata told Reuters that his company sold 800,000 Wii units in the U.S. during Thanksgiving week, more than double last year's figure. The increase is helped in part by the fact that the supply is bigger, but still, the fact that there's still that much demand indicates consumers are still happy to buy the cheapest (or rather believed to be cheapest, sorry Xbox 360 Arcade) console.

Also selling very well,. it appears, is "Gears of War 2." Microsoft already announced it sold more than 2 million units worldwide and Wedbush Morgan analyst Michael Pachter predicts the game sold as many as 3 million units domestically last month (EEDAR analyst Jesse Divnich predicts a more conservative 2 million-plus). The other huge game, according to Pachter, was likely "Fallout 3." Bethesda already announced that it shipped 4.7 million units worldwide and the analyst predicts it sold around 1.5 million units in November, on top of the 510,000 from the end of October.

Not selling so well? It looks like the big music games could be in decline. "Guitar Hero: World Tour" sales were already down 61% in October from "Guitar Hero III" last year (as I detailed here) and Divnich predicts the November "III" to "World Tour" drop could be 50%. "Rock Band 2," meanwhile sold a so-so 238,000 units in October and Wii Music moved a dismal 81,000. Only the latter is a flop, but it seems that none are setting the world on fire they way they did last year and even in the first half of this year (when "Guitar Hero III" for Wii, in particular, was very hot).

Another sign: Prices for "World Tour" on eBay are significantly cheaper than retail, indicating that supply is no longer a problem.

It could be that "Rock Band" and "Guitar Hero: World Tour" are so expensive and these are obviously lean times when not many people are ready to spend $200 on a videogame ("Wii Music" is only $50 but has other problems, like the fact that it's not very good). Of course the bigger question that Activision and MTV have to worry about is whether this is a sign that the music videogame biz has peaked. Given the hundreds of millions MTV spent on Harmonix and the major investment it's making in a Beatles game, plus the fact that Activision plans to triple the number of "Guitar Hero" skus by 2010, that's a worrying thought.

Finally, it appears that EA's "Mirrors Edge" experiment may not be working out, at least off the bat. I am hearing industry sources that initial sales on the first person parkour game were quite soft.

Of course we'll get actual hard data on Thursday from NPD.

Nintendo has yet to announce the full song list for Wii Music, even though it comes out next week, but I  just got my copy and, conveniently, there's a list of credits in the instructions for all 14 of the the licensed songs. Not exactly competition for the track lists in "Rock Band 2" or "Guitar Hero: World Tour," but it's not meant to be.

The company previously said there are around 50 songs in "Wii Music," so we can assume all the rest are either public domain tunes or Nintendo's own theme songs. Unsurprisingly for a game that's meant to have such broad appeal, the licensed tracks are all really well known songs that have been around for a while and everyone can enjoy, if not exactly love. "Jingle Bell Rock" is about as edgy as it gets. And of course since there's no singing in "Wii Music," they're are well known melodies that you can recognize without the lyrics.

Interestingly, since the point of "Wii Music" is "playing" the song yourself, there's no issue with master recordings. So the instruction book only credits the composers and publishing companies, not the recording artists.

Take a look and see what you think:

"Chariots of Fire" theme song by Vangelis

"Daydream Believer" by John Stewart (made famous by The Monkees)

"Every Breath You Take" by Sting

"I'll be There," originally performed by The Jackson 5

"I've Never Been to Me," the classic Motown hit by Charlene

"Material Girl," which was made famous by a nice young lady named Madonna

"Please Mr. Postman," the debut single from the Marvellettes from way back in the early '60s

"September," from Earth, Wind and Fire

"Suriyaki," a Japanese song popular in the '60s performed by Kyu Sakamoto (OK, I've never heard of that one)

"The Loco-Motion," another 60s pop song that tortured young adults my age when we were kids

John Lennon's "Woman"

"Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go" by the illustrious George Michael

"Jingle Bell Rock." We all know this one.

"Do-Re-Mi" by Rogers and Hammerstein from "The Sound of Music." (No, not the last song that Kurt Cobain wrote.)

The new episode of Comedy.com's "Glitch in the System" features advice on using your Nintendo Wii as a toaster or a hiding place for porn now that there are no more good games coming out for it, plus more of host Jacob Sirof at Penny Arcade Expo, where he talks to Kotaku editor Brian Crecente about donkey punching and some folks promoting "Brothers in Arms" about getting shaved... down there. (I always keep it classy here on The Cut Scene)

(Produced, as always, by me.)

