Perhaps most objectionable are the things one can do in Scribblenauts when babies, steak and lions come together, as amusingly described by the Entertainment Software Ratings Board. Warning: gruesome descriptions of rad bike tricks performed over infants await you! Proceed with caution.

This is a puzzle game in which players navigate a series of traps, puzzles, and enemies to collect stars scattered throughout the colorful levels. Players have the ability to summon different objects by writing/typing in the word (e.g., bike, spaceship, lion) and watching it come to life. If multiple words are entered in a sequence, different whimsical scenarios can be triggered: a bicycle can be used to jump over a baby; a bulldozer can clear away a shark; and cabbage can be fed to dinosaurs. Players can elect to summon "cartoony" versions of bats, bombs, guns, and flamethrowers. These types of items can be used to destroy objects or even other summoned items (e.g., a club can be used to hit an animal; steak can be attached to a baby to attract lions; rockets can be lobbed at a man). These triggered animations are minimally depicted and are usually accompanied by popping, musical sound effects; bright, star-shaped flashes; or small puffs of smoke. If players wish to, they may type in the word vomit, which causes a beige-colored lump to appear on the screen.

Do you have any idea how many times I'm going to try to solve Scribblenauts puzzles with the words "vomit," "flamethrower" and "baby"? Neither do I. It's doubtful my brain can envision a number that large.

Scribblenauts [ESRB via NeoGAF - thanks, Alphahawk!]

According to Japan's Nikkei newspaper, pre-orders for Dragon Quest IX Hoshizora no Mamoribito have topped 2 million. That would most certainly make the Level 5 developed RPG the bestselling game in Japan for the week, on par with the 3 million or so copies of Dragon Quest VIII shipped during that game's release week, eventually going on to sell more than 4.88 million copies.

We'll wait for actual sales numbers before weighing in on DQ IX's success or mega-success on a new platform.

With some 26 million-plus Nintendo DS systems already sold in Japan, the game will have no trouble finding an audience. We expect long lines and an additional hardware boost for the DS Lite and DSi overseas.

New 'Dragon Quest' May Test Square Enix's Staying Power [Nikkei (subscription required) via Andriasang]

C.O.P. The Recruit is all about a petty criminal who becomes a one man episode of Miami Vice set in New York City. Rather than using the DS to capture the city in a bird's eye view the way that Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars does, The Recruit renders New York in 3D open world on the upper screen and uses the lower screen for inventory, maps and objective details. So while the game might resemble parts and concepts of other games and TV crime procedural shows, it really is a fresh take on DS gaming.

What Is It?
C.O.P. The Recruit is an open world shooter/adventure game with 60 some-odd missions and six square miles of city to explore. Like GTA games on consoles, the game is made up of three primary parts: shooting, driving and the occasional mini game. Right now, I'm told the ratio in The Recruit is 30-50-20.

What We Saw
I played through a couple of early main story missions. Then I watched the developer jump to a later mission to show off the "catching up" cut scene feature where the game splices together pieces of cut scenes and text to explain what you're supposed to be doing.

How Far Along Is It?
The Recruit is due out this fall.

What Needs Improvement?
Too Much Driving: Your character can commandeer pretty much any car in the whole game by standing in front of it to make it stop and then pressing one of the face buttons. This is fun for the first five minutes of driving across town to a mission, but it rapidly becomes un-fun when you spend all your time bumping into other cars or trying to navigate around Central Park. At times, The Recruit feels more like a driving sim than an open world crime adventure game.

What Should Stay The Same?
Nice Shooting Controls: Tapping your weapon with the stylus (or poke it with your fingernail) in the lower screen snaps the upper screen's third-person view into an over-the-shoulder view so you can shoot people. Basic movement still gets done with the D-pad as with the rest of the game, but to adjust aim or turn left, right, up, or down, you have to drag the stylus along the lower screen – which feels more intuitive than it sounds. To fire the weapon, you can double tap the lower screen or squeeze the left shoulder button.

Impressive Scope: There is so much to do in this game. Besides the 60 missions, there are five different times of day you can view the city in (depending on which missions you're playing) and the city itself is so big for a DS game. Even if the driving gets a bit monotonous, it seems like the variations in missions will make up for the dull bits – and you can always commandeer boats when you get sick of cars. In the 20 minutes I spent plowing through the early part of the game, I could be doing anything from shooting criminals to putting out fires (because apparently the NYC Fire Department is always late) and the lone mini game I played where you had to pick out a redhead on a series of security cameras certainly felt like a nice change of pace.

Final Thoughts
This game is invariably going to be compared to Grand Theft Auto and I think what The Recruit lacks in hookers, it hopes to make up for with its story. Twenty minutes really wasn't enough time to get a feel for the story, but if it's even half as solid as the shooting gameplay seems to be, I'm optimistic.

The game is still turn-based and there's still a lot of strategy involved. But this adorable DS game is more of a puzzle game than an RPG, even if it does have the anime cut scenes and party stat balancing. Secret of Mana fans and Puzzle Quest-ers alike will definitely want to take a look.

What Is It?
Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes is a puzzle RPG where players build up an army of various units to take into battle. Combat is all about forming lines of like-colored units – horizontal for defense and vertical for attacks – and trying to do as much damage to your opponent's hit point gauge before he wrecks yours by shooting attacks through or over lines of defense.

What We Saw
Games writers got a crash course of the tutorial levels and a glimpse at one of the more complex battles (which can last up to 30 minutes, it sounds like). Later I was able to sit down with the entire tutorial section and two early quests, one story and one optional.

