We posted an article one month ago that invited readers to do a little thought exercise. Here's what we said: "On the 5th of November we're going to post an article or two about video games, gadgets, technology, and general geekness ... the things about video gaming and technology that ought not be forgotten."

So here's our list of some video gaming and technology moments worth remembering. Hope this gets you thinking (and feeling nostalgic too!). And we look forward to your comments (and arguments). What do you remember and wish that the world will never forget?

Today is October 5. That means that November 5, Guy Fawkes Night, is one month away.

While we don't celebrate this day in the US (it's not even a public holiday in the United Kingdom - it's only a yearly celebration), many of us know of this day thanks to the DC Comics / Vertigo graphic novel (comic book) series V for Vendetta by Alan Moore and David Lloyd and its movie adaptation (with inimitable performances by Natalie Portman as Evey and Hugo Weaving as V).

Still, any "holiday" that gives people an excuse to light fireworks and go door-to-door begging for spare change sounds like something worth celebrating. So we at QJ.NET invite you to get into the spirit of things to remember, remember the 5th of November.

On the 5th of November we're going to post an article or two about video games, gadgets, technology, and general geekness - what moves us and affects us and touches us, and all the things about video gaming and technology that ought not be forgotten. Pretty much like the QuickJump QuickList articles in our Opinions & Analysis section at the front page and the other articles in the Opinions & Analysis sections of our many video game, science, and gadget blogs.

We invite you to plan ahead and consider what you want to remember on that day - because our articles obviously can't be the final word - that's what comments and the QJ.NET Forums are for. (Besides, now that we've turned off anonymous comments - and now that comments are smarter, funnier, and more meaningful - you have a good venue to share your reactions.)

We look forward to your thoughts. See you on the 5th of November.

Time magazine interviewed Shigeru Miyamoto, the video game designer who created the Super Mario, Donkey Kong, Legend of Zelda, Star Fox, Nintendogs, and Pikmin series of video games.

And he said some interesting stuff that got us thinking...

Violence in video games. Miyamoto is one smart cookie:

The obvious objective of video games is to entertain people by surprising them with new experiences. Violence is one means of doing that, [though] I look to make people laugh or smile. But the more we have parents playing video games themselves, the more they will understand the interactive world and how to deal with games that have a tremendous amount of violence.

Did you hear that, oh ye lawmakers and anti-gaming lawyers? Video games - like all kinds of art - seek to create an experience. Violence is one way - not necessarily the best way - but it's still one relevant way because adults play video games too.

Miyamoto prefers to entertain us through storytelling, artistic craftsmanship, and humor instead of through gore and gratuitous violence. But even this gentle person is intelligent enough to understand that violence is always part of art.

[If only our lawmakers read Macbeth or A Tale of Two Cities. Heck. If only they learned how to read instead of just relying on the "summaries" that anti-gaming lobbyists send to them!]

Will Legend of Zelda ever be a movie? Miyamoto's answer is a bit disappointing:

I struggle with the Hollywood process.

But it's not all bad news! Miyamoto did say that making a Nintendo game into a movie is an idea that holds a lot of potential. And in the past, Miyamoto has often said that he admires the work of Studio Ghibli (Princess Mononoke, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, Howl's Moving Castle).

Who knows, maybe the creative drive will eventually force him to make a movie. We take it as a self-evident fact: Legend of Zelda has *great* Hollywood potential.

Other questions. Time magazine is a mainstream publication, so you can expect the rest of the questions to go over old stuff that you all know by now - how the Wii and DS are trying to change gaming culture, the old "casual gamer" versus "hardcore gamer" debate, and Nintendo's use (and re-use) of old franchises like Mario.

But, as always, if you want to check out the source of our news, just look for the Via or Read link below.

Also, those you may also want to check out Miyamoto's thoughts on retirement and his ideas about the next Legend of Zelda game.

Orson Scott Card, author of Ender's Game (the Hugo Award winner and Nebula Award winner), is a recovering game addict - or at least that's one interpretation you can give his interview over at Gaming Today. Ender's Game is being turned into a movie by Warner Brothers, and at the same time Orson Scott Card is open to the possibility of his book becoming a video game.

For those not familiar with Ender's Game, just understand that it's one of the best sci-fi books ever written (in our honest opinions). A fast-paced story about violence, evil, war, and leadership. It's required reading, or so Wikipedia claims, at the Marine Corps University at Quantico.

And if it's good enough for the US Marines, it should be good enough for you gamers out there, right? Anyway, back to the interview. Orson Scott Card talked about being addicted to gaming:

The weird thing was that even when I wasn't playing, I felt a tremendous anxiety. I had responsibilities - there were cities waiting for me to tell them what to build! Now, I'm not insane. My conscious mind knew that it was just a game, and when I wasn't running the program, nothing was happening at all. But I invested so much tension in the playing of the game that it didn't go away when I left the computer. The call of duty was still there.

