"We also view it as highly likely that the game will include some sort of skateboard peripheral with all SKUs when it ships, given the massive success (and higher price points and profitability) of Activision Blizzard's Guitar Hero franchise," said Creutz in a report for Cowan and Company.

Hmm. That's great and all but it does ignore the fact that the reason people use the existing game's simple - yet reasonably deep - button based combo system to perform insane mid air grabs and death-defying grinds is that they don't know how to do it on a real board.

A bit of motion control is no bad thing, but the first time someone tries an ollie on a rebadged Wii Fit things might start to seem a bit counter-intuitive.

We are happy to be proven wrong, of course. All Activision would say is that the next iteration "won't be your father's Tony Hawk."

My Dad prefers Zoo Keeper on the DS, to be honest.

Analyst Talks Tony Hawk Skateboard Peripheral [Shacknews]

Maybe Piktura, speculated to be a new Pikmin game could lure them in. Nintendo filed a copyright for the name Piktura with the Japanese patent office this summer but has said nothing official about the property.

We do know that Nintendo is hard at work on another game in the Pikmin series. Miyamoto said it himself. But details on that game — its platform, title or design — have been nonexistent.

Oh, sure, we're totally speculating about a possible future Nintendo announcement, with little more than circumstantial evidence to support the theory. It's an ill-advised move, we know. Still, we wouldn't mind stylus control in our next Pikmin. And interacting with digital photos, maybe ones from our own garden, could be gee-whiz neato.

What say you? For or against Pikmin on your DS? Would it push you over the edge to rebuy the Nintendo DS for a third time?

Well they might, who knows? Mike Hickey, analyst for Janco Partners, thinks that he does. He told Game Daily,

"We expect GTA will likely be ported to Apple's iPhone platform, leveraging the device's touch screen technology and accelerometer."

Well, it was either that or leverage the Home and Wake/Sleep buttons, I suppose.

Grand Theft Auto for iPhone? [GameDaily]

Target says the mystery machine will be in stock on October 28, but a street date could come days later. Something's up, ladies and gentlemen, but only time will tell if these insane PS3 40GB rumors pan out. I, for one, am very suspicious.

US Playstation 3 40GB Shows Up In Target Store Scan [Gaming Bits]