How Far Along Is It?
The game is due out this fall.

What Needs Improvement?
No Quicksave Option: I realize that the DS can go into hibernate mode just by closing the lid, but I'd really like a quicksave option for the middle of boss fights. You know, just in case I'm tempted to rage quit or enter a hospital's intensive care unit where the doctors will get uppity with you for not turning your handheld devices completely off.

What Should Stay The Same?
Easy-to-Learn, Difficult-to-Master: Based on the pace of the tutorial and first missions, I'm pretty sure most players won't have trouble picking up the game's controls. However, based on the sheer number of units you can accumulate (way more than can actually be deployed in battle at one time) and the fact that there's local multiplayer versus, I think this is going to be a tough game to truly master. Exactly the kind of thing you'd look for in any game, even a handheld.

Final Thoughts
I really liked this game both because the puzzle combat was solid and because the 2D sprite and anime cut scenes were so cute. It reminded me of Secret of Mana, Puzzle Quest and the anime Record of Lodoss War all at once – and at the same time, Clash of Heroes felt like a totally unique experience. Very impressive.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars' 18-and-up rating isn't anything new for the series. The Japanese software ratings board CERO shows all GTA titles as Z-rated, including the two PSP entries in the series. But no other DS game has managed to secure that behind-the-counter letter rating.

Perhaps that's why Cyberfront, not Capcom, is publishing Chinatown Wars in Japan. Typically, the Japanese distribution of Grand Theft Auto games is handled by Capcom, often to success. But for Chinatown Wars, the publisher of the PC version of Grand Theft Auto IV will be taking the reins.

Maybe Capcom was turned off by the atypically moderate sales of Chinatown Wars in the face of releasing a Z-rated Nintendo DS game. We'll see if this is indicative of a trend when the PSP version of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars is released for the PSP in the country.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars Will Be The First "Z" Rated DS Game [Siliconera]

According to a new trailer for the game, which can be seen here, Infinite Space will grace these shores in Spring of 2010. Yes, that seems like a long way off, especially if you are chomping at the bit to customize your space ship and have spacey adventures interspersed with animated cut scenes.

Fret not, impatient gamers, because it looks like the game will be worth it, if reviews and sales of the Japanese version of Infinite Space are any indication. Besides, you don't want it to come out this fall or holiday season, only to get crushed by the weight of a crowded Q4, do you?

You have until next Tuesday to rack up the required "coins" to ensure you're of Gold or Platinum membership caliber. Doing so will net you some cool, undisclosed Nintendo related thing that you can possess, look at, and have others covet. Those coins can be acquired by registering Nintendo games and answering surveys, a small price to pay for material ownership of some thing—which could very well be a cool thing.

Accumulated coins will still be available to spend on Nintendo-themed tchotchkes, but your status will be reset next week. Don't be left in the cold! Join me in being PLATINUM.

And thanks to everyone who reminded us to remind you.

Club Nintendo

Above is a shop in Den-Den Town, Osaka's version of Akihabara. It's opening early at 8:00am — which of course isn't midnight.

In Japan, Dragon Quest IX goes on sale Saturday, July 11th. Expect lines. Long ones.

ドラゴンクエストIX発売日は8:00オープン まだ予約もできる [Ota Road]

Flying airships? Check. Dungeon battles? Check. Plucky young spike-haired anime characters going on a globe-trotting adventure, fighting dragons, wyverns and other unimaginable evils? Check please! Nostalgia's game development pedigree is rock solid and looks to not rock the boat with any of its RPG conventions, perhaps with the exception that's it's set on Earth, spanning real world locations that include New York, London, and Cairo.

The first trailer for Nostalgia is dramatic and cut scene filled. Interested?

RPG Dream Team Delivers Steampunk Nostalgia To The DS [Kotaku]

The newest issue of Famitsu teases Tingle's return, offering little more than an elfin sprite, the text "Fairy?" in Japanese, Nintendo of Japan's official URL and a platform—the Nintendo DS. Tingle's already been given star treatment in two DS games, Freshly-Picked Tingle's Rosy Rupeeland and Tingle's Balloon Fight DS, the latter a Club Nintendo of Japan exclusive.

A new Tingle game may seem like the perfect fit on Nintendo's downloadable DSiWare service, but this teaser appears to be for a full-fledged title. Perhaps this one will come to America. Even if it doesn't, we're likely to see this haunting scenario played out once again.

Nothing on the official Nintendo site yet, but perhaps when the mag hits newsstands later this week, we'll know more.

According to a report from CNBC, Iwata says that Nintendo had another handheld gaming system in the works as recently as three years ago. What that platform would have been, which market it would have targeted and what kinds of games it would play, Iwata didn't say.

What he did say, or at least indicate, was that platform that would coexist with the Nintendo DS and Wii wouldn't do much for the company's "momentum."

"But when we are launching new hardware, the most important is thing is to sustain the momentum," Iwata said. "If introducing new hardware won't do anything to do that, well…" Well, what?!

Could it have been the ill-conceived dual-DS card version of the Nintendo DS? Or could it have been something more interesting, another entry in the Game Boy family? Only Iwata knows!

Nintendo President: 'We Have Scuttled New Hardware' [CNBC via Dtoid]

Nintendo has penciled in a few of its releases for this year, but some, like Golden Sun DS won't be out until 2010. Some, like Picross 3D and WarioWare D.I.Y. are still "TBD," even though both are already available in Japan. Some are already out, like The Legendary Starfy.

All are after this.

First, just the Nintendo stuff.

