I figured that since I live in the middle of nowhere it would be fun to bring some schwag along.

Here's the deal, I've got a smallish stash of freebies that I'll be handing out of to anyone who spots me over the next couple of weeks. Just flag me down and say you're a Kotaku reader. It's not a ton of stuff and I have no idea if anyone will notice me during my travels, so I can't really say how long the freebies will last. In other words, if I don't have anything for you if you do spot me, don't be annoyed and sorry in advance.

I'll be traveling through Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas and back to Colorado. We're mostly just passing through these states, with a few stops along the way in places like El Paso, Fort Worth, New Orleans and Moultrie, Georgia.

As is often the case, Trish will be driving and I'll be writing shotgun. (See what I did there?) But I hope to squeeze in a bit of road gaming along the way on the DSi, PSP or iPhone.

Do you have any summer trips planned?

Other Nintendo summer releases after the jump. Happy pre-ordering! Kim Phu

May 21, 2007

Nintendo News: Nintendo's Summer Lineup Satisfies Core and New Gamers

Whether you're a longtime gamer who likes classic franchises or a newcomer
aiming to keep your brain sharp, Nintendo's summer lineup of games has
something for you. Nintendo's offerings are anchored by key Wii(TM) games
like Metroid Prime(R) 3 Corruption and Mario Strikers(TM) Charged.
Nintendo DS(TM) owners can challenge their minds with games like Brain
Age(TM) 2: More Training in Minutes a Day and the new picture-based puzzle
game, Picross DS(TM).

Licensees also are demonstrating a strong commitment to Wii and Nintendo
DS by announcing more than 40 titles in all genres. The unique controls
of Wii and Nintendo DS make the Nintendo platform versions of these games
entirely new experiences. No matter what your taste or experience level,
you'll keep busy this summer!

Wii
July 30 Mario Strikers Charged Nintendo
Aug. 20 Metroid Prime 3 Corruption Nintendo
September Battalion Wars 2 Nintendo
Aug. 14 High School Musical: Sing It! Disney Interactive Studios
Aug. 14 Madden NFL '08 EA
August Tiger Woods PGA Tour '08 EA
August Space Station Tycoon Namco Bandai
August Brunswick Pro Bowling Crave
August Dave Mirra BMX Challenge Crave
August Pinball Hall of Fame: Crave
The Williams Collection
September Brothers in Arms Ubisoft
September Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal Warner Bros.
September George of the Jungle Crave
Fall Boogie EA

Nintendo DS
July 30 Picross DS Nintendo
Aug. 20 Brain Age 2: More Training Nintendo
in Minutes a Day
Sept. 10 DK Jungle Climber Nintendo
Sept. 24 Chibi-Robo: Park Patrol Nintendo
July SimCity EA
July Namco Museum DS Namco Bandai
July Drake & Josh THQ
July Glory Days 2 Eidos
Aug. 14 Madden NFL '08 EA
Aug. 14 High School Musical: Disney Interactive Studios
Makin' the Cut!
Aug. 14 Heroes of Mana Square-Enix
August I SPY: Fun House Activision
August Jewel Quest Expedition Activision
August Tiger Woods PGA Tour '08 EA
August Worms: Open Warfare 2 THQ
August Luminous Arc Atlus
August Mega Man Star Force: Pegasus Capcom
August Mega Man Star Force: Leo Capcom
August Mega Man Star Force: Dragon Capcom
August Operation: Vietnam Majesco
August Turn It Around Majesco
August The Wild West Majesco
August Fulllmetal Alchemist Destineer
Trading Card Game
September Drawn to Life THQ
September Zoey 101 THQ
September Crayola Treasure Adventures Crave
September Nancy Drew and The Deadly Majesco
Secret of Olde World Park
September Holly Hobbie & Friends Majesco
September Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Capcom
Trials and Tribulations
September Looney Tunes: Duck Amuck Warner Bros.
September Pet Luv Spa & Resort Tycoon Activision
September Animal Genius Activision
September George of the Jungle Crave
September Jam Sessions Ubisoft
September Professor Brainium Destineer
September Indy 500 Legends Destineer

Having spent much of the day talking to industry insiders I'm starting to see some of the real reasons behind the move to downsize E3. The main, overarching reason seems to be that the event had become more important then the industry it was created to showcase.

