"It hit the victim in the leg, causing a large, red welt and several puncture marks," said Senior Sgt Bruce Jenkins, in the North Island town of Whakatane.

NZ man 'used hedgehog as weapon' [BBC - Ninja Girlden]

Seriously, you need to be watching Bill Gates' farewell speech at CES. I'm sure news is coming, but that picture up there, that's all you need. If you want actual news out of the speech make sure to check out Mike's Liveblogging here.

Gates Speech [Microsoft]

This is exactly what eBay auctioneer kyleselectronicsplus07 is doing at this very moment. It is made quite clear in the description that the price is for the Wii ONLY and the rest of the goodies are free bonuses. The seller seems to have a good reputation and 10% of the sale goes to Charlotte ReStore - Habitat for Humanty. Certainly an admirable cause, but could this truly be for real? And what exactly is the story behind someone willing to give up their entire life over eBay, although at that price I suppose you could afford an all new one a couple times over.

The auction has nine days to go and in news that will surprise no one, it currently has no bids. I'm going to continue watching this just to see exactly what happens with it and I'll report back on it next weekend as it gets closer to the end of the bid. Check below for the full description.

This auction is for one (1) Brand New Never Opened Nintendo Wii Console Sports Edition with 5 Games. This also includes Wii Play Bundle that comes with an extra Remote and 9 Wii Play Games. With the purchase of the Wii console, we will also throw in for free our Charlotte, North Carolina 2-story, single-family home. This house was built and purchased new in 2006 for $240,000 and is within walking distance to major attractions such as Bank of America Stadium (Carolina Panthers) & Bobcats Arena (Charlotte Bobcats). You are also only minutes away from the Charlotte Douglas International Airport, I-485, I-85, I-77, and many uptown restaurants. Everything in the house is yours if wanted, including a Brand New 46" Sony Bravia Full 1080p LCD HDTV along with all the furniture and appliances. We will personally drive and deliver this Wii with all the accessories listed once payment has been received and cleared. Once we hand you the Wii, we will also hand you the car keys and house keys to both our home in Charlotte and a 2002 BMW 330i. We will even have you(1) and up to 5 other family members or friends (for a total of 6) flown in to see the house and city and will also pay to have you moved up to Charlotte from anywhere in the continental United States. This is to be the most DELUXE and EXCLUSIVE listing for any Wii that there will ever be on eBay. If you choose, you will have nothing to do but to hop on a plane with 5 of your closest friends or family members. We'll handle all the rest for you. We will personally deliver these items to the winning bidder on the day of his/her choice, including Christmas Day, December 25, 2007.

[via Megatonik]
[Thanks, Kevin]

A while back, Japan's DS craze red lined, and it got so bad that American DSes were re-imported from America to satisfy the demand. Things quieted off, or so we thought. But even recently, consumers still line-up for DS Lites, and stores, it seems, are too! Writes Kotakuite Scott from Nagasaki:

I was just shopping at my local Yuuing (it's like Tsutaya, books, DVDs, CDs, and games) where they haven't had DS Lites for months now. When they do expect a shipment, maybe once a month or so, they place up posters to let customers know when the sales go down. But, when I went in tonight, they had about 8 units on the shelves. A closer look revealed they are not Japanese versions, but the US and Asia versions (okay, it wasn't a closer look, the big American flags were a give away).

I snapped two photos with my miserable cell phone camera of the poster in the store. You might not be able to read the small text but the general gist is there: American and Asian DS Lites, 19,800 yen (3000 more than the Japanese version), and they cannot be sold back used like most other gaming hardware and software at this store.

Tip for Nintendo, Co. Ltd., how about saving more Lites for the domestic market? Just a thought... Brian Ashcraft

Eds note: Our man in Tokyo Jean Snow brings word of just how insane getting a DS Lite is

It's absolutely ridiculous to think that a person living in Japan still has to go through the following if he wants to get his hands on a stinkin' Nintendo DS lite — that's over 2 years after the initial DS launch, and close to a year for the DS lite — but this is what I had to go through today in order to score a Crystal White Nintendo DS lite (and let it be known that I have an original DS, which I got at launch).

My wife had heard that you needed to call the stores to find out if they were getting some stock, and then rush there to wait in line, and she'd also been told by some friends that Bic Camera got their shipments in on Friday (they also sometimes get some on Mondays and Wednesdays, but Friday are for the big orders). So she called this morning, and sure enough, they had gotten a shipment, but wouldn't reveal when they would go on sale, or where they would make people line up. The wife had gone through the same thing 2 weeks ago — when she scored a pink DS lite — so she told me to head there around noon, and to try and find out what would be happening.

