I enjoy doing a bit of math in Google every now and again, and I just copped something amazing: The Nintendo Wii is going to have more than double the revenue of the Sony PlayStation 3 come November.

In the US of A Sony is promising 400,000 units of the PS3 at launch. Nintendo is promising around 2 million Wii's for the

US

Now, if we give Sony the benefit of the doubt and say that every PS3 in the US will be sold at the higher $600 price point, and the Wii is obviously at $250 across the board, that means that Sony stands to have revenues of $240 million; Nintendo $500 million, presuming they sell all their consoles. Sony will obviously make much less than $240 million as not everybody is going to be buying their PS3 at $600, so if Nintendo fails to sell off all of their launch stock they still have plenty of margin for error to be able to claim 100% more revenue than Sony.

Half the price and double the revenue, I still maintain that the Nintendo Wii will be the real console to beat. In the past Nintendo has always had the creative edge in certain areas - in 2006 it would seem that they have done their sums as well. Of course, as DFC Intelligence helpfully pointed out, the Wii has to be more than a fad to be truly successful. It's my opinion however that with a wide range of games and the reasonable price point, the Nintendo Wii would be an attractive bet even without its controller.

So, EA has released a new version of its digital distribution system. Fearing spyware I had it downloaded to a random TG office machine that'll probably be taken apart and rebuilt in a week and, after playing around with the service for ten minutes, I already think of it exclusively as a poor mans S

team

The comparisons in terms of attempted functionality are pretty obvious - the ability to buy games (obviously) and download promotional materials like demos, and even the user interface are not dissimilar. The contrast between usability and lack thereof is also quite stark - the EA system is like Internet Explorer dressed up; and thanks to a lot of users downloading and trying it out today it's as slow as your granny after being run over by an SUV.

The world of digital distribution truly belongs to the small and dynamic companies like Paradox and Valve. They have set up halfway visionary systems which work and which, quite critically, provide value for money. Why would I want to pay $50 for a digital copy of Battlefield 2142 when I can get a hard copy for the same money which will take me half the time to actually get when downloads are factored in; and God only knows how reliable the EA system will be at tracking my purchases and ensuring that I still technically own my copy of BF2142 tomorrow?

While all this is going on I can buy cheaper copies of mainstream and independent (Read: interesting) games on the likes of Gamer's Gate and S

team

After arriving back from the US of A on Monday morning and discovering that it was, in fact, the middle of the night; and that the middle of the night was to be my midday, I had to find something to tire myself out with. Two options were available: Run around the block continuously; or go to see Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan. Going to see the movie was the correct choice, as it turns out, because I laughed so hard that sleep was a natural follow-on from watching the film.

Completely un-politically correct; rather partially factually incorrect where the government of Kazakhstan is concerned, this movie is a farce of epic proportions which is also an interesting social commentary in and of itself. Sacha Baron Cohen, the British comedian who plays Borat and is, it is worthy of pointing out, Jewish, manages to show up a lot of modern civil societies quirks and cracks in the process of making you laugh.

The most famous of Borat's social highlighting comes via the casual hatred of Jews, especially when he can get seemingly civilized folk to agree with him. Homosexuals, women and Muslims are just some of the other folk in for a pasting by Borat - funny in and of itself, but scary when you see perfectly straight faced people agreeing with him.

More innocuous, but still worthy of note, are some of his excesses in simply walking up to and greeting people in the street - it perhaps shows how paranoid a society we live in that the reactions ranged from threatening violence to running away in sheer panic. In fact, I'm surprised Cohen survived the filming of this movie - singing "Kazakhstan is so great... All other countries are run by little girls" to the tune of the American National Anthem alone nearly got him killed.

Still, it's best to view Borat's movie as a sheer farce, and on this level each set-piece sketch is pulled off to perfection within the bounds of the unscripted cast of unwitting extras. At 83 minutes the movie is perfectly timed - you couldn't keep physically laughing for that long, even if Cohen and Co could manage to keep the gags coming for longer than an hour and a half.