Perhaps I'm a bit naive, but having played lots of Xbox Live with lots of stupid/obnoxious/racist strangers (mostly teenagers), I figured that the big three had figured out how to ban obviously offensive screen names from their systems. I also figured, based on nothing but assumptions, that Nintendo's Wii Wi-Fi Connection would be the least likely place to find that kind of thing since Nintendo's the most "family friendly" company and seems like the place where racist idiots would spend the least amount of time.

So imagine my bemused surprise Saturday night when I went online to play "Mario Kart Wii" for the first time and immediately discovered one of my opponents had the charming moniker "I h8 nigas." I think Nintendo may want to put a little more work into the technology it uses to screen player names.

Its press conference isn't until tomorrow, but the first notable news of E3 actually comes from Nintendo.

The Japanese gaming giant has addressed one of the top concerns of many Wii players -- that the Wii-mote just isn't very accurate. That makes it impossible to have an awesome swordfighting or even cooking (yes, I love my "Cooking Mama") game where your movements are exactly tracked on screen. Instead, the Wii just gets the gist of your movements... sometimes, which can cause a lot of frustration.

Not anymore, Nintendo is promising. It just posted a sneak preview on its website of the "Wii MotionPlus," a plug-in (pictured left) for the Wiimote that, well, let's let Nintendo say what it does:

The Wii MotionPlus       accessory attaches to the end of the Wii Remote and, combined with the       accelerometer and the sensor bar, allows for more comprehensive tracking       of a player’s arm position and orientation, providing players with an       unmatched level of precision and immersion. Every slight movement       players make with their wrist or arm is rendered identically in real       time on the screen, providing a true 1:1 response in their game play.

No information yet on whether this will be standard on all Wii's sold going forward or how much it will cost. But this could enable some awesome new games, especially the type that we avid gamers have been demanding. Here's the big question in my mind: Has this been in the works long enough for LucasArts to enable it on "The Force Unleashed?" Because I think we all really want a precise Wii lightsaber experience.

Apparently the Wii Fit has dirtier things on its mind than just helping people with their posture:

Still have to sort through this all, but here's the raw data that NPD just provided for March video game sales in the U.S. First take: "Super Smash Bros. Brawl" had a HUGE month and Wii sales benefitted as well. PS3 finally got back ahead of the 360, but just barely. And both "Rainbow Six Vegas 2" and "Army of Two" had decent debuts.

Missing from the top 10 chart? Meaning they didn't debut too well: "Lost: Via Domus," "Condemned 2: Bloodshot," "Dark Sector."

                                               March 2007                  March 2008             Change

Total Video Games                    $1.1 B                          $1.7 B                     57%

Hardware                                  $377.9M                      $551.3M                  46%

Software                                   $579.1M                      $945.6M                  63%

Accessories                               $139.5M                      $220M                     58%

Hardware                       Units sold in March 2008            Units sold lifetime-to-date

PlayStation 3                          257,000                                    4.1M

PlayStation Portable                297,000                                   11.2M

Xbox 360                                262,000                                    9.9M

DS                                          697,000                                   19.2M

Wii                                         721,000                                   8.8M

PlayStation 2                          216,000                                     n/a

Top 10 video games                    Platform          Publisher                  Units sold in March

Super Smash Bros. Brawl              Wii                 Nintendo                    2.7M

Rainbow Six Vegas 2                    360                 Ubisoft                      752.3K

Army of Two                               360                 Electronic Arts            606.1K

Wii Play w/Remote                      Wii                 Nintendo                   409.8K

God of War: Chains of Olympus   PSP                 Sony                          340.5K

Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII       PSP                 Square Enix                301.6K

Guitar Hero III                           Wii                  Activision                   264.1K

MLB 2K8                                     360                 Take 2                       237.1K

Call of Duty 4                             360                  Activision                   237K

Army of Two                              PS3                 Electronic Arts             224.9K

(Note: all figures are U.S. only. The lifetime-to-date figures are calculated by me with a bunch of annoying addition, since NPD doesn't provide it anymore.)

Vidgame companies try to stay as tightlipped as they can about sales, except when they have a huge hit.

So it's no surprise we heard from Nintendo today that "Super Smash Bros. Brawl" has sold a boffo (as we say at Variety) 1.4 million units in just its first week on sale.