The interview also tackled what goes into writing a story for video games. Card said:

Games CAN'T have the kind of storylines that movies and books have, or they wouldn't be playable. ... What makes a game work is the opposite of what makes a story work. In a story, you are seeking to find out what really happened - why people do what they do, what the results of their choices are. ... In a game, the opposite illusion must be created. Even though most games absolutely force you to follow preset paths, the gamewrights try to give you the illusion that you are making free choices (even though you are actually, in almost all games, still being channeled through certain puzzles with fixed solutions).

As for Ender's Game, it won't just be one game in Card's vision:

• The Battle Room. This pivotal set in the book can be several game modules in real life.
• Space war games. The three wars (back in Mazer's time all the way to Ender's time).
• Story-based games. Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow.
• MMORPG. This one is based on the Battle School in Ender's Game.
• The Fantasy Game. The "mind game" from the novel.
• The Hive Queen. It's like Civilization (a game franchise that Card was addicted to).
• Post-war war. Card describes this as being like Risk.

Well, Mr. Card, there are quite a few fans here at QJ.NET who would be first in line to get a game that follows the Hegemon.

As you know, the Namco Museum Remix video game for the Wii is actually many games in one. It has "remixes" (i.e., versions that have been re-invented and re-created) of a bunch of Namco classics like Galaga and Rally-X, as well as added in nine more classics like Super Pac-Man, Dig Dug, Mappy, Gaplus, Xevious, and Galaxian.

This video features two of the Namco Museum Remix games. The video starts with Rally-X clips and ends with two Galaga levels.

If Pac-Man meets go-kart racing is your style, you'll enjoy the first Rally-X clips. Personally, I was rather bored by the first two clips (but that's probably because whoever was controlling Pac-Man kept on setting himself or herself up for nasty crashes).

But at 3:03 into the video, things really pick up with the Galaga remix. It looks more alive and happy - and we look forward to shooting down the bad guys with the Wiimote. However, I'm kind of a bit disappointed that the features that made Galaga fun are missing (others have pointed out that there are no extra points for shooting whole rows).

All in all, this looks like an early demo version, and Namco probably has other features they still want to add to the game (for example, wouldn't it be nice if the Galaga Pac-Man could get abilities that would let him dodge those shots being aimed at him?).

Namco Museum Remix is being developed by, and will be published by, Namco, that well-loved game company. The game is being scheduled for the 3rd or early 4th quarter of 2007.

Lovers of casual games who have flocked to the Wii will rejoice at this title.

We held off reporting on the rumored Nintendo E3 info (that allegedly came from a credible source) that was posted at NeoGAF the other day. Mostly because we wanted to wait for confirmation that it was true (which in turn was mostly because we sort of wanted a lot of the rumored good news to be true).

But when you're running a news and entertainment site, sometimes "entertainment" is "news" - especially when the rumors are as juicy and entertaining as these. And rather than let this new set of rumors slip by into oblivion, we might as well preserve them for the sake of posterity.

The rumors read like a Nintendo fanboy's fantasy list. We most especially love the bit about the final video that was shown at the end of the "Nintendo Media Event":

Link then appears screaming for a very brief second before the screen turns black and a tri-force slams onto the screen and smashes into pieces. If the character model used for Link is any indication of where this series is headed, expect ultra-realism, grittiness, and a very dark feel.

Oh man. That Angst!Link or Dark!Link is just going to be fodder for erotic fanfiction writers the world over. You can't get much more entertaining than this. (And what if it turns out to be true? You do know that many critics and fans are trying to pressure Nintendo into having more "mature" stuff for the Wii.)

More juicy rumors after the jump!

An analyst says that we should expect March video game sales to be "flattish." Yes, we know: March was last month.

Before you consult the "Time Traveller's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations" as recommended by the late, great Douglas Adams in "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe," you should know that the analyst isn't expecting the past - he's simply expecting the sales results from March, which will presumably be released at some point in the space-time continuum in our future.

According to GameDaily Biz, Colin Sebastian, an analyst from Lazard Capital Markets (a New York investment bank), did a "back of the envelope" analysis about March sales. And here's what he predicted were (will be?) the sales for March...

In general, Sebastian expects that March sales of next-gen products will be balanced by a drop in the sale of older-gen products. He also expects that Nintendo Wii and DS shortages will also contribute to sales figures being "flattish." Sebastian further expects that March will be dominated by God of War 2 (Sony), Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2 (Ubisoft), Guitar Hero 2 (Activision), and Def Jam Icon (Electronic Arts), among others.