The movie is well worth going to see. Turn off your paranoid politically correct sensors - in fact, when you emerge from the cinema you should go online and laugh some more as you read the scribblings of idiots who fail to turn off their racist amplifiers and whom seem to take Borat quite seriously when he says women can't write books.

So, I've decided that as I'm only going to verifiably live once I might as well try this MacCrap at least once in my life. Last night (or rather, at around 2am this morning) I ordered a MacBook with a 1.83 GHz Core Duo processor (really, the price / performance hike to 2.0 GHz is not worth it.) This morning Apple announced that they're putting Core 2 Duo processors into MacBooks, and I nearly kicked my own arse into the Apple store to see if I could try and upgrade my order.

It would seem that, quite contrary to my usual luck and sense of good timing, things have turned out quite well for me - Apple has automatically upgraded my order to a Core 2 Duo processor; and, by a happy coincidence, it will cost me €20 less for the pleasure. Cha cha cha cha cha cha, etc.

Of course I've probably just been doomed to a life of tech support woe or something with this machine. Or I'm about to walk out under a bus / truck / the only SUV in

North Dublin

Ahh, back into the movie-going groove. After the jubilations of Borat, Halloween gore-fest Saw III is a big letdown. Essentially Saw III is more gore and more elaborate and harrowing situations which, when all is done and dusted, seem like more of an attempt to catch the true horror of the previous films and bottle it up for an assured box office hit.

Yes, Saw III is gory to the point of sheer excess. Yes, it will make you squirm. I suppose that it does have the potential to make some cinemagoers faint. But a true horror masterpiece it is not. The movie is, as I say, a cash-in. You'd want to have seen the previous two movies to fully "get" Saw III, and after seeing I and II you will be in the position for big disappointment anyways. Only bother with Saw III if you happen to be a gore junky.

Fox News Flash: PLAYSTATION PORNABLE!!!! EEEVVVVIIILLLL!!!!!!

So, Fox 29 has wheeled out the plastic newscasters and concerned inflections to have a go at the PlayStation Portable. Apparently you can access pornography on it via the WiFi browser. I Am Personally Shocked And Appalled By This. Watch the video, or allow me to paraphrase.

MALE FOX TYPE: Is the PSP on your kids Christmas list? Well, mmuuuaaahhhaaaa, boy do I have news for you!

FEMALE FOX TYPE: I don't want to ruin anyone's Christmas... it's just that it helps ratings

FEMALE FOX VOICEOVER: Portables are all the rage. Everyone has one... and they're Insidious. You can do more than play football or race cars... and no, I'm not mentioning the violent video games we trashed in our previous video game spot... yet. I want to make this out as a wholesome product before destroying everything you believe in. Mmmmuuuaaaahhhhaaaaa.

This thing is actually a giant porn downloading super-computer!

CONCERNED POLICE OFFICER: Parents can watch their kids in the kitchen, or the living room... but not while they have a mobile PSP. Or, maybe just if they just don't care.

FEMALE FOX VOICEOVER: Pandora's box!!!!! ...Erm, what's a Pandora's box?

[Porno flashes on screen, cue concerned mother strapping in child]

CONCERNED MOTHER: What the hell dude?! This thing can access the internet?!!?!!?! And it's meant for kids???!!!!! Why didn't I read the friggen manual???!?!?!?!?!?!

[Cue kid who looked at porn on his PSP... using school WiFi... wait, no, wait, I think I might just see a way in which that might have been prevented... Nope, there it goes again... let's just get back to Banning This Sick Filth]

APOLOGETIC CHILD: I swear I turned it off right when the naughty pictures flashed up on screen.

INTERNET SECURITY EXPERT: Ohh, it's incredibly easy to find. It's that other evil company, Google. In fact, they're all evil in that technology world.

FEMALE FOX VOICEOVER: The stooges of pornography are even cashing in on porn on the PSP! But erm, and you can stop listening to me now, you need a credit card and actual money to be of any interest to pornographers. But hey, supposing your kid gets a credit card? I mean, you bought them a PSP without thinking of the consequences, why not?