Nintendo DS

• The Legendary Starfy - June 7, 2009
• Fossil Fighters - Aug. 10, 2009
• Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box - Aug. 24, 2009
• Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story - Fall 2009
• Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky - Fall 2009
• Style Savvy - Holiday 2009
• The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks - Holiday 2009
• Glory of Heracles - 2010
• Golden Sun DS - 2010
• WarioWare D.I.Y. - TBD
• Picross 3D - TBD

DSiWare

• Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again! - June 8, 2009
• Flipnote Studio - Summer 2009
• Crash-Course Domo - TBD
• Hard-Hat Domo - TBD
• Mario Calculator TBD
• Mario Clock TBD
• Pro-Putt Domo TBD
• Rock-n-Roll Domo TBD
• Six in One Translator (working title) - TBD
• White-Water Domo - TBD

Now... everything!!

That may be due to the game actually being the fifth entry in the Hercules no Eiko series, which originated on Nintendo's Famicom. This will be the first internationally released entry. So, Nintendo's E3 2009 demo for Glory of Heracles, developed by Paon, feels very much tuned to the new player, describing very clearly how to interact with townsfolk, the benefits of visiting shops to buy weapons and upgrades, and exactly how an epic role-playing game is supposed to be played.

Glory of Heracles follows JRPG conventions closely, offering up a familiar turn-based interaction complete with attacks, magic, skills, escape and more. There's also a running list of stats that fills the DS's bottom touchscreen, one filled with helpful explanations for the RPG noob.

Graphically, Glory of Heracles is... a little on the rough side. A blend of 3D environments with scaling 2D sprites, it looks good in battles, thanks to colorful characters, but less attractive when exploring towns.

The E3 demo was light on story, but official word from Nintendo notes that Glory of Heracles features a Greek motif. The standard hero "washes up on a beach with amnesia" convention leads into the unraveling of the "mysterious pasts" of the game's cast of characters. You know, the kind of story line that will train you on how RPG stories work.

Glory of Heracles uses the Nintendo DS's touchscreen for something a little more interesting, a quick mini-game one can play when spells are cast to increase their effectiveness.

You can see the DS game in action in our gallery below to see if you're looking forward to its 2010 release.

Tap the touchscreen and your character will jog to the location of your choice. Or, use the cross pad.

The rest is a hands-off demonstration that showcases how good Golden Sun's transition to the Nintendo DS and into the third-dimension looks. Golden Sun DS on the E3 showfloor is essentially a series of elemental summons, showing off a half-dozen or so dual-screen filling beasts and deities raining damage down upon foes.

The Djinn system that made the first two Golden Sun games so replayable is back. As we watched battles unfold, a collection of Djinni danced about the top screen. On the bottom, our AI controlled trio of heroes did battle.

Golden Sun DS looks to include some familiar summons. Extended cinematic attacks from Atalanta and Ramses looked sharp. Some of those summons look have been given a redesign, as I'm not sure if one was supposed to be Tiamat or Procne. But these summons illustrate how pretty the DS iteration look, so they were highlighted prominently.

Visually, the game looks lush, as the demo panned across a series of environments, showing off bright foliage and rocky mountain passes. Fans of the visual style of the GBA version will appreciate what Camelot Software Planning has done with the 3D design.

Golden Sun DS is out sometime next year.

There are core-focused games like Sin and Punishment 2 and Military Madness: Nectaris for the Wii. There's also The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks and Picross 3D for the Nintendo DS. These are all things I want to play!!

Nintendo even has Golden Sun DS playable, apparently, as well as the Animal Crossing Calculator. We're going to play—and write up impressions on—almost everything on the list. And I'm definitely going to make that Animal Crossing Calculator read '80085' at some point and giggle.

For the full list, read on.

Wii:

• New Super Mario Bros. Wii
• Wii Fit Plus
• Wii Sports Resort
• Sin and Punishment 2
• Endless Ocean 2
• Line Attack Heroes
• Span Smasher

WiiWare:

• PictureBook Games: Pop-Up Pursuit
• You, Me & the Cubes
• Final Fantasy IV: The After Years
• BIT.TRIP.CORE
• Icarian: Kindred Spirits
• Sword & Soldiers
• Military Madness: Nectaris
• Cave Story

Nintendo DS:

• The Legendary Starfy
• The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks
• Fossil Fighters
• Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box
• Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story
• Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky
• Style Savvy
• Glory of Heracles
• Golden Sun DS
• Picross 3D

Nintendo DSiWare:

• Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Minis March Again!
• Flipnote Studio
• Animal Crossing Clock
• Animal Crossing Calculator
• Photo Clock
• Mario Clock
• Mario Calculator
• Six in One Translator (working title)
• Crash-Course Domo
• White-Water Domo
• Hard-Hat Domo
• Rock-n-Roll Domo
• Pro-Putt Domo

Released in Japan this April as Made In Ore, the game is outfitted with tools so that players can make their own mini-games and upload them for others to play. Check out Smash Bros. creator Masahiro Sakurai trying his expert hand at the title.

What we don't know is the game's release date. What we do know? When released, expect ding-dongs.

Golden Sun DS, according to Nintendo of America, follows the story of previous Golden Sun heroes' descendants and "immerses players into the magic of its adventure by pushing the boundaries of intuitive touch-screen controls." Visually, it looks like the transition from 2D to 3D was actually a relatively unbumpy one, not the easiest thing in the world to do. Then again, I wasn't completely in love with the visual treatment for the Game Boy Advance entries, so maybe we'll just consider it a wash.