Developers were spending sickening amounts of money and time to ply their goods and stand out from the glitz and noise of the show. Many companies had fulltime positions created just to deal with putting their presence at the show together. The business of making games slowed to a crawl each year as companies primed for the show. Games were rushed or slowed because of the show. In essence, it had become the cart driving the horse and the industry was tired of it.

Personally, I think the summer is a little better. That seems to be the slow down for the industry and for news in general. Of course, that means it might be during my birthday. Dammit! Brian Crecente

Wow, I hope the live folks are up to reviewing and approving all of those titles in such a short period of time. I'm not positive, but my sense is that the hang-up has been in the approval process. Maybe they've streamlined it. Brian Crecente

MS: '50 Live Arcade games by year end' [Computer and Video Games]

Nintendo's DS and DS Lite were the top-selling portable in June, with gamers buying almost 600,000 of the portables in the month. While Nintendo raked in the portable cash, Cars managed to outsell the two devices, with THQ clearing more than 646,000 copies of the games from store shelves. Brian Crecente

U.S. video games June sales up 25 percent-report [Reuters]

Not only is the Talismoon Whisper fan 7 percent quieter than the original 360, it also moves 58 percent more air. It also glows a deep electric blue. Perfect for zapping mosquitos!

Order yours from Divineo.cn for $23.95 Brian Ashcraft

More Here [Max Console]

With summer around the corner in Japan (still gearing up for rainy season), fireworks are making their seasonal appearances in stores around the country. Kotaku reader Aaron stumbled across these totally unlicensed Nintendo-esque firecrackers in Osaka's Matsuyamachi district. Since when does Link ride Yoshi and Mario wear red Ghost 'n Goblins armor? Brian Ashcraft

Japanese Fireworks [Official Site]

More on what to expect for the rest of the summer as it rolls out before our sun-weary eyes. But for June, you can expect lots O DS Lite goodness. We're declaring the month of June, the month of Friday Night Lites and to celebrate the sexy ultraportable gaming beast, we've sweet-talked Nintendo into giving us five Polar White DS Lites to hand out this month. And because a DS Lite without a game is like me without my sexy locks, each Lite will also come with a game or two.

To top the whole month of DS Lite goodness off, Florian has volunteered to go line sit and land a Midnight Black DS Lite in Ireland and ship it off to the month's grand prize winner.

Here's how it's going to work. Each Monday we will announce the theme of the week and the contest details and each Friday we'll announce the winner. On the last Friday of the month we will do a random drawing of all of the people who entered all of the DS Lite contests to pick the winner of the black DS Lite.

This first week is rather short, but we're still giving up a DS Lite and some games.

The theme for this week is Brain Blasters. The prize will include a Polar White DS Lite, DS Lite case, Brain Age, Big Brain Academy, Magnetica and Trace Memory.

To enter the contest you must break this code: nrytt xrfwy ktwdt zuzsd ptyfp znyjx

One hint: the Key to the code can be found in Eliza's first post on Kotaku. If you search for the story you'll come to the month that leads the first sentence. Perhaps the third month isn't the only one Caesar should beware.

To enter, email the answer in the subject line to: kotakucontest@gmail.com by midnight Friday EST. One entry per a person please. If you enter more than once per a weekly contest Kotaku reserves the right to have fits and ban you from this and future contests.

And remember, even if you don't win you will still be entered into the month end contest. Also, don't forget to check back every week for the contest. Brian Crecente

Ed's note: Here's the full list of weekly contests. Also I've updated what we're giving away this week to include all the extra stuff.

Here's some unfinished business from Crecente's clotheshorse insanity yesterday. Tecmo's selling bikinis from Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball. Not sure when these when on sale, but they fetch $149.99 a piece. Bit pricey, if you ask me. Then again, I've never bought a bikini, so what do I know.

Click on Store, Then Shop Merchandise [Tecmo] Thanks, Chilly!