...Ugh, I canne go on. So boring, so clich馘 and so simplified it could only be aimed at an audience of easily frightened parents who will, never the less, go out there and give their kids a piece of technology without understanding how it works or even, apparently, what it can do.

The Entertainment Software Association has set its legal dogs upon game blogs including Kotaku and bits bytes pixels & sprites, sending a Cease & Desist nasty letter over a parody ERSB rating t-shirt, "Your Mom Rated E for Everyone."

Naw, here let me find a dictionary for the ESA, I think sympathy is in there. The entertainment industry voice in North America, which protects us from Jack Thompson (or is just an easy target for a lampooning by him), is also do not forget A Big Evil Corporate Voice - their mission, remember, is "dedicated to serving the business and public affairs interests of companies that publish video and computer games". They're not happy that the ESRB rating is being parodied... but wait, parody is an acceptable art form and doesn't constitute copyright infringement! Hurray for those niggling legalities the ESA heads can ignore whilst making eejits out of themselves.

Big blogs like Kotaku can stand up to this sort of a legal challenge, but smaller one-man blogs are not in such a position (such as bits bytes pixels & sprites); strong-arming does, in fact, work when the person you are going after is too weak to defend themselves, no matter how weak your actual legal hand is.

According to Tokyo-based Kotaku reader Dirk Benedict, many PlayStation 3's sold on launch in Japan went to homeless and poor Chinese people; hired to stand in line and purchase the console for more wealthy individuals who are selling the units on for exorbitant prices online.

If Benedict's letter to Kotaku, and the images he captured, are to be believed then the foul-up that was the 80,000 - 100,000 "strong" PS3 launch in Japan really went far, far worse than expected; with the first person to be congratulated for purchasing a PS3 in fact being a hired Chinese line-waiter who didn't buy any software for the console.

These console launches have surpassed stupidity at this stage. People getting in line over a week before the console launches, with the 10^th person in line not even being assured of getting a unit, and line-sharks buying the console to sell it on for big profit. Supplying enough units to last about two seconds on retail, in a world where paid-for pre-orders aren't even an assurance of getting a product on launch, is really and truly farcical.

I've come to the point of loathing just about everything about the PlayStation 3 launch, just as I did with the Xbox 360 launch last year. Limited supply after drumming up huge demand; exorbitant prices; poor organisation; company arrogance in telling us all about the next- gen, and then wondering why the first guy you've pulled up on stage to congratulate is, in fact, a poor man working for a line-shark; and all for some new tat, same as the old tat but with better graphics. Jeez guys, it's a video game console, let's stop with the tunnel vision here.

If anyone needs me I'll be off reading a good book.

The day after TG Daily's Humphrey Cheung interviewed about 10 gamers that were waiting in line at the Best Buy in Burbank, Calif., the diehard PlayStation 3 fans were dispersed by Best Buy officials and local authorities. These loyal gamers had called in sick and quit their jobs - one even postponed his engagement because he didn't have enough cash to buy a sparkler and a PS3.

Okay, so maybe these guys aren't exactly heroes. Some may also refer to them as losers. But we may also know them by another name: martyrs. That's right - martyrs. Why? Because these young men were willing to sacrifice their time to be on the frontline of next generation gaming. As misguided as I think their efforts may be, I commend them for stepping up and dedicating themselves to their first love: PlayStation 3.They are hardcore gamers, plain and simple.

And yet, they got dumped by Best Buy. What happened? We're not quite sure. At least a few of the guys in line had been there for a few days. Why did the managers at Best Buy let them camp out for a few days and then suddenly change their policy, order the group to leave and then call the police? A couple of Kotaku's bloggers searched for answers at the Burbank Best Buy and got what I would term as a chilly reception. They were even told not to take pictures of the posted sign that stated lines were not allowed to form outside the store until the day before the launch (that would be Thursday, Nov. 16, for those keeping score).