Sebastian expects that March will be (was? will have been? would be becoming?) a good month for Activision because of Guitar Hero 2 and Call of Duty 3. Furthermore, he expects that March sees (will see? might have been seeing?) a 20% drop in sell-through for Electronic Arts, but EA will have (has had?) two or three of the top Wii titles for the month.

We'll have to wait and see. Who knows what our past futures have in store?

Paul William Scott Anderson is a film director, famous for science fiction movies and for movie adaptations of video games. His body of work includes "Mortal Kombat," "Event Horizon," "Resident Evil" (he also wrote, but didn't direct, the sequels - "Resident Evil: Apocalypse" and "Resident Evil: Extinction"), and "Alien vs. Predator." Anderson was also one of the producers on "DOA: Dead or Alive."

Paul W.S. Anderson was expected to write and direct the upcoming "Castlevania" movie. But not anymore. At least that's what "a very reliable source" told Dread Central, the horror movie and videos news site:

The film, based on the long-running video game franchise from Konami, has been in development hell since it was first announced, but Anderson's always been on as director and writer. Apparently either he didn't like where the project was going or didn’t feel like waiting anymore, because now he's off all together.

Most of Anderson's movies have been love-it-or-hate-it pieces of work. "Soldier" got heavy criticism, and even his financially profitable movies like "Resident Evil" and "Alien vs. Predator" got pooh-poohed by fans of their respective franchises.

Some of us here at QJ.NET believe that not all the criticism against Anderson is fair (some of us think the criticisms against his movies are a bit exaggerated), but we can't help but wonder if there's truth in what Dread Central had to say:

You know a project is in trouble when Paul W.S. Anderson, a man who's spent almost his entire career turning potentially cool movies into steaming piles of pooh, leaves a film.

To the fans of Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow or Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin (both for the DS), the classic Castlevania with Simon Belmont (on Wii Virtual Console), or Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (Xbox Live Arcade), or the countless other versions of Castlevania (over two dozen games in the series!)... you fans may agree with us when we say this: yes, sometimes movie adaptations suck, but we're fans, and we'll be lining up for premiere tickets. See you there!

Nintendo of America Inc. has released a press release that confirmed the information we gathered the other day from the Japanese wii.com section on the Internet Channel.

The Internet Channel is the Wii's very own version of the Opera Internet browser from Opera Software, and as you know, Wii owners have been able to download a trial version of the Opera Internet browser since December of 2006. Thanks to the Wii Opera Browser feedback page, Nintendo developers were able to make improvements to the final version of the browser.

As announced earlier this week, the final version will be coming out on April 2007 and will feature the following improvements:

• Improved zooming and scrolling
• An improved zoomed font
• Shortened startup times
• Quicker access to "favorites"
• An ability to hide the toolbar
• Buttons that will instantly type common preset letters, such as "www" or ".com"

Some sources had placed the release of the final version sometime in the last weeks of March, but delaying the release until April is necessary so that developers have the time to put in all those features and enhancements listed above.

Even though the final version of the Opera browser Internet Channel will be available in April, the browser will remain free for Wii owners to download through the end of June. After June, you will need to pay for the software download: users who haven't already downloaded the Opera browser can go to the Wii Shop Channel to download it for 500 Wii Points.

Activision Publishing Inc. (a part of the fast-growing Activision Inc.) has signed an agreement with Live Nation, the creators of the Monster Jam series of monster truck competitions which include racing and freestyle events. According to the multi-year agreement, Activision now has exclusive rights to develop and distribute video games based on Live Nation's Monster Jam series.

We're not yet sure what the official title of the games will be, but the first Monster Jam game should be ready by the end of 2007. It will feature 20 of the world's top monster trucks on the Monster Jam circuit, including Grave Digger, Maximum Destruction, Monster Mutt, and El Toro Loco. (If the cute floppy ears and tail-like extension don't make it obvious, that image to the right is Monster Mutt.)

Charlie Mancuso, President of Live Nation - Motor Sports has this to say about the new partnership:

We feel we have found a partner in Activision that shares our vision for both an authentic Monster Jam game that will appeal to the core Monster Jam fans, and a game which will also appeal to gamers by going above and way beyond anything we could do at the live events; it will have it all.

It's not yet clear which platforms will jam to the smoke and rumble of Monster Jam's world-famous monster trucks, but Activision said that the agreement is for "video games on all platforms." We'll post this article as an off-topic bit of news in QJ.NET's Windows/PC, PS3, Wii, and Xbox 360 sub-blogs for now, until Activision releases more concrete details.