That's a truly astronomical number, especially considering that this is a game that is pretty much targeted at the hardcore gamer audience (who else gets excited by seeing Pikachu take on Sonic?) and it's launching well out of the holiday sales period, when most videogames are sold.

By comparison, "Super Mario Galaxy" sold 500,000 units in its first week in November.

Given all that, it's no surprise, if still impressive, that "Smash Bros. Brawl" is now the fastest selling game in the Nintendo's history in North America. It's well on track to outsell "Super Smash Bros. Melee," which eventually sold 7 million units and was the biggest game for GameCube.

It's worth keeping in mind, however, that this is huge but not quite HUGE. "Halo 3," for example, sold over 2.5 million units on its first day in the U.S. and over 5 million in its first week worldwide.

When I wrote a mixed review of "Super Mario Galaxy" in November, the response from Nintendo fanboys was by and large not too kind (take a look at some of the comments calling me an "anti-Nintendo hatemonger," "horrid little twat for brains," and other friendly terms here.)

Luckily for Variety.com's message boards, our critic Matt Peckham was overwhelmingly positive about "Super Smash Bros. Brawl," calling it "a grand love letter to everyone who played the last two 'Smash Bros.' games and an irresistible invitation to anyone who hasn't."

Sure, the graphics aren't any better than they were in "Super Smash Bros. Melee" on the GameCube, but "it's not the sort of game that's either slow enough pace-wise or vain enough gravitas-wise to invite such scrutiny." In other words, there's so much fast paced fun going on that sharp hi-def visuals aren't what matter. I haven't played the game yet, but between the adventure mode, the on- and offline battles, the endlessly customizable options, and the level builder, it looks like you could literally never run out of things to do for your $50.

Matt's a pretty tough critic, and when the only negative thing he had to say is that the controls are  "a little loose and occasionally inaccurate," (Nintendo fanboys, you may start accusing us of bias now for that outrageous statement) you know you've got a damned good videogame.

Here's the first paragraph:

Packed with beloved icons catapulting across jostling screens as they engage in bloodless grudge matches, "Super Smash Bros. Brawl" explodes onto the Wii at the top of its game. With more characters, more tweaks, more multiplayer options, and a sprawling side-scrolling story mode, it's a grand love letter to everyone who played the last two "Smash Bros." games and an irresistible invitation to anyone who hasn't. Nintendo may be mining an utterly familiar lode, but "Super Smash Bros. Brawl" is such a pitch- perfect crowd-pleaser that it's certain to secure a place as one of the year's best sellers.

And you can read the whole thing here.

I wouldn't be surprised if Playstation 3 is in the headline for most stories about the January vidgame  sales data from NPD, but to me the biggest surprise was "Rock Band."

While most of the top 10 games chart was the same as we saw in December, "Rock Band" rocketed from nowhere (at least not in the top 10) to take the no. 4 slot with its Xbox 360 version. Aided by a high price compares to typical games, and even "Guitar Hero III" with its controller, "Rock Band" across all three of its platforms was the no. 1 revenue generating game for the month at $30 million.

"Rock Band" even sold better on the Xbox 360 than "Guitar Hero III," by a razor thin margin of 184,000 compared to 183,000. Of course, "Guitar Hero III" for Wii did even better, though, selling 240,000.

On the hardware side, the shocker is that PS3 outsold 360 for the first time and almost beat Nintendo's Wii (exact sales figures below). As I noted in my story for tomorrow's Daily Variety, there were likely several contributing factors, including:

-More PS3's in stock after the holidays than the competing systems, both of which outsold it all of last year.

-Warner Bros' decision to switch to Blu-ray, essentially ending the format war and putting PS3 in an excellent position as an inexpensive, multi-use Blu-ray player.

-Good old fashioned momentum for the PS3 thanks to the price cut and a growing library of solid games like "Uncharted" and "Ratchet and Clank: Future."

Of course, it's still worth noting that only one PS3 game was in the top 10 and for total system spend on games, hardware and accessories, Xbox 360 remains in the lead (360: $297 million; Wii: $244 million; PS3: $219 million). Clearly, 360 still has the hearts of the hard core gamers with the most cash to burn.