I did some investigating of my own yesterday at my local Best Buy. I soon discovered that there were no lines or tents forming outside, but I didn't see a sign that prohibited such activities, either. That could be because the neighborhood was quite as nice as Burbank - or maybe the valley has more gamers than my 'hood, I just don't know. I went into the store and sure enough, there was a big, shiny PlayStation 3 in a display case in the center of the store. Some guy was playing Ridge Racer, and a few people were watching him and asking the nearby Best Buy employee when the console was going on sale. Next to the PS3 display, however, was a larger group rocking to Guitar Hero II (not on PS3), and a few more gamers trying to score a copy of Gears of War for the Xbox 360. Not sure what all of that means.

Back to the PS3 fans - it still bugs me that these guys got tossed. They waited in line for two or three or even four days and got nothing. Meanwhile, Sony was partying at a PS3 launch party in Beverly Hills last week with a bunch of celebrities like Chris Rock, Diddy, Paris and Nicky Hilton (the party was held at the Beverly Hilton, of course), David Arquette and, of course, everyone's favorite party girl Lindsay Lohan. So these celebrities like the PlayStation 3. BFD! The people whose opinions really matter were lined up outside, ready to wait out more than a week to be one of the first gamer's to get their hands on a PS3. So while Sony roles out the carpet for a bunch of non- gaming famous people, the real fans get left out in the cold.

Life is so unfair sometimes...

So, the long-awaited follow up to "Operation Flashpoint" has been released in developers Bohemia Interactive's native Czech Republic and, according to the official website, the game has gone to No. 1 in some of the best sellers charts. Hurray for the Czech's and their recognition of a good soldier sim when they see one.

Meanwhile, as anticipated, we in the rest of the world shall have to wait until Q1 2007 unless you can speak either Czech or German. I'm tempted to get out the old dictionary and just give it a lash...

Armed Assault Image Preview

If one were to stack up the coverage of the PlayStation 3 since the weekend you could be forgiven for thinking that Sony has shipped the 4 million units they want to by March, instead of the 80,000 or so that have gone to Japan.

It's console launch week alright, and blanket headlines are screaming PS3 This, PS3 That With Accompanying Pictures of Cats For Comparison. Of course the most amusing thing about all of this is watching the looks on peoples faces when they realise that the next-gen, which apparently must be starting now, isn't actually the Orgasm ina Box they might have been promised previously.

The big complaint about the PS3 from the off this week is back compatibility. It's a selling point for Sony, who laughed at Microsoft's attempts for bridging the Xbox and 360; and now it turns out that big titles such as Final Fantasy and Gran Turismo are not working properly on the PS3, and there could be as many as 200 titles which won't see the light of day on Sony's "backwards compatible" console. Of course Sony are apologetic about the whole thing; though they didn't bother to tell anyone about the problem until it was pointed out by users. Is that my cynic sense activating?

Not even Wikipedia, bastion of worthwhile knowledge and the pursuit of human happiness through Comma Nazism and pedantry, has escaped the hardships of this console war. Apparently the vandals have been at it and the moderators have had to come in with their big sticks of revert edits and lock the Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii articles away for their own protection. For shame, console fanboys.

In case anyone was wondering, I meanwhile continue to read my good book. Schott's Almanac 2007, if you must know. Cost me €22.99 (that's €23); I didn't spend weeks excitedly circle jerking with random people online in anticipation of its publication; and I'm quite possibly a better person for being able to tell you that last year 81 people were reported as having been struck by lightning in the UK and, curiously considering the abundance of lightning compared to volcanoes, 86 people were treated for injuries relating to the latter.

Analyst Colin Sebastian of Lazard Capital Markets has said that he expects Sony to ship 150,000 to 200,000 PlayStation 3's for the

US

This comes after Sony Computer Entertainment of America (SCEA) co-chairman Jack Tretton said last month that launch allocations were more of a "target" than a precise number; and after the company cut the Japanese launch allocation from 100,000 units to 88,400, according to official sales figures released after the PS3 launch there.