Anyway! There's a new Golden Sun coming to the Nintendo DS in 2010 and that's our silver lining. Or golden lining. Whatever! Watch the debut trailer again.

The "inside" in the game's title is quite literal, as you'll travel through the guts of Mario and Luigi arch-nemesis Bowser in an effort to save the Mushroom Kingdom. Apparently, after being tricked into eating a magic mushroom, Bowser inhales everything around him, including the titular Mario and Luigi. Then, hilarity ensues.

The series' trademark timed button pressing action expands with the capabilities of the DS hardware, as players will have to turn the portable on its side to fight some battles, blowing into the microphone and tapping the touchscreen to save Princess Peach.

Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story is due this Fall for the Nintendo DS.

That could mean that we'll hear more about Nintendo's plans for a Super Mario Bros. game for the Wii, see the reveal of the new Wii Fit Plus, and almost definitely hear more about The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks and Sin & Punishment 2. More than likely, you'll have Wii MotionPlus shoved right into your face, as Nintendo's Satoru Iwata, Reggie Fils-Aime and Cammie Dunaway wow us with stats, game reveals and amusing anecdotes.

We'll know soon enough, as Nintendo's E3 press conference begins at 9 AM PST sharpish.

Our Kotaku buddies are at the Nokia Live theater, liveblogging their little hearts out to give you up to the minute updates. Read on for those updates.

A very official looking trailer for Aliens: Colonial Marines DS, one that requires a great deal of squinting, was uploaded to YouTube recently, giving us our first look at the unannounced game. Attached are developers Gearbox and WayForward Technologies, the latter responsible for Shantae, LIT and Contra 4.

Music aside, the trailer looks spectacular, a very capable 2D side-scrolling shooter that's packed full of what you'd want from an Aliens game: chest-bursters ripping through sternums and waves of aliens being turned into acid salsa.

While we'd normally be suspicious about a randomly uploaded trailer for a game we'd not heard a peep about, the trailer appears legit. WayForward employees write on their personal web sites about an unannounced "action game on DS" that's "based on one of the best licenses imagineable [sic]," calling it "WayForward's spiritual follow-up to Contra 4."

We're checking in with Sega and WayForward to see what's up and hope that the "shelved due to money issues at Sega" description is inaccurate.

Yes, Nintendo of America executive vice president of Sales & Marketing Cammie Dunaway will be there. Also appearing will be Nintendo president Satoru Iwata and Reggie Fils-Aime, the company announced today. The three amigos of Nintendo's E3 keynote will be handling all new Wii and Nintendo DS announcements at this year's E3 expo, delivering a fresh batch of promises and an update on Nintendo's smiles per faces tie ratio.

Since this one's "about the games," expect more focus on promised Mario and Zelda titles, less onstage demonstrations of Personal Trainer Walking. No mention of a Wii Music jam session, but we can always hope.

The action kicks off June 2nd at 9 A.M. Pacific Time. Nintendo fans in Mario outfits bearing supportive signage can begin loitering at the Nokia Plaza in downtown Los Angeles at 7 A.M. if they'd like to be photographed.

The online retailer is showing Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box as arriving on these shores on August 24th. Call that unconfirmed, because Nintendo of America has yet to announce the game for a release, let alone dating the thing. But Amazon's listing notes the next Layton title will have "tons of in-game puzzles of different types and difficulties" and "three times the voiced dialogue and movies of its predecessor," which would seem like they know what they're talking about.

The Japanese version, known as Layton Kyouju to Akuma no Hako, shipped in November of 2007 to solid sales. A third game in the series, Layton Kyouju to Saigo no Jikan Ryokou, was released for the Nintendo DS in Japan late last year.

If Amazon's listing is accurate, that's good news for fans of the series.

Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box [Amazon via GoNintendo]

The two titles both appear to be third-person perspective action games highlighting battles from the Star Wars universe, shrunk down to fit on the competing platforms' LCD screens. Perhaps these two games the younger siblings of Free Radical's aborted Star Wars Battlefront III, which, concept art and leaked trailers aside, appears to be no more than a bluish apparition of a game.

We've contacted LucasArts to see what's up with the two new Battlefront games and would expect to hear more about the titles at E3. Official descriptions and ratings after this.

Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron
Platform: PSP
Rating: Teen
Content descriptors: Fantasy Violence
Rating summary: "This is an action game in which players experience different battles from the Star Wars universe. Presented in a third-person perspective, the game allows players to engage in space, land, and air battles or build troops and upgrade armies in a strategy-based mode. Players can use laser guns (i.e., blasters), explosives, and lightsabers to destroy enemy robots (i.e., droids) and humans who often cry out in pain when attacked. During one dramatic cutscene sequence, an unarmed man is sliced by a lightsaber, while another character is shot in the back with a blaster."

Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron
Platform: Nintendo DS
Rating: Everyone 10+
Content descriptors: Fantasy Violence
Rating summary: " Star Wars Battlefront: Elite Squadron is an action adventure game in which players experience different battles from the Star Wars universe. From a third-person perspective, players engage in space battles, 'speeder bike' chases, and top-down battling. The ground battle includes constant laserfire combined with hand-to-hand combat using 'lightsabers.' A depleting health bar and various "yelps" indicate damage inflicted upon certain characters."

Sega has announced that Jambo! Safari, a port of the 1999 arcade title, will be coming to the Wii later this year with "modern graphics and deeper gameplay, suited to today's Nintendo consumers." Staying true to the arcade original, players can choose one of four safari rangers and a small fleet of vehicles to catch and photograph African wildlife. It will arrive as Jambo! Safari Ranger Adventure, adding required-by-Wii-law mini-games including "Ostrich Racing" and "Meerkat Madness."

