Nintendo finally announced WiiWare, aka original downloadable games on the Wii — coming in 2008. I wonder if consumers will be confused by all the terminology (Virtual Console vs. WiiWare vs. Shop Channel), if they’ll appreciate the distinctions, or if they’ll even notice either way? (That’s an honest question, not a leading one.) Anyway, on a positive note, I’m really excited to see what indie developers will do with the Wiimote. On a negative note, I have a hard time believing Reggie’s statement that Nintendo won’t “screen ideas,” given Nintendo’s brand positioning, historical behavior, etc. I also wonder how a developer can “qualify” for getting onto the service if the quality of their proposal isn’t being taken into consideration. Size of the studio? Age? Previous relationship with Nintendo? None of those bode well for a very wide swath of independent developers. Given all that, I will assume the statement is an exaggeration.

The MacArthur Foundation is putting $1.1M into a new middle and high school in New York that will feature a curriculum “based on videogames”. That doesn’t appear to mean “kids will play educational games all day” (though I’m sure that will be part of the curriculum). Very little detail is offered, and what little there is would confuse the heck out of most normal people (i