"We expect Sony to deliver 150-200k units to stores in the United States for the launch; consumers without pre- orders may find it difficult to locate an available system," said Sebastian "We expect sales of approximately 750k PS3s domestically by year end," he added.

Rumours have also begun to fly as to when exactly stores such as GameStop will actually ship their pre- ordered units to customers, with some indications that the units will not actually be shipped on November 17^th; rather, at some stage "before Christmas". This could be a further indication of lower than expected launch numbers for the PS3 in the

US

Sony had originally aimed to ship 2 million PS3s by the end of 2006, and even adding the rest of the world's launch numbers (including

Taiwan

Sebastian expects that Nintendo will ship 1.2 million units to the

US

It would appear that Sony has, once again, left it to the last minute to confirm, deny or stoke rumours of its own demise.

The Company of Heroes v1.3 patch is out. That's the good news. The bad news is that it contains a major gameplay flaw in which tanks can sail on through tank traps... obviously Not A Good Thing, both for gameplay and Relic's QA process through which, apparently, bugs can sail on through.

Patching has always had a bit of an arduous history in PC gaming; particularly in recent times with the widespread use of broadband leading to many game publishers essentially saying "Release now, earn money, turn it into a playable product in six months time." In the case of games which get relatively stable releases, as we see here, sometimes things can go horribly wrong with patches. I recall DICE, developers of the Battlefield franchise, to be particularly distinguished in this field.

Ohh well, Relic promise that the 1.4 patch for Company of Heroes, containing a fix for the 1.3 patch, will be released "soon", having been in development for some weeks (minus the new bug hotfix.) The 1.3 patch comes with all kinds of lovely additions which I will allow you to read about at your leisure while you wait for it to download (either when you log into Relic Online in-game or via third party download services.)

On my way home from the office last night, I drove buy a local Best Buy here in Los Angeles on Sawtelle Avenue. And sure enough, there more probably more than 100 people lined up waiting for the PlayStation 3 launch tonight at midnight. They sat in collapsible camping chairs, wrapped in blankets and other heavy layers, hunkering down for the night.

You see, even here in L.A., the weather gets cold at night during the fall and winter months. It's the desert, people - really hot and sunny during the day, and then colder than a witch's - well, you know - at night.

Anyway, they were lined up on a sidewalk that bordered the Best Buy building. Why? Because several PS3 fans that had arrived the day before were told they could not wait in line on store property. Apparently, this was part of a new company policy for the PS3 launch (check out Monday's blog post about gamers in Burbank, Calif., getting tossed). I guess I can't blame Best Buy for prohibiting people from camping out in front of its entrances. Frankly, I hate loitering, and the last thing I'd want as a store owner is to have a bunch of Jay & Silent Bob wannabes and skate rats scaring away customers.

However, I'm a little ticked off because Sony and its major retailers probably could have handled this better. Take the Best Buy on Sawtelle. The store managers tell the eager PS3 fans not to wait on store property. Okay, fine. That seems like a reasonable request. But then, according to folks waiting in line, Best Buy officials then informed the patient crew that there was no point waiting in line on the sidewalk because Best Buy was going to form its own "official" PS3 line and wouldn't honor the order of the sidewalk waiters - which, quite frankly, seems not only ridiculous but also mean-spirited.

Of course, the gamers in line protested. In fact, a couple intrepid gamers at the start of the line began calling local media and gaming press organizations to spread the word about Best Buy jilting them. They also began to organize their own "official" list so they could maintain order and keep track of everyone's place in line. Eventually, after the group complained vehemently and called in the press, Best Buy relented and agreed to honor the sidewalk line. Then the store manager told the crow that they would check each person's driver's license and write down their name and place in line. Then every two to three hours, a Best Buy employee would do a roll call down the line to see if people were still in line. I didn't get a chance to talk to Best Buy about the roll call system, so I can't assume that if a particular person was, say, in the bathroom and missed roll call they would somehow lose his or her place in line. Because that would really suck.

Stay tuned for more...