Trust me, it's far more fun than I'm making it out here, akin to similar Sega arcade titles released at the time like Crazy Taxi and 18 Wheeler: American Pro Trucker.

Also potentially exciting is an announced Nintendo DS version of Jambo! Safari, dubbed Jambo! Safari Animal Rescue. Details and media are still scarce.

According to NPD Group data from Gamasutra, the Nintendo DS title from Rockstar Games managed to move another 74,000 copies in the United States. A drop from the 89,000 copies sold in its first month on the market, but not a dramatic one. But Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars NPD per day (NPD-PD) sales tell a slightly different story.

Chinatown Wars was only on sale for 19 days in March, giving us an average of 4,684 copies sold per day.

In April, the DS game had 28 days to shine, according to the NPD Group's reporting period. That's an average of 2,642 copies per day. That drop is more considerable.

That decrease may be made more dramatic by the increase in Nintendo DS hardware sold during the month. With the introduction of the Nintendo DSi, the portable dual-screen platform sold through almost twice as many units in the United States on a month to month basis.

With 827,000 new Nintendo DSi owners on the market, one might think fans of committing touchscreen crimes would be holding out for bigger screens to play their Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars on. But it appears they'd rather play New Super Mario Bros. instead.

NPD: GTA: Chinatown Wars Continues Steady Sales In 2nd Month [Gamasutra]

Either Ms. Michaels was unhappy with the results of Wii owners living up to her 2009 ultimatum, or publisher Majesco is looking to profit further from slovenly Wii Balance Board owners. The first Jillian Michaels Wii game went on to move more than 600,000 units, so I'm simply guessing it's the latter.

Majesco CEO Jess Sutton says, via press release, that the DS version is being created in order to "keep up with today's on-the-go lifestyles." Hey, I have an "on-the-go" lifestyle! Maybe this is for me!

New to the 2010 ultimatum is are new workout modes, including the six-month long "Fitness Resolution" feature and "Exercise with Jillian," giving you one-on-one time with the titular trainer. Majesco also promises improved motion tracking, but does not promise Michaels-esque washboard abs.

Jillian Michaels' Fitness Ultimatum 2010 will have to compete with both Wii Fit and EA Sports Active for fitness dollars when the game is released this Fall.

Guess I'll just have to play it twice as long to make up for it. I totally dig puzzle games that put a twist on the classic Dr. Mario drop-down virus-related puzzle games. Pack in a swine flu-repelling surgical mask, NIS America, and you're bound to sell millions.

Look for Puchi Puchi Virus to hit the Nintendo DS in late May and check out the screens in the gallery below.

Chinatown War [deviantArt via Tiny Cartridge]

Now, we're not implying that only mom should be slaving over a hot stove all day, especially on Mother's Day. But that DS Lite carrying case? No man should be seen with that flowery shell in his proximity, unless it's being held aloft like a rodent carcass, in pursuit of its proper owner.

And the DS package is being described by retailers as the "Mother's Day Bundle," so I'd think we're right in feminizing this particular hardware option.

Best Buy of Canada is currently listing the bundle at $159.99 Canadian (obviously!), but we understand it will be priced the same when it ships to the United States.

We're checking with Nintendo of America to see if that is indeed the case.

Nintendo DS Mother's Day Bundle [Best Buy - thanks, Kevin!]

Long, drawn out decisions have never been my strong point, particularly when it comes to the more trivial. Being a Platinum Club Nintendo member has its privileges (mysterious annual gifts!) but it also forces one to decide—should I get the Nintendo-themed hanafuda cards? I really have no idea how to play a game of koi-koi or hachi-hachi. I'm unlikely to be willing to learn.

Should I reward myself with the Game & Watch Collection for the Nintendo DS? It's possible I'll play that less than the hanafuda card set.

Perhaps I'm overlooking the best that Club Nintendo has to offer. Maybe that silver Nintendo DS card case is the greatest thing since sliced bread.

So I'm leaving the decision up to the clearly opinionated Kotaku commenter crowd. Of all the things one can acquire with 1000 coins, what should I get? Who has already redeemed coins for prizes? Should I hold off, hoping desperately that Nintendo will release Wii Remotes or GameCube controllers in a Wario color scheme?

Bah! I give up. Help!

Games are no stranger to schools, of course. Think back to the 80s when at least 30 minutes of every school day was given over to drowning your wagon in Oregon Trail in the name of History class, or letting your SimCity fall to ruin through crime and tornadoes on behalf of Social Studies. From the first school-sanctioned games like these to the full-blown edutainment of today, it's safe to say educators are aware of the learning potential in video games.

But taking a step further and actually developing a curriculum around the Nintendo DS takes innovation – and money. After all, there's only so far math drills can really take you whether you're on a PC or DS and money for education systems still doesn't grow on trees.

Leading the charge toward a Nintenducation in the UK is Scotland. Their Centre for Games and Learning (aka The Consolarium) is an extension of the Scottish Government Schools Directorate that presents teachers and education administrators with ideas for implementing all kinds of gaming consoles into schools.

Derek Robertson, National Adviser for Emerging Technologies and Learning and administrator of the Consolarium, says that the use of the DS in schools is now commonplace, compared to when he first introduced the consoles to schools in 2006. "Initially I purchased 30 [Nintendo DS consoles] and carried out my first Dr. Kawashima [aka Brain Age] trial. The extended trial saw us handing out over 450 consoles to support our project."

