According to Newsweek's N'Gai Croal, the New York-based NPD Group will limit the data it releases to its non-paying customers starting with the October hardware sales data, which is due for release later this month. Hardware sales data will no longer be available every month, and the Top Ten SKUs charts will be cut in half. Hardware sales data as well as the Top Ten software titles will instead be released on a quarterly and yearly basis. Find out more at the full article.

Moral Kombat, Spencer Halpin's controversial feature-length documentary about video game violence, will be premiering at the VideoGame Expo in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on November 3. If you're in the area on that date, check it out. It should be a pretty interesting and thought-provoking experience.

In case you haven't heard about Moral Kombat yet, here's a backgrounder. According to a press release announcing the documentary's premiere, Moral Kombat is "a probative work that examines interactive entertainment as a medium and seeks to objectively portray the debate in a fair and poignant fashion". It's also the first high-def documentary shot entirely in HD three years ago.

The film includes testimonies from a few leading figures in the video game violence issue, some of whom will be present at the premiere for a panel discussion moderated by Newsweek's N'Gai Croal. Among those who will grace the Moral Kombat premiere are prominent anti-games advocate Jack Thompson and Lorne Lanning, video game developer and co-founder of Oddworld Inhabitants.

Online site GameTrailers has this special video productions focusing on Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo in relation to their preparations for this year's E3. For this week, the show highlighted Nintendo's consoles Wii and DS and what announcements fans can expect from the company.

The discussion was spearheaded by Spike TV's "Game Head" host Geoff Keighley and the guests include: GameTrailers Editor in Chief Shane Satterfield, analyst Michael Pachter, Game Informer Online Managing Director Bily Berghammer, and Newsweek General Editor for Tech N-Gai Croal.

Basically, the three discussed what surprises Nintendo has in-store this year in terms of video game titles, possible hardware upgrades in relation to enhanced Wii-DS connection, and the controversial game Manhunt 2. Aside from the already mentioned, a lot of other important topics came up so we suggest you get your headsets now and watch the video via our Read link below.

In a couple of hours, it'll be official, but N'Gai Croal over at Newsweek has the first word on the arrival of WiiWare, which are original downloadable games for the Nintendo Wii.

Yes folks, that's right. Much like Xbox Live Arcade before it, it seems the Wii will also have a similar service, adding to its already impressive line-up of virtual console games by having downloadable games built specifically for the Wii system, which gamers can purchase by using Wii Points.

More importantly, the process of getting good downloadable games means independent devs can also join in on the WiiWare craze by sending in their own ideas and games, which should make for a very robust development atmosphere.

In his talk with Reggie Fils-Aime, Croal also noted some interesting tidbits about how the process of games-making for WiiWare would go. While Nintendo gets to determine how much each game should cost, the games won't be vetted by Nintendo. "Instead," writes Croal, "Nintendo would only check the games for bugs and compatibility," with developers responsible for getting their games rated with the ESRB (and other ratings boards worldwide, presumably).

In any case, we'll get more word in a few hours, so stay tuned. In the meantime, let us know what you think about the coming of Wiiware to the Wii.

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UPDATE: Thanks to some helpful press releases sent our way, we just got word that Nintendo has officially announced WiiWare, a service "which will allow developers large and small" to create downloadable games specially made for the Wii. As mentioned above, the WiiWare titles will be sold through the Wii Shop Channel and can be bought using the same Wii Points you use to purchase virtual console titles.

Said Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime,

Independent developers armed with small budgets and big ideas will be able to get their original games into the marketplace to see if we can find the next smash hit. WiiWare brings new levels of creativity and value to the ever-growing population of Wii owners.

As for when the first titles will come out, you can expect them to come sometime in early 2008.

In an interview with Newsweek's Talk with N'Gai Croal, Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Aime said that licensee recruiting for the Nintendo Wii was easier because of their history with third-parties for the Nintendo DS. Right from the start, they were able to get third-party developers to jump right into developing games for the Wii.

And published statistical data from NPD signified that two out of three games bought for the Wii are from third-party developers and publishers. Reggie Fils-Aime commented, "That's fantastic for us."

Of course, he and the whole of Nintendo recognizes that there needs to be more knowledge sharing about the technical development aspects for games specifically made for the Wii. It's only fair to key publishers that have decided to invest and partner themselves with Nintendo.

"That's a commitment by Mr. Iwata, that's a commitment by Mr. Miyamoto, and the good news is that it's happening right now," Fils-Aime claimed. Their initiative to encourage experienced and senior developers to delivering games to the Wii is not a prize to Nintendo, but it should lead to greater games.

To counter gaps in game releases for the innovative console and to counter effects of "Wiinui," Nintendo will need more support from creative and resourceful third-party developers to bridge better games for Wii gamers. But if publishers are hoping to tap into the broader gaming market that the Wii reaches, wouldn't they persevere through the Wii game development either way?

Fils-Aime concluded, "We think that's the best way to leverage our own knowledge and expertise in a way that'll create fantastic games for the consumer to enjoy on our platforms."