I got World of Warcraft today. I know, I know; you either think I'm too late to the game or shouldn't have walked into that minefield at all. I blame Humphrey Cheung, one of our faithful news editors over on TG Daily who stuck the idea into my head out in LA two weeks ago.

Fortunately for those concerned folk who do not want to see me stuck in WoW for the rest of my days, the WoW Europe website seems to be totally fooked to the point that setting up an account is impossible. Agree to the terms, enter the authentication key, your details; I've got as far as "Choose payment method" on one of about a half a dozen tries before it invariably fails to load the next page or spits out an error message in gibberish.

Wonderful, just wonderful. The

US

Low supply, high demand and even higher prices on eBay... If you couldn't see a bit of a PlayStation 3 related crime wave coming then you might want to save your $600 and get some laser eye treatment instead.

Engadget has the roundup of muggings, scuffles and even shootings (in

Texas

The Darwin Award has to go to an assista nt Wal-Mart manager in

West Bend

That may not have been breaking the laws of man, but it sure was a crime of stupidity...

Sheesh. The human capacity for stupidity never ceases to amaze me - particularly when you get more than two people in the same space.

"You know, two guys got robbed at gunpoint a few miles down the road," the police officer said.

I froze.

"Wait, what?"

Midnight was minutes away, and we were in the Circuit City store in Hawthorne, Calif. Two Hawthorne police officers described how authorities nearby had responded to two incidents involving thefts of PlayStation 3s by armed assailants. My TG colleagues and I had been chatting all day and night about what kind of chaos we might see at the midnight sales; we talked about the incident at the Super Wal-Mart in Palmdale, Calif., Wednesday, where several eager shoppers got violent and unruly, forcing the police to shut the store down. Then there was the ill-advised "musical chairs" incident at a Wal-Mart in Milwaukee, Wisconsin (which Aaron blogged about this peculiar incident the other day). And of course, there was the "drive-by" shooting - albeit with a pellet gun - that injured four people outside of a Best Buy in Kentucky. Okay, so it was a BB gun and not a Mac-10. Still, I was unnerved. Now I was hearing about real guns being used to rob two PS3 owners just a couple miles down the road.

All of the sudden, L.A. has turned into freakin' Baghdad. All over a video game console.

Quite frankly, I don't need this. I was freaking out Thursday night. I have no problem admitting that I was a little scared. I wasn't getting a PS3 last night, but did it matter? Would that really stop some insidious criminal lurking in the shadows of Circuit City who saw me walk into the store before midnight and walk out soon after sale started? It certainly didn't help one guy at the Best Buy in Alpharetta, Georgia. Kotaku reported on an unfortunate soul named Dave who was essentially stalked from one Best Buy all the way across town to another store and then had his car broken into by someone who assumed he had a PS3 in the trunk (turns out, he did not).

Well, the Hawthorne Circuit City certainly appeared to be a respectable location - no barbed wire fences nearby, no shopping carriages littering the sidewalks, no gun/pawn shops within my visual frame of reference. However, there were plenty of, um, shady-looking characters hanging around the store - some of whom I'm sure were gamers but others perhaps not. Luckily, there were no major incidents at Hawthorne; there were a few people in line that got a little pushy and had to be reprimanded by the cops. Oh, and there was one annoying chucklehead who was hanging around the line, without a PS3 shirt, who was talking smack to people while drinking a can of Miller Lite (smart kid - I heard he was later asked to leave by the police).

So we got in and out in one piece (for more on the PS3 launch at Circuit City, check out TG Daily). And as far as we know, none of the lucky gamers (or bloodthirsty capitalists) who got one of the 100 60GB PS3s that night were robbed or mugged or car-jacked. But I was dismayed to hear about the violence that had taken place Thursday night in other parts of the state and the country. One person was shot outside of a Wal-Mart in Connecticut by two armed men (no word on the victim's condition); two other gunmen robbed a GameStop in Elk Grove, Calif. Two more people were robbed in a PS3 line at a Circuit City in Springfield, Oregon. And more reports are trickling in about various muggings, beatings, stabbings and riots across the nation.