I got there at 12, asked some staff behind the counter in the games section (insisting I had called, because they were just about to say that they didn't know anything before that — the filthy liars), and was told that I had to "hang out" for a while, as they didn't know when they were going to go on sale. Maybe 40 minutes later, two staff with bright green Bic vests ran out from behind the counter with signs that said that DS lites were about to go on sale, and then started forming a line along the staircases (the game section at the main Bic Camera store in Ikebukuro is on the 3rd floor). I was the fifth in line — some guys got there quicker than me — and a few minutes later they started handing out tickets for the color you wanted (I was the first to ask for a Crystal White). Then, 10 minutes later, they started guiding us to the sales counter, and... DS lite GET! Jean Snow

The doesn't-get-out-very-much Halo die-hard version of the Shroud of Turin. Folks over at the Xbox Domain game site are saying some claim it's possible to see Master Chief's face in the new trailer. Look closely at the reflection in his helmet, and there it is. Me, I've seen better faces in those ink blot Rorschach Tests and say that it's either a candlestick or a dead trout. Or a dead trout on a candlestick. You? Brian Ashcraft

Master Chief Is Probably A Little Better Looking [Xbox Domain]

Last month, chowderhead Uwe Boll challenged his critics to a boxing match, which he would film and include in his adaptation of Running with Scissors' Postal. Uwe failed to clue-in Running with Scissors, it seems. The company's CEO Vince Desi said, "I didn't know he was going to do this." Then again, who did?

Game site 1Up contacted Desi, who replied:

Mayhem at RWS [Running With Scissors] is a company lifestyle but not communicating is something I don't exactly appreciate. I was being serious when I said it, I really how [sic] no idea what he was up to.

You won't be the first Vince, and definitely not the last. Uwe's kooky, you know. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [1Up]

More Moore Here [UK:R]

Poor Sony fanboys. Times have been tough recently, with everyone picking on the company and knocking its upcoming console. Take heart, there are others out there going through the same pain. Some cope by sending us illegible emails, lambasting Florian for being lippy. Others drink large amounts of Mr. Pibb and call GameSpot, just as this caller did. Feel free to continue using GameSpot as your fanboy forum to vent. Brian Ashcraft

Listen Here [YTMND] Thanks, Alan!

Last week, Uwe Boll proved that he wasn't only a stinky filmmaker, but batshit insane by offering to physically beat-up his critics, film the bouts and put them in one of his cruddy "movies."

Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka from internet site Something Awful has thrown his hat in the ring and will be going head-to-head with looney director. Rich writes:

I sent Mr. Boll and email, asking him if his offer still stood. Would he still fly me up to participate in one of his unintentionally horrific non-horror films, this time with the lure of physically kicking the snot out of me on film? Well folks, I'm proud to say the answer was 'yes.' Mr. Dr. Sr. Boll replied and 'added me to the list,' the list of folks he plans on beating up because we talked bad about him on the Internet. In exchange for this incredible privilege, I promised Dr. Mrs. Boll PhD that I would actually sit down and review his films 'Alone in the Dark' and 'House of the Dead' so people would know I'm completely serious about hating this man and letting him punch me in the face until he decides to stop.

I've never met Lowtax, but do wish him luck. Is Kotaku going to throw its hat in the ring? No. We'd rather sit around the office, sip chocolate raspberry coffee and make snide remarks about "Alone in the Dark". Because no matter how many journalists that "director" beats up, the facts do not change: Uwe Boll is a chowderhead, and his movies are rotten. Brian Ashcraft

Full Article Here [Something Awful] via Destructoid

You've seen what a 5 year-old can do on DDR, he's was a 14 year-old can do on In the Groove. It's like he's Riverdancing or something. And the kid isn't even happy with his score! Brian Ashcraft

Thanks, Dobbsy_jr!

He's has had enough snark. German filmmaker Uwe Boll announced he is willing to take on the haters. In a boxing ring. With gloves. (Read: he's nuts.)

"I am fed up," said the chowderheaded director. "I'm fed up with people slamming my films on the Internet without see[ing] them. Many journalists make value judgments on my films based on the opinions of one or two thousand Internet voices. Half of those opinions come from people who've never watched my films."

During the filming of game studio Running with Scissors' Postal title, Chowderhead will personally go mano-a-mano with his biggest detractors in boxing matches that will be used in the film. Because as everyone knows, when you can't verbally outwit someone, it's just better to beat them up. The logic astonishes.

We only wish we had the imagination to make this up. Excerpts from the batshit insane press release after the jump.

Towards the end of the filming of Postal, the five most outspoken critics will be flown into Vancouver and supplied with hotel rooms. As a guest of Uwe Boll they will be given the chance to be an extra/stand-in in Postal and have the opportunity to put on boxing gloves and enter a BOXING RING to fight Uwe Boll. Each critic will have the opportunity to bring down Uwe in a 10-bout match. There will be five matches planned over the last two days of the movie. Certain scenes from these boxing matches will become part of the Postal movie. All five fights will be televised on the Internet and will be covered by international press.

