On to fifth issue of QuickJump QuickPeek! Positive feedback has been strong and if there's one thing we love to do outside playing videogames, that's got to be making sure you guys are liking your stay here. So amidst the fanboyish shouts of "Avada Kevadra" and "Erecto Wand" (opps, wrong spell) from Potter maniacs here at the office, we bring you the round-up of the things that shook the halls of the gaming industry this week.


PlayStation Portable
Welcome to our fifth issue! For this run, we have more news that prove how strong the PSP homebrew scene is. For starters, we have Sony CEO Jack Tretton signifying support for PSP homebrew. For those who missed this report, try pulling those raised eyebrows a little lower first.

OK, this "little" revelation was made on an IGN interview with Sony bigwigs Tretton, senior manager Patrick Seybold, and senior director Dave Karraker. When asked whether they have any plans of giving PSP homebrew some long-deser...

Japan loves 'em Gundam games, no doubt about that. Mobile Suit Gundam MS Front 0079, which will be appearing on the Wii, seems to be yet another title that will put thousands of gamers and otaku in awe.

Dreamcast owners who grabbed Gundam Side Story: Rise from the Ashes will feel right at home with this new title. Utilizing Wii's motion sensing capabilities to take down enemy mobile suits from inside your cockpit, mech action and shooter fans would want to take a look at what seems to be the best Gundam video game yet.

How can we say that so confidently, you ask? Well, here's a video to win your heart. Head over to the Read link to find more.

  
Now that June has come and gone, the NPD Group finally released the resulting numbers of the console war from the period of March to June, and the entire first half of 2007. Check out the numbers in the graphs Ars Technica has provided to illustrate how each console fared, and judge for yourselves.

For the March-June graph, we can clearly see that the Wii shot through the ceiling with impressive numbers, with Xbox 360 going second and the PlayStation 3 falling in third. It should be noted that Sony has a big plan despite its losses though, and the fruits of its labor will clearly show should Blu-ray win the format wars.

On the handheld side, the DS towers over ALL systems, even the next-gen consoles. The PSP, while having lower numbers, is doing relatively well and is the only system whose numbers steadily increase as each month passes.

Moving on to the console sales charts for the first half of 2007, the order of how each console fared well ...

It's common knowledge that the Christmas holidays are very important for boosting market sales. This also applies to the gaming industry, as Paul Hochman of Today notes. He writes that the big three console makers will be having some problems this holiday season, facing their "biggest shakeup in years," due to some deficiencies on each console maker's part.

For the Xbox 360, Hochman cites its persistent problem of product malfunctions - the now-infamous Red Ring of Death - something that Microsoft is scrambling to fix with an allocated US 1 billion budget and an extended 3-year-warranty. Microsoft also advised customers to wait at least one week while their console is being repaired.

In Nintendo Wii's case, all seems peachy for the console. However, there's one spot that Nintendo hasn't managed to fully fix, and that's undersupply.

With an almost chronic case of undersupply, the quest for a Nintendo Wii usually involves the following inconveniences: queuing...

Care for a dose of fast and explosive swordplay? We've got the first trailer for Sega's upcoming video game for the Wii, Bleach: Shattered Blade.

In this sword-clashing title, we'll be seeing Ichigo and the rest of the crew battling against the arrancar. For those who aren't familiar with the manga or the anime, arrancar are the Hollows who can rip their masks off and use shinigami (death god) powers. Anyway, in the Bleach: Shattered Blade trailer, we see a number of easily distinguishable characters: Ganju Shiba, Kenpachi Zaraki, Renji Abarai, Toshiro Hitsugaya, and Byakuya Kuchiki.

Check out the video and see if you like Bleach's first Wii outing. We'll be bringing you more news on Bleach: Shattered Blade so stay glued.

Totally Games has revealed that adding RPG elements and keeping things a little more logical for Alien Syndrome is proving to be a challenge. On a recent developer diary log from senior designer Jeff Kung, new details have been dropped as to what this new PlayStation Portable and Nintendo Wii title has in store.

Game historians will recall the original Alien Syndrome as an arcade-style run and gun classic by Sega. The resurrection of the franchise sees a change in genre as  a more action-RPG-oriented presentation is utilized. Emphasis on balance, realism, and quirkiness have taken the premium and it's looking good.

Starting with weapons, the devs made it a point that a balance must be struck between melee and ranged weapons to give everyone a playing field level enough to accommodate everyone's style of play.

While melee weapons require you to get close to enemies, they do offer a chaining effect that allows you to pull off devastating combos against foe...

The man who's about taking names, kicking ass, and making games sat down in an exclusive interview with GamePro to receive major feedback of the Nintendo Wii's continuing success in - and apparently even outside - the gaming industry. When asked on three most pressing issues, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime appeared to sit back comfortably into the ol' Reggie as we all knew him.

 
Perhaps the biggest issue is how many Nintendo fans, which include the core gamers, suddenly feel left behind, despite the DS and Wii breaking sales milestones every quarter of a fiscal year. With so many casual, mini-game and non-gamer appealing titles being shoveled, hardcore gamers felt as if they were shot in the back by the Japanese gaming giant.

Games that cater to the core are apparently taking too long, and there are very few and far between in terms of caliber and gameplay level being delivered in the third-party development front. Fils-Aime took the opportu...

Here's the latest for the soon-to-be-released Bleach games: the US will be getting the same playable content as the Japanese version so they will also enjoy the same unlockable content and characters. In short, everything from the Jap version will be intact.

Bleach: Shattered Blade for the Wii promises to be sword-wielding fun using the Wiimote. It will have a total of 32 playable characters and features multiplayer combat.
Bleach: The Blade of Fate for the DS features a new kind of battle system that takes advantage of the two screens. To read more about the aspects of each game, check out our previous article.

Bleach: Shattered Blade and Bleach: The Blade of Fate will both be released this October 9. Hey look, screenshots!

    

Wii owners in Europe take notice - Kirby's Ghost Trap and Devil's Crush will be making their way to your consoles very, very soon, via Nintendo's offering to the retro world, the Virtual Console.

Let's hop onto the time machine and pretend it's 1995 once more, just to see what these games are all about.

First up is Kirby's Ghost Trap. Not quite the ghost-busting title we'd want Kirby to star in, but a very fun puzzle game nonetheless. Defeat each and every one of Kirby's foes by strategically stacking and blending fast-moving, color-coded blobs.

If you do it right, you'll cause a massive chain reaction that will cause a torrent of ghostly ghouls to rain upon your hapless enemies. Featuring 16 levels and familiar enemies from the Kirby Universe, any fan of the pink blob with a black hole for a stomach will feel at home with this VC title. Kirby's Ghost Trap is available for download for a mere pittance of 800 Wii points.

Next up is the aptly-titled D...

Filed under: Mods, Peripherals, Controller


As if installing LEDs into the Wii's remote, nunchuck, and casing wasn't enough, the art of arbitrarily jamming lights into things has spread to Wii peripherals, like an STD infecting a new host after amorous contact.

Selling for about $20.50, CoolMods' handgun shell is as direct as you can get; just slide your remote into the pistol's plastic housing, and you're good to go. Though there doesn't seem to be any room to hook up a nunchuck, the LED-friendly clear design more than makes up for it. Of course, you could always just wrap a string of Christmas lights around the Wii Zapper when it comes out, but don't you think that'd look a little goofy? Check past the post break for another look at this totally-not-goofy-at-all gun shell.



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