This is so sad. Honestly, what is the world coming to? On one hand, I'm happy to be alive and glad no one got hurt at the Circuit City sale here in L.A. On the other hand, the absurdity of all of this is pounding my head like jackhammer, I've got a killer headache, and I hope I never have to go through something like this again.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to got get ready for Nintendo's Wii launch party tonight.

The Nintendo Wii has launched in the US of America to a distinct lack of ill-will, drive-by shootings or other hyphenated misdeeds. Some stores sold out, some were well stocked enough to meet the demand and, overall, there are a lot more happy Wii campers than PS3 ones this morning.

Chances are that if you're looking to get a Wii for Christmas Santa won't have to spend the pension fund on eBay to get one. Nevertheless there does appear to be a shortage of extra Wii controllers floating about (they'll probably be the premium eBay item, so); but better to be down a controller than a console I say.

Meanwhile the reviews of Sony's PlayStation 3 are coming in... erm, negative. At $600 and hyped to the sun I don't think many have stopped to question whether or not the PS3 would actually be any good. Ohh yes it has Cell teraflops coming out of its ears, but at the same time I could install Windows ME on my Alienware if I wanted to.

Time, T he New York Times (with Joystiq editor in agreement) and others besides have stopped to say to themselves "Erm, it's actually quite a clunky machine; the games aren't that great as of yet and we may have to wait for patches from Sony to get it right." That's correct folks, no longer can console gamers sniff at the constant patching PC users have to regularly undergo - it would seem that the PS3 will need to be patched to make it work better.

Complaints about the machine and its little quirks are abound - comparisons to the Xbox 360 are plentiful, pointing out that the PS3 can't play your music in-game; the wireless controller has to be plugged in before use (work that one out); there's no rumble on the controller anymore (to facilitate the half-baked motion sensitivity Sony mocked before it became popular); you can't download files in the background (try that 400 MB demo at the cost of not being able to play your games for three hours...)

All of these complaints come with the same clause: "Unlike the Xbox 360." Forgetting about the Wii entirely, it would appear that the Xbox 360 is the more polished, user-friendly box. I still think they're both over-priced (in software as well as hardware) and wouldn't buy either unless I got a big tax-break (and even then I'd think twice); but in the "I have money to burn" category it would seem that the Xbox 360 is the lighter of choice.

I await the Wii launch on this side of the pond on December 8^th. Rob gets to sit in LA with his today. No, I don't like him either.

Epic's first paddle into the market of single player first-person shooters has paid off in spectacular fashion as Gears of War has shifted over a million copies in the two weeks since its November 7 launch.

Gears of War was hyped up to the high heavens, but surpassing Halo on the Xbox Live stakes and shifting so many copies is a spectacular result. By my reckoning there's one copy of GoW for every seven or so Xbox 360's worldwide. Not bad at all.

I'm considering actually buying myself an Xbox 360 come February or so. If Microsoft can offer a price cut by then and games like GoW aren't up in the "€25 short of €100" price band it might just be a mature enough system to consider.

There, see, Microsoft is turning me around. Slowly. That's a good sign for the next-gen, eh?

For some time now, I've been trying to get my hands on a Wii. And it's proven to be a most difficult task, even though Nintendo's new console has had much more available units than Sony's PlayStation 3. In fact, the pursuit of Wii- piness has pretty much consumed me for the last couple weeks. See, I lost out of the pre-orders because I simply wasn't quick on the draw. My colleague Mark Raby at TG Daily scored one, the lucky S.O.B. I thought about lining up for one at the EB Games/GameStop at Universal CityWalk here in L.A., where Nintendo held its officia l West Coast midnight launch event. But there was that whole work thing standing in the way. Oh well.