Who's eligible?

To be eligible you must be a critic who has posted on the Internet or have written in magazines/newspapers at least two extremely negative articles in the year 2005. Critics of 2006 will not be considered.

Folks between 140 and 190 pounds, send an email to info@boll-kg.de and help Uwe prove that he isn't a bad filmmaker through physical violence. Brian Ashcraft

More Here [GameSpot] Thanks, Dennise!

A Louisiana news website has an unsettling report about the West Feliciana Parish Sheriff seizing video games from a 16-year-old murder suspect's home, based on a suggestion by anti-games zealot Jack Thompson:

Thompson said published reports that Neher told detectives he and Everette killed Gore because Gore would not let them borrow his car follows "the same scenario in (the video) 'Grand Theft Auto.' "

Sheriff J. Austin Daniel said an autopsy showed Gore was beaten to death but also shot in the face.

"Nobody shoots anybody in the face unless you're a hit man or a video gamer," Thompson said, adding that the apparent repeated "pummeling" of the victim is consistent with scenes in violent video games.

Man, I hate that one mission in GTA, you know the one where you're trying to borrow that guy's car and he won't let you, so you just totally stomp his ass and blow his face off and score mad points. I always have to tank cheat my way through that one.

As a hilarious aside, the shooter was home alone because his mother, the exquisitely-named Happy Morris, was booked last week on "simple battery of a juvenile and unauthorized entry into an inhabited dwelling". The specifics? She broke into a house and slapped a fourteen-year-old girl.

There's undoubtedly a video game at the root of that particularly heinous crime, too. Nobody slaps fourteen-year-old girls in the face unless you're a Hot Dog on a Stick employee or a dating sim enthusiast. Eliza gauger

Read complete article here. [2theadvocate.com]

Goichi Suda, aka Suda51, sat down with Gamasutra's Brandon Sheffield and a buncha journos to talk about his company's latest release: Contact. Best known for designing Killer 7, Suda took a producer role for the RPG Contact. Tomm Hulette described the game as "a rare breed of quirky RPG that attracts a rabid fanbase with its whacked-out story, setting, and characters." The game also includes animal-training, item-collecting, monster-hunting and mini-games.

When told that the game seems really normal and not wack-o like typical Suda titles, the designer-turned-producer replied:

I think if I'd made it it would've been called Killer Contact or something. And anyway, it's the normal people like me who make crazy games. People who make normal games like Contact are the real crazies. So Akira Ueda [Contact's lead designer] is totally nuts.

And that's coming from a guy that wore a Lucha libre mask while promoting Killer 7! Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Gamasutra]

We believe that the PS3 will be the place where our users play games, watch films, browse the Web, and use other [home] computer functions. The PlayStation 3 is a computer. We do not need the PC.

Harrison concluded the interview by wetting himself. He then lifted a top of the line PC (casemodded to look like a nude and oily Samus) and a box of PSP keyboards onto the table, doused them in gasoline, and lit fire to it and the German reporter. As the flames consumed them all, he laughed and gibbered maniacally, traces of blood-flecked foam slicking his cracked lips. Eliza Gauger

Your PC is history [Computer and Video Games]

This poor fella was playing WoW, as you do, when his neighbour let off a .44 Magnum, shooting through the wall, ricocheting off our WoW'ers gaming desk and missing him by a mere 3 inches. I mean, I know this guy was playing Alliance and all, but there's no need for that.

Apparently the neighbour's landlord is 'beginning eviction procedures'.

Come on America. Please remove certifiable lunatics who keeps guns [in bathrooms] from the premises pronto, pls, thx, gg. A person's WoW time should be sacrosanct. Alice Taylor

So I Nearly Got Killed Today... [via Aeropause]

Now, Futuremark has uncovered a very dangerous anti-piracy system Starforce is now using. This copy protection system installs a driver that runs at the highest level of access on the system, which gives it low level access to the PCs hardware and any drivers and processes. This driver runs regardless of whether the game runs; keeping an eye out for any suspicious activity such as attempting to copy a protected disc. If something suspicious is detected, it forces the PC to make an immediate reboot, regardless of any other applications running and whether or not the user has any unsaved work.

Gee, why would anyone not want to purchase a product that relied upon Starforce for its DRM? According to a Starforce PR spokesman, it is because they just must be members of the Russian mafia:

StarForce Technologies, for its part, often takes extreme offense to negative comments... ...When questioned, Zhidkov [SF's PR manager] told us, "The issue on StarForce is obviously sponsored by our competitors or organized crime groups that run CD/DVD piracy [operations]. We are now in close coopreration with [US and Russian officials] investigating the matter and trying to find out who stands behind the boycott campaign.

That quote was obtained from the latest issue of Computer Gaming World.

Starforce DRM Exposed And It's Not Pretty [Gadget Life]