The book, which in recent years has trended strongly toward video game records (and, according to us apparently, is a "must-have") found that more American consumers recognized Pac-Man, beating Mario by 1 percent, 94 to 93.

I'd say Mario hasn't done so bad considering not only he has a humanoid form, but he also has changed repeatedly over the past 27 years, whereby Pac-Man has largely been the same yellow pie-shape (except for animated cartoons and other non- or semi-canonical appearances.)

Then again, I don't see Pac-Man putting out a hugely selling title this year, or being the public face of a major console-maker and games publisher. So, take Guinness's appraisal for what it is: The long memory of an entire nation, many of whom might not be gamers.

[via Go Nintendo]

Game on! Tomorrow (Saturday October 25th) members of UK DS fan group DSLondon will try to crush those poor kids' dreams by SHATTERING the world record in a flurry of stylus swiping and button mashing as participants play any game they like for five glorious minutes.

The organizers hope to attract at least 500 DS gamers to the Rocket Complex on Holloway Road, London. I will be there with my DS, because when it comes to making children sad - Kotaku will always represent.

The ULTIMATE DS meetup [DSLondonRecord]

If you want to be in on the fun (yes, "fun" is such a subjective term, isn't it?) you better start planning your itinerary now as this will be attempted on Tuesday, March 18th. For further details check out Guinness' Gamer's Edition through the link below. Personally I think it would be a more interesting social experiment to have the World's largest gathering of Birdo characters. And when I say interesting I obviously mean scary as hell.

[Guinness World Records via Kombo]

In addition, gamers can now register with evidence of their own records and apply to be part of Guinness' effort to set a world record in Guitar Hero III (pending they live in London, NY, Sydney, Toronto, LA or Paris). Playing a little GHIII sure beats the hell out of eating a Cessna airplane (or at least passing the thing out after).

Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition [via sidebar]

The Black DS Lite that we'll be giving away to the grand prize winner of our string of DS Lite Give-Away contests is now in our grubby, greedy little hands, just waiting to be mailed off to some lucky gamer!

If you care about anything more than the fact that this time we've definitely got one to give away, the entire exciting account after the jump. If not, make sure you enter this week's contest for a chance to win the Black DS Lite!

You might remember our last Nintendo DS Lite contest, in which Brian Ashcraft was meant to secure a fresh new Japanese DS Lite for one lucky Kotakuite mere moments after release. In what would be a single moment in time summarizing his entire life from birth to blogger, Ashcraft abjectly failed. So the winner of our first DS Lite contest went months without getting their beautiful little toy and as proof of his penance, Ashcraft was forced to chop off the tip of his pinky with a ginsu knife and mail it off to Crecente, who promptly tore open the UPS box and devoured the rotting but well manicured morsel. It was a grisly fiasco.

Tasked with purchasing a Black DS Lite in Dublin to send off to the grand prize winner of our current Kotaku DS Lite Give-Away, I was not eager to repeat Ashcraft's mistakes, nor emulate his incompetence. So two weeks ago, I went down to GAME on Dawson Street, slapped 60 on the table and pre-ordered three Black DS Lites. One for Kotaku, one for me, one for Joel Johnson to sell on eBay after a preliminary temper tantrum about the price when translated from Euros to American Dubyos.

"Okay, so I'm pre-ordering three. So they're definitely going to be here, right?" I asked one pallid Dawson Street GAME drone.

"Definitely."

"Absolutely?"

"Positively."

But I still didn't trust him, so I called over the manager and posed the same question. He also promised me that there was "no way" that I wouldn't have three shimmering ebony DS Lites in my possession on the morning of the 23rd.

I squinted my eyes dangerously: "Okay..." I said. "I believe you. But I think it's only fair to warn you that I am a man with a gross predilection for insane acts of crippling physical violence. I'm a blogger. I'm motherfuckin' CRAZY. Are you familiar with Mario?"

The manager's face went pale, his adam's apple quivered. After a dry gulp, he nodded, eyes wide in terror. In retrospect, I don't know what I would have done if he didn't know Mario, but as he did, I channeled Denzel Washington from Training Day — spittle flying from my face, my hands doing an insane pantomime of the act of strangulation &mdash and proclaimed that S.O.B. Mario had nothing on me. What I was going for was the insinuation that I would jump on his head so hard that he'd crap out his entire spinal column, but I'm not quite sure how he translated it. Either way, the threat worked.

"Sir," he stuttered. "I promise you that there will be no problem."

But I still wanted to make sure that I kept my pinkies for Guitar Hero so I set my alarm for 4am so I could go and camp out in front of GAME in the gloam of launch day dawn. But then I slept through it, waking up only 15 minutes from store opening. Panicked, I rushed out the door, throwing a tweed jacket quickly over my Lil Red Devil pajamas.

But, as you can see from the photo gallery above, there was little to fear. Ireland, at least, had plenty of Black DS Lites to go around. Unlike the cannibalistic feeding frenzy of the Japanese launch, the only crowd that surrounded the Dawson Street GAME this morning was a collection of about five or six smelly and bedraggled gamers. Disappointing, really. As a man capable of insane acts of crippling physical violence, I was hoping that I'd at least need to do some eyeball gouging to secure one.

In fact, the whole of the Irish launch of the DS Lite was depressingly well handled. The staff at GAME were earnest, competent and friendly. They told me that although their company had sold-out of Nintendo DS Lites through pre-order nationally, they had spares to sell to people who walked in, even though they'd previously told me they'd only be selling them by pre-order. So if you're Irish and want a DS Lite, the Dawson Street shop is the one to go to.They were even nice enough to let me take a picture and post it on this blog. A swell bunch of guys.

You might notice that I included a picture of a used copy of Mario & Luigi 2 in the set. Why? Because every time I make a post claiming that game companies are ripping Europeans off, someone always enters the comment section to tell me I'm full of crap. Notice the price for a used copy of M&L2: 39.97. That's fifty dollars for a game that some joker has already gunked up with a slime comprised of cheese-and-onion crisp powder and human saliva. In comparison, it goes for new for $35 in the States. The Black DS Lite itself retails over here for 150. That's $190 each... almost 50% more expensive than it's US price.

Anyway, the bottom line is I'm now sitting on the Black DS Lite we'll be giving away at the end of next week. I've been playing (and drinking) with mine, and it's absolutely beautiful. One lucky Kotakuite should have it in their hands within the next couple weeks. Will it be you? Enter our two remaining DS Lite give-away contests and secure your chance to get it... from Ireland with love! Florian Eckhardt

Friday Night Lites Round 4: Rock and Roleplaying