I had planned on scouring the earth -- or at least the greater L.A. area -- for a Wii at various retail outlets Sunday morning, but I was thoroughly exhausted from my second midnight console launch event in three days that I slept late. Again, I just wasn't quick on the draw. I called a number of stores to see if they had any in stock. No dice. This is the problem with living in a city that has millions of people, tons of gamers, and lots and lots of folks who evade steady employment. So I jumped online early Monday morning to see if there were any sites still selling the console. And I found one:

Wal-Mart. Ugh.

I normally don't shop at Wal-Mart. I find some of their practices to be distasteful. But hey, they had Wiis, and I wasn't about to split hairs. I pulled the trigger and scored. Finally! The price was steep: $796.84. Wal-Mart was only selling the super-duper bundle that required the purchase of eight games. Like I wouldn't have bought eight games anyway! I was crushed, however, when I discovered there was no Twilight Princess or Call of Duty 3 units available. Whatever. Live to fight another day. I snatched up eight games, and ordered next day-shipping via UPS. Here's how it broke down:

Wii console: $249.82

Marvel: Ultimate Alliance: $49.82

Red Steel: $49.82

Cars: $49.82

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent: $49.82

Excite Truck: $49.82

Far Cry Vengeance: $49.82

Dragon Ball Z: $49.82

Need for Speed Carbon: $49.82

Shipping: $94.97

Sales tax: $53.49

So the order was confirmed on November 20. With Thanksgiving just a few days away, I wasn't sure that Wal-Mart would be able to ship any of the stuff by Wednesday. But to my surprise, my Wal-Mart order track said most items, including the Wii itself, "will arrive" by Tuesday 11/21 and Wednesday 11/22. Next day shipping indeed! So why after more than a week hasn't anything showed up yet? Stay tuned...

We've seen plenty of psychiatric studies in recent years that examine the behavioral effects of playing video games, especially violent games. For example, earlier this year I interviewed Dr. Craig Anderson, a professor of psychology at Iowa St. University who is recognized as a leading expert in the effects of media violence. These psychological examinations have long suggested there are significant effects of playing hours and hours of violence video games, but there hasn't been as much hard scientific data to indicate what the effects are exactly.

However, a new study indicates that there are indeed physical effects on the brain that manifest themselves during the play of violent titles. Dr. Vincent Mathews, professor of radiology at the Indiana University School of Medicine, lead a recent study that randomly selected 44 adolescents to play a violent game or a "nonviolent but equally fun and exciting game" for 30 minutes to see how their brains reacted. The games selected were Medal of Honor: Frontline, which is a mildly violent T-rated title, and the completely nonviolent racing game Need for Speed: Underground. Using MRI technology, the doctors observed and recorded the differences in brain activity during the 30 minutes.

According to Dr. Mathews' study, the adolescents who had played violent video games exhibited more brain activity in a region thought to be important for emotional arousal and less activity in a brain region associated with executive functions, which includes the ability to plan, shift, control and direct one's thoughts and behavior. Meanwhile, the group that played the nonviolent game exhibited more activation in the prefrontal portions of the brain, which are control inhibition, concentration and self-control, and showed less activation in the area involved in emotional arousal.

"Our study indicates that playing a certain type of violent video game may have different short-term effects on brain function than playing an exciting but nonviolent game," Dr. Mathews said in a press statement about the new study. It's not clear, of course, what the long-term effects on brain activity are for playing these two titles, and the IU researchers have said they plan on conducting future studies that examine the duration of violence in video games and its effect on brain functions.

While 44 adolescents are a relatively small sample for such a big issue like video game violence, I for one am intrigued by these studies. I think it's laughable to suggest violent games will lead to children killing people in Grand Theft Auto-style. On the other hand, I suspect there may be smaller, more subtle effects on the brain from playing games 10 hours a day. I wonder if IU is taking applications for its next video game study...

The Xbox 360 is the winner of the current console war. A bit of a premature statement considering as how the PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii have only been on the market long enough to have their first technical teething problems? I think not, and here's why:

The Xbox 360 has won the current generational console war because it was first to market and is the most mature system out there. There are over 7.5 million Xbox 360's in the wild as we