The Consolarium encourages schools to the use the DS for more than just math drills and brain training puzzles. "We suggest that schools follow [the Brain Age] methodology although they are free to trial other approaches," said Robertson. "Our main approach is not to prescribe a series of lesson plans but to suggest how the game, be it Nintendogs or Hotel Dusk, can be used as the contextual hub about which learning in a variety of curricular links can grow from."

Translation: students get to play Hotel Dusk. In class.

This application of the DS to schools marks a paradigm shift in the relationship between games and education. In the old days (by which I mean the 80s and early 90s), Oregon Trail and SimCity were phased out in favor of more learning-specific software like Math Blaster. There's nothing wrong with dressing up multiplication tables in interactive software, of course. But it did limit learning opportunities to whatever the game was programmed to do and it put teachers in a hands-off role.

With games like Nintendogs, teachers get to be creative, designing lesson plans around what happens in the game. For example, teachers in two Scottish schools used the virtual pet sim back in 2008 as a way to tempt kids into reading up on the first dog in space. Students also wrote stories about their Nintendog and competed with their classmates in the in-game competitions for real life prizes from the teacher. This year, another Scottish teacher has used the Nintendogs initiative to launch an art project where students tried to use what they saw in the game to influence the dogs that they drew or painted in real life.

Although the success of these programs is hard to measure (aside from teacher, parent and student testimony), something clearly seems to be working for Nintenducation. Robertson said Scottish schools are starting to shell out for their own consoles because they've seen results from the Consolarium's initiative. One school even received a donation offer within the last two months for 2500 DS consoles.

Meanwhile, in England, the Consolarium's ideas are starting to catch on. Dawn Hollybone is a teacher at Oakdale Junior School in London where students aged 7-11 are getting their hands on both Brain Age and Professor Layton to further their education.

"We use the consoles for 20 minutes a day," she said. "Each year group has a session timetable per day and then I ask that they use it at least three times a week. The use of these is planned into each individual lesson, [so if it's] part of a maths session, then it may be used as a mental starter to warm up… or as part of a Literacy lesson, the class may use the reading aloud programme or syllable counter."

Additionally, Hollybone also uses PictoChat as a way to bulk up writing exercises by having students write to one another and collaborate on projects.

"In this way they are not merely 'just' playing the games they are used as a way into a lesson or as a plenary," Hollybone said.

It all looks incredibly awesome (or maybe we're blinded by jealousy); but there are some concerns that critics have raised over DS usage in schools. There's the obvious "games don't teach kids" arguments we're used to hearing from the Oregon Trail days; but there's also a valid concern about the cost of putting a DS in the hands of every school child. Not all school systems are as small Scotland's or Japan's – and here in the US, the cost of public education through taxes barely covers school lunches, never mind a $100+ console plus $30 games.

"I suppose costs are a barrier but if that's all we have to worry about, then great," said Robertson. He said he's more concerned about getting the message out to critics of the methodology itself that games are good learning tools, not some subversive pop culture enemy. "There is still a worry over the media's general propensity to perpetuate the moral panic argument or for the impact to be lost in an intellectual debate, but I feel as though we have managed to change attitudes… and are helping to change attitudes beyond our [borders]."

Japan seems to have their back at least — in Kyoto Prefecture (Nintendo's home base), Nintenducation is still going strong in Yawata City after being introduced about three years ago. Last month in neighboring Osaka Prefecture, there were reports that the Osaka Board of Education approved a measure that would allow 10 middle and elementary schools in the area to incorporate the DS into the classroom experience.

So what can we expect for the US schools? Nintendo couldn't be reached for comment on this feature, but we did get in touch a middle school history teach and a DS-fluent parent to get their take.

Caitlin Ferguson is a 9th Grade Geography teacher at Port of Los Angeles High School in California. She herself doesn't own a DS, but having seen it in the hands of some of her friends, she's vaguely aware of its educational potential. But in a school system where High School students already have regular access to computers, she thinks a Nintendo DS might be overkill.

"They're lackadaisical as it is," she said. "If they're getting the work done… I could see using it as an enrichment tool, rather than a curriculum tool." An example of that would be letting students play Brain Age only after they'd completed their regular math assignment – instead of before.

Ferguson did acknowledge that teachers could take Nintenducation a step further if the school passed out DS consoles to students. For example, she suggested that a Life Skills class could assign students an exercise where they compare Cooking Mama recipes with real-life cooking recipes and pick out all the differences.

Ultimately, though, Ferguson's concern about putting the DS in schools is that it will be a barrier between teacher and student. "There's so much interaction [that happens] between teacher and student," she said. "It can't be replaced by a DS. Neither can the work."

Ferguson's concerns about the line between work and play are echoed by parent Julia Temple. Her son is in 3rd grade at St. Paul's Episcopal School in California and for the money she pays, she doesn't want him playing games instead of traditional learning.

"I wouldn't be happy if they gave [students] DSs at school," Temple said. "I could see that maybe it would engage children… it could make for a positive experience." But to her, the DS is a toy used for having fun, not for learning; she thinks the time a student spends gaming would be better spent with a book.

Temple said she was alright with students learning on computers, though, because she sees them as a part of everyday life that students have to learn eventually. "The DS is very limited," she said. "You can do more on a computer."

But, like the critics, Temple's biggest concern is cost: "Ultimately, I don't think they should have DSs in school because we have so many other things we could be spending money on."

We may not see Nintenducation in the US anytime soon because of the economy. But if Japan and the United Kingdom show consistent promise with their DS programs, it may be only a matter of money and not of principle that keeps the consoles out of school. Like they say, knowledge is power - and like Nintendo used to tell us back in the 80s: "Now you're playing with power."