Yep, you read the title right. We won't be seeing Sonic for quite some time in the future. When talking about the recent announcement of the Nintendo-Sega collaboration, Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games, Sega president Simon Jeffery told Newsweek that they're planning to give their blue hedgehog a bit of a make-over, meaning no new Sonic titles in the near future.

We are actually undergoing a fairly considerable refresh of Sonic as an intellectual property, as a character. Sonic on the Wii is probably the first product that's come to market that reflects that. We're not going to be bringing another game out on the other platforms for quite some time, because we feel that it is time to reinvent Sonic, to make Sonic contemporary again. At the same time, even the recent 360 and PlayStation 3 games have sold extremely well.

Reinvent Sonic, eh? Wonder how that's going to end up. Well, they already have started going back to "the original Sonic" with Sonic and the Secret Rings. I say that's actually a good start. Of course, before you give someone some make-over, you'd have to revisit your roots first. It's going to be interesting to see how they will "make Sonic contemporary again" though.

We fished the picture above from a Neoseeker forums thread on Sonic art. Well, let's just hope that "Sonic In a Dress" remains as a fan's concept art, and not make it to the final drafts of Sega. (pink looks sooo good on blue though)

It's the big question that some game industry analysts are asking, and some were quick to answer. Despite the really big popularity surrounding the Nintendo Wii, many critics are still whispering left and right. Some people attribute the phenomenal success of the Wii due to it's health benefits, while others claim it's family-friendly and fun.

But there have been a few negatives mentioned, especially about the Wii being "an impulse buy" or that it's just a passing phenomenon and people will get tired of it later. The really big issue that the critics are leaning on is: "are there enough games to keep the Wii up there?"

Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime, in an interview last October with N'Gai Croal of Newsweek, said that there will be no game drought. And as Games Radar has pointed out in their chart, Nintendo seems to be doing well for now.

But the more anticipated games, Metroid Prime 3 and Mario Galaxy, are unlikely to come out this year, despite claims that the titles "will give [Nintendo] fantastic momentum" for their launch. So what's left for the Wii fans once they've grown tired of the games they have now? Wait, will they ever grow tired of them in the first place?

We guess those who are worried can only hope that the third-party titles out there can keep the Wii show on the road.

Newsweek's Alt-Ctrl division was recently able to post an interview they had with Electronic Arts regarding The Godfather game of theirs heading for the Wii. Much to say, what's on everyone's minds is how the Wii remote and Nunchuk would be used - besides, what's a mafia game without all the thug-slappin' fun?

The dev team actually really put some considerable effort in coming up with the control scheme for The Godfather: Blackhand. They wanted to make sure that the motions used to control your Corleone character will be realistic, and to do that, they even called on a focus group. The team asked a couple of people what it would look like if they themselves were to throw a punch, swing a big, strangle a thug.

The problem lies, however, on the "margin of error" a given move has because people might throw a molotov or slap a bum silly in their own specific way. So, EA had to be generous in mapping the controls, making motion-sensing a bit lenient to recognize certain possible movements. It had to be "tolerant of a lot of variation in the player's moves." But that's the thing, see? Making control-recognition too open makes a certain move overlap with another.

How did they deal with this? The full interview is behind the "Via" link. Meanwhile, behind the "Full Article" link are the controls for the game as seen in screens.

Check 'em out screens after the jump!

Tag this under "not news," err, we mean off-topic. Anyway, in a Newsweek piece about the demand for the Wii and the unfortunate radio contest, there are a few blurbs from Perrin Kaplan that inform us that Nintendo offers their condolences (despite them not having anything to do with the contest) and gives us an idea of how Nintendo is handling the apparent Wii shortage. Perrin Kaplan says:

We produce a healthy number, with more shipments coming weekly. We're not sure what more we could have done to meet such overwhelming demand... We try to minimize that [airlifting in consoles as Sony did with the PS3], as air is costly. We're a profit-oriented company.

Amazing. A nice way to promote Nintendo and its efforts to generate supply, and a nice indirect critique of Sony's strategy. Well, at least that's how this blogger sees it.

Obviously, this isn't news because the biggest thing that's revealed is that Nintendo's in it for the money, and we all already know that.

This makes me wonder though: how would 2007 look like if way back in the 90s Nintendo didn't ditch Sony? Maybe we'll really have a PSWii. Maybe that YouTube kid will be screaming "PS64" instead of the now-famous "N6Fooarrrr!" Forgive me, my mind wanders.

A few days ago, we let you in on how the snowboarding Wii game, SSX Blur, will use the Wiimote. It was a detailed description and all, but sometimes to really understand how things are gonna work, we need some visuals. It's a good thing that the respected Newsweek mainstay, N'Gai Croal, let us in with some screenshots of the control scheme for EA'S SSX Blur.

The game's producer, Alex Hyde also added that the Wii controllers' motion-sensing features seemed to be a perfect fit to the nature of the game. Aside from that, he added that the Wii controllers "allowed us to add a level of depth to the game that isn't possible on a traditional gamepad using a complex combinations of buttons. Also, the fact that the control scheme is more physical causes the player to be much more engaging and immersive experience, which is a real plus."

Looks good to us. Now we just have to wait for a couple of months to try the game. For now, taking a look at the control schemes ain't gonna hurt.

More screens after the jump!