Here's the data so you can make sense of it yourself:

January 2008 hardware sales

Wii: 274,000

Playstation 3: 269,000

DS: 251,000

PSP: 230,000

Xbox 360: 230,000

January 2008 game sales

Call of Duty 4, Xbox 360: 331,000

Wii Play, Wii: 298,000

Guitar Hero III, Wii: 240,000

Rock Band, Xbox 360: 184,000

Guitar Hero III, Xbox 360: 183,000

Super Mario Galaxy, Wii: 172,000

Burnout Paradise, Xbox 360, 144,000

Call of Duty 4, PS3: 140,000

Mario Party, DS: 139,000

Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games, DS: 133,000

Back in 2005, EA and Steven Spielberg signed a deal to develop three new videogames together. Last summer, EA released preliminary information on two -- both of which are being developed at the L.A. development studio. We always knew the first one to come out, code named PQRS, is a block-manipulating puzzle game for the Wii aimed at casual players.

Click here for more Boom Blox screenshots

Today, EA is releasing some more info. Usually I wouldn't go through the details of a new product like this, but since it's Steven Spielberg and we are Variety, it seems appropriate. So here are all the new facts we learned:

-The game is called "Boom Blox"

-As we basically knew, players use the Wii-mote to "throw, grab and blast" Jenga-like pieces in complex 3-D puzzles.

-It comes out in May 2008.

-While it remains Wii exclusive in terms of consoles, EA is also making a version for mobile phones.

-There's single player, co-op, and versus gameplay. It  ships with over 300 levels.

-Along with puzzles, there are also characters who interact with players, including "Blox-laying chickens or the baseball throwing monkeys, who bring personality to the Tiki, Medieval, Frontier, and Haunted themed environments."

-Players can "remix" any level of the game, or build new puzzles from scratch, using a level editor. They can then share their creations online. This is particularly cool to me, since I'm a huge fan of the level editor in "Halo 3" and think that kind of thing is the future of gaming. But this is the first implementation of it in a "casual" game aimed at families that I can think of (am I wrong?). Plus it's obviously great to see games finally doing something with the Wii's Internet connection.

EA also released a bunch of screenshots. I'm pasting in small versions of a couple of my favorites in the post, but you can see a full gallery of them here:

Boom Blox screenshot gallery

Oh, and no further info on Spielberg's other game in development, code-named "LMNO" -- an "A.I." like game about a secret agent on the run with an android woman that's being made for 360 and PS3. We probably won't see that one until either the holidays or sometime next year. And no word yet at all on what Spielberg's third game with EA will be.

For the sake of those who read this blog and not Variety.com, and also just for the sake of provoking discussion, I plan to link to and discuss a lot of the reviews and news about videogames from the "actual" paper on here.

So I'm starting with our review of "No More Heroes," by yours truly. I'll be blunt: I think this is the best game yet for the Wii. Period. And I know I'm provoking the fanboys who viciously assaulted me for merely really liking "Super Mario Galaxy" and not loving it. And "No More Heroes" certainly isn't as deep or as slick as that game.

But it's eons more original than anything that has been made for the Wii. A great sense of style, great controls, funky characters. As I wrote in my review, it's "the first great hipster videogame." It's also the first non-shooter to figure out the Wii controls. Swinging the Wii-mote every time you hit an enemy would quickly get annoying and tedious. But saving the motion sensing for kick-ass finishing moves and wrestling throws? That's a sense of satisfaction you can't get on a a 360 or PS3.

The only caveats in noted in the review are the weak soundtrack and the lack of a good physics engine, which makes the fighting imprecise. But there's one other thing too detailed to go into in the review that I wanted to add here. If anyone reading this got to ranking number four in the game, they'll know what I'm talking about: What the hell is up with the magician guy? The basic battle is fine. He has a few good moves and I love how sometimes the camera turns upside down (or are we just on the ceiling).

But towards the end of the fight, "No More Heroes" starts triggering these bizarre little mini-games where Harvey traps Travis in a box and the player has to shake the controller in order to get out. Then it happens again. And again. And again. The last time I fought Harvey, I counted eight times I got stuck in that damn box. I got out every time, but to no purpose. It didn't cause any damage to the boss. And when it's over, you're thrown right back into the fight where you started, which can be very disconcerting.

Whatever it was Grasshopper was trying to do with that particular feature, it totally didn't work.

But still, the game is great. The only question left for me is: Will "No More Heroes" be another under-selling critical darling? Ubisoft's decision to release it in January makes me think that's their appraisal.