According to a report from Silicon Alley Insider, there's a very good reason that Chinatown Wars didn't crack the top ten. While analyst estimates on first month sales ranged from a conservative 200,000 to a more hopeful 450,000, actual sales look to have come in under 90,000. With almost three weeks worth of sales accounted for, that's not what we'd call encouraging.

When compared to the most recent release, Grand Theft Auto IV, it's downright dismal. GTA IV moved over 2.8 million copies in its first month, when the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 game launched last April.

We'd say that doesn't bode well for Mature-rated games on Nintendo's portable platform.

According to SIA, Take-Two sounds hopeful that Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars will continue to sell, pointing out that March was not a stellar month for the industry.

Take-Two's 'Grand Theft Auto Chinatown Wars' Bellyflops [Silicon Alley Insider]

The Xbox 360 version of the survival horror adventure walked away with the number one spot, moving 938,000 copies to U.S. consumers. Its PlayStation 3 counterpart moved 585,000, giving Sony's current generation platform three titles in the top ten, including MLB 09: The Show and Killzone 2. The latter of those saw sales close to that of its debut month, moving another 296,000 copies in March. Sony announced earlier today that Killzone 2 has sold 1 million copies worldwide since launch.

Chart regulars Wii Play and Mario Kart Wii combined for another half million in sales, with 2K Sports' MLB game rounding out the top ten. Missing from the top ten is Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, which looks to have sold on par with EEDAR's estimate of 200,000 copies or less. Guess we'll go with "risk" on that.

The top ten bestselling games in the U.S. for the month of March, according to the NPD Group are...

01. Resident Evil 5 (X360) - 938,000
02. Pokemon Platinum (DS) - 805,000
03. Halo Wars (X360) - 639,000
04. Resident Evil 5 (PS3) - 585,000
05. Wii Fit (Wii) - 541,000
06. MLB 09: The Show (PS3) - 305,000
07. Killzone 2 (PS3) - 296,000
08. Wii Play (Wii) - 281,000
09. Mario Kart Wii (Wii) - 278,000
10. MLB 2K9 (X360) - 205,000

Video game software sold to the tune of $792.83 million in March, a 17% drop year over year. That puts annual industry sales at $2.21 billion, which would indicate a drop in total revenue for the year.

And that's not too good.

Nintendo's Wii and DS platforms held strong as the best and second-best selling hardware in March, moving a combined 1.16 million-plus units last month. That's a drop from March 2008, when Nintendo hardware racked up 1.42 million in total Wii and DS sales, boosted by the release of Super Smash Bros. Brawl, which shifted 2.7 million copies that month.

Hardware sales were down across the board for Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft, month-to-month. Year-over-year, however, the Xbox 360 actually saw an uptick in sales, moving 330,000 consoles last month as opposed to 262,000 during March of last year.

Here's how the U.S. console war went down in March, with the NPD Group reporting sales from 3/1/09 to 4/4/09.

• Wii - 601,000
• Nintendo DS - 563,000
• Xbox 360 - 330,000
• PlayStation 3 - 218,000
• PSP - 168,000
• PlayStation 2 - 112,000

NPD analyst Anita Frazier commented on the down month.

"If there was one area that surprised me this month, it was hardware sales," Frazier said. "While it's not unusual for March hardware sales to be lower than February, I thought we'd see higher unit sales on most platforms. The Xbox 360 was the only platform to achieve a year-over-year unit sales increase."

She also adds that the PlayStation 2, which saw a price drop on April 1 in the United States, should be reflected in April's sales.

"The PS2 price decrease occurred on April 1, so this month included only 4 days of sales as the new retail price. We would expect to see an increase in PS2 hardware sell-through in the April data."

Revenge of the Fallen will be on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC, Wii, PlayStation 2, Nintendo DS and PSP in various gameplay formats. I'm sure they would have put it on dishwashers, if they could have — but I do wonder why there's no iPhone version.

Game details are scarce (at least until a certain embargo lifts tomorrow), but you can get an idea of what to expect from the screenshots and concept art in the site's media section: giant robots, big levels, explosions – the good stuff.

One thing you won't see on the site, though, is Shia LaBeouf. I count that as a win, though I suppose he will be in the game because he is in the movie. But from now until the time Activision releases more details on the game and possibly more movie-tinged plot hints, I can pretend Optimus Prime steps on him in the first five minutes of the film.

Check it out here.

That's because two analysts who follow the video game market, Wedbush Morgan's Michael Pachter and EEDAR's Jesse Divnich, have wildly different estimates of the DS game's performance in March. While Pachter pegs sales at about 450,000 for Chinatown Wars, Divnich estimates they'll come in at less than half of that, with just 200,000 copies sold in the United States.

Yes, I know. Analysts.

But Divnich, based on his low ball prediction, says that his findings indicate "elevated risk" for publishers who are thinking about bringing more mature, more violent fare to the generally family friendly Nintendo platform.

We haven't seen Pachter's comments on Chinatown Wars' sales, but would expect they're more positive than the warning that his peer at EEDAR released to investors. We'll know for sure this Thursday who's right, when the NPD Group releases its findings. Then the victor will be forced to eat the heart of his analyzing enemy.

EEDAR: Chinatown Wars Performance Proves Mature DS Games 'Risky' [Gamasutra]
Analysts Disagree Widely About ‘GTA: Chinatown Wars' Sales [MTV Multiplayer]

The Nintendo DS game is planned to hit these shores on June 8th, giving us a chance to go on a "spectacular undersea adventure," Starfy style! Nintendo has released new screens for the English language version, screens which we've downloaded, uploaded, then gazed at and told them how adorable they are.

