The U.S. gaming industry is enjoying a very lucrative year, thanks in part to the booming sales of Nintendo’s Wii and DS consoles. NPD announced that for the month of July Nintendo sold 608,400 DSs and 555,000 Wiis. Though the sales number of both Nintendo consoles is down, they are still the leader of the pack.

Sony has the third and fourth place with 224,900 PS3s and 221,700 PSPs sold. Microsoft managed to sell 204,800 Xbox 360s.

The hardware figures are also reflected in the software charts with Wii games occupying four slots in the top ten. These are Wii Fit, Wii Play, Mario Kart Wii, and Rock Band for Wii. Guitar Hero: On Tour for the DS is at number three. The number slot is taken by NCAA Football 09 for the Xbox 360.

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The Nintendo Wii has successfully conquered the gaming console market. Its sales number is still on the rise after two years of release. Gamers are already speculating on what Nintendo have in its drawing board. Will there be a Wii 2 in the near future?

Talks about Wii 2 began when Nintendo President Satoru Iwata revealed that his company is working on the next generation hardware. There was no mention of specs or features that they’re working on. Would it be a graphics upgrade or do they some innovative ideas in the works that would change how we play our games?
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The Wii is enjoying much success in the market today. Last month it has outsold the PS3 and the Xbox 360. The Wii did this with its innovative control system and high quality games. I have one wish for Wii though. I hope that Nintendo increases the Wii’s internal storage.

Its 512MB internal storage is the smallest among gaming consoles. Even the latest iPhone has a larger memory with its 8GB of storage capacity. I don’t know why Nintendo don’t want to increase the Wii’s storage.

Games such as Guitar Hero need more storage space for its DLC. Then there’s the WiiWare service. With its current internal storage, you can only save at least 5 games in it. Although you can use an external SD card for storage, you can’t play from it.

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Nintendo is the latest conquest of a small Texan company. Anascape Ltd. Has successfully filed a patent infringement against Sony and Microsoft. Sony licensed the patent in2004 while Microsoft settled in May of this year.

Nintendo challenged the ruling but the court sided with Anascape. This ruling makes it illegal for Nintendo to sell its Wii Classic Controller, GameCube WaveBird, and the regular GameCube controller. This ban is still on hold while Nintendo appeals the ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals.

Nintendo spokesman Charlie Scibetta has this to say about the case:

“Nintendo was already planning to appeal this case to the Federal Circuit court. The recent ruling by the trial court does not impact that decision.”

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Nintendo dominates the US gaming market for the month of June. Its Wii and DS consoles grabbed the top two spots in the gaming charts. The Nintendo DS sold 783,000 units while the Wii sold 666,700 units.

At the E3 last week, Nintendo announced two new titles for the Wii to help them stay on them. They are betting on Wii Sports Resort and Wii Music to keep the gamers interested, although I have my doubts on the sports title that requires a new peripheral in order to play it. Check my MotionPlus article for more on that one.

Here’s the US gaming charts:

1.       Nintendo DS — 783,000

2.       Wii — 666,700

3.       PlayStation 3 — 405,500

4.       PSP — 337,4000

5.       Xbox 360 — 219,800

            6.    PlayStation 2 — 188,800

Source: NPD

Previously I have written about a NES System in a cartridge. This is much cooler than that. I have stumbled upon a mod that puts the entire NES system in a NES controller. G-force, a modder from Benheck forums, has this to say about his creation:

“I took a famiclone (Super Joy III) and put it in a controller, with a bit of style and quality added. It was made for my girlfriend who’s a big NES nut like me. That made it easy to guess a gift for her birthday. Just thought, “What would I want?” I got it made a little late, but it was worth it to make right.”

I’m sure he scored huge points with his girlfriend because of this gift. Plus his mini NES controller system has tons of features such as built-in games including Tetris and Contra, a cartridge connector at the back, and a 2^nd player controller port.

G-force has a gallery of the components and the actual controller system here.

Nintendo announced at E3 an upgrade for the Wii-mote. It debuts the MotionPlus add-on for the peripheral that would translate into more accurate motion sensing. It sticks to the bottom of the Wii-mote.

The MotionPlus add-on will cost you $30. To date, only Wii Sports Resort is the only title that’s compatible with it. With all the hype and its price tag, there must be a perceivable advantage over a regular controller but those who have tried the demo were disappointed with it. There’s nothing out of the ordinary with it.

Good thing the MotionPlus is still in demo. Maybe some tweaks will happen for its commercial release. Nintendo stated that Wii Sports Resort will require you to have the MotionPlus add-on. I don’t like this Nintendo business module at all. Why force their consumers to buy an add-on just to play a new incarnate of its Wii Sports game?

Two of the nonconventional titles that showed up during E3 are Mushroom Men titles for the Nintendo Wii and the DS. The games are developed by Red Fly Studios and published by Gamecock Media Group.

The DS version, Mushroom Men – Rise of the Fungi, will be the prequel of the Wii version. It tells the early history of the Mushroom Men universe. It will be a side-scroller. In this version you get to choose from three different characters. You will learn and develop the character’s skills and the story will be until the start of the Spore Wars.

The Wii version, Mushroom Men – Spore Wars, will begin where the Rise of the Fungi’s story ended. You’ll be in the middle of a war between different mushroom factions. You will control Pax, an unexpected hero. He must put the Spore Wars to an end while trying to solve his own personal problems. This time around, the game will be in full 3D.

Game is set to be release in October.  Learn more about the games at the Mushroom Men web site.

What is Homebrew? According to Wikipedia:

Homebrew is a term frequently applied to video games that are produced by consumers on proprietary game platforms; in other words, game platforms that are not typically user-programmable, or use proprietary hardware for storage.

Don’t you wish there is a way to use homebrew application on your Nintendo Wii? According to Wiibrew, there is a way. Plus there are tons of applications made specifically for the Wii.

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The first time thechoozen of Bit-Tech forums saw the trailer of Wall-E, the newest Pixar movie, he knew right away that he had to do a mod based on it. So he transformed an old Nintendo GameCube console into Wall-E.

The case mod is made up of parts from an old toy and Plexiglas. They made a cover for the front ports to hide the ports. If you’re going to use the GameCube, just pull down the cover and insert the joystick in.

The GameCube is covered with acrylic and airbrushed to look like Wall-E. The arms, which are made of Plexiglas, are movable to assume different positions. The eyes are made of acrylic layers.

This GameCube case mod was made February of this year, way earlier than all the hype Wall-E is getting these days. He does look like number 5.

Source: Bit-Tech forums

More photos after jump.

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