The Journal is referring, of course, to the most recent sales data from Japan, courtesy of sales trackers Enterbrain and Media Create, who show that Sony's PlayStation 3 has started to gain some ground against the Wii, where the contest between the Nintendo DS and PSP is a little more even.

While Sony's monthly domination of Nintendo on the console front may be temporary, video game sales declined in Japan some 18% last year, in contrast to another year of growth for the industry in the United States. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata chalks that up to a weaker market. And it's up to Nintendo to do something about it.

"The Japanese market is not very strong right now overall," Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said in an interview with the publication, presumably while wearing an energizing leather blazer. "So we need to do something to re-energize it."

As the Journal points out, sales trends in Japan often, but not always, foretell similar trends in the West, a market that Nintendo is still seeing massive success competing in.

Third parties like EA, however, may be betting on the Wii's success to continue, as it plans to ramp up development for Nintendo's console.

Nintendo's efforts, like the launch of the Nintendo DSi, DSiWare, the new Wii MotionPlus peripheral and a planned video download service, may be part of what the company has planned as part of an industry recharge. The company hopes to have something you're interested in to show at E3 this year, so maybe that'll do the trick.

Nintendo Loses Some of Its Luster [WSJ]

Iwata tells the Wall Street Journal that the advertising-based video service—currently announced for availability in Japan this year, but reportedly coming to other territories "later"—may go portable. He also hints that the video service, born of a partnership with Japanese ad agency Dentsu, will be different "in a Nintendo-like way."

"If the Wii and the DS are connected, it should be possible to download video through the Wii and take it with you on the DS," Iwata tells the Journal. The Wii already allows DS owners to download game demos via the internet.

"When the service begins, you'll see how we're going to do it differently in a Nintendo-like way," he adds. "There are a lot of on-demand video services, so there's no reason to do the same thing, so we're going to do something different. We'll start the service in Japan, and if it does well, we'd like to take it overseas."

Iwata also tells the Wall Street Journal one of his goals for the Wii is to make the console "something that people will turn on even if they don't have a purpose in mind."

"We're not there yet though, and there are a lot of things we have to do to achieve that," Iwata said. We'll leave it to you to fill in the rest.

Q&A With Nintendo's President [WSJ]

The collection of more than 50 music mini-games is surprisingly deep for a title that relies on two touchscreen mechanics: tapping and flicking. (Okay, there is a tiny bit of rubbing too.) While the word "mini-games" may have become a dirty word to core gamers feeling pushed aside by the tide of short session compilations flooding Nintendo platforms, Rhythm Heaven is a quirky, feel-good medley of gameplay that's simple enough for more casual fans, but challenging enough to appeal to a core sensibility.

Rhythm Heaven is already a monster hit in its native Japan. Do we think that you should "tap into the rhythm" and add to the game's multimillion sales? Or does Rhythm Heaven miss a beat?

Loved
Style: Visually, Rhythm Heaven is loaded with unquantifiable charm. The game's design plays up the strengths of the Nintendo DS hardware, keeping 3D visuals to a minimum, packing the game with cute characters and environments rendered in a simple 2D style. The game's visual variety is not unlike that of the WarioWare series, but feels more homogenized, less intentionally bizarre.

Surprising Variety: The Rhythm Heaven developers utilize the Nintendo DS touchscreen controls to a consistently refreshing degree. Despite there being little in the way of complexity to the tap and flick scheme, rarely do two games feel alike. Later games still remain novel in their design, but the rhythmic skills you'll learn throughout make previously completed games much easier. Playing through the medley remixes is a blast.

Some Really Catchy Tunes: With the exception of a handful of tracks (see below), the Rhythm Heaven soundtrack rarely offends. In fact, there are a couple of tunes that are infectious, that not only complement mini-games well, but also make previously completed game easy to return to for an attempt at improvement (or perfection).

A Lovely Addition To The DS Library: There are few games like Rhythm Heaven for the Nintendo DS. Fans of both iNiS's Osu! Tatakae!! Ouendan and Elite Beat Agents and Nintendo's WarioWare Touch will probably enjoy the smart musical gameplay most, as Rhythm Heaven has a great sense of humor and an off-kilter, but carefully crafted aesthetic.

Hated
No Restart Option: Rhythm Heaven can be surprisingly difficult, even for music game veterans. Part of that is due to occasionally vague instructions and the fact that the game doesn't do a very good job of explaining what it is you're doing wrong when you fail. The other part is that flicks sometimes don't register as the player intended. Most annoying though, especially when trying to score a "Perfect" rating, is that the game doesn't have a restart option to speed up the action. You'll have to quit the game if you screw up, then wait for the autosave, the loading screen and the practice menu to load.

Grating Vocals: There are a couple of tracks in Rhythm Heaven—Fan Club, The Dazzles and Frog Hop— that I never want to hear again. The common thread is that they all have vocal parts that are tough on the ears. The localization on the voiced parts is hilariously bad and will likely offend anyone who has played the import version.

Rhythm Heaven is easy to recommend, no matter how you classify yourself as a gamer. While the game has few design and localization quirks, the game features a level of polish that Nintendo is known for, offering a valuable package filled with enjoyable mini-games and post-completion challenges. It's delightful, addictive and can offer a serious challenge.

Embrace the mini-game!

Rhythm Heaven was developed and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS, released on April 5th in North America. Retails for $29.99. Completed all mini-games, unlocked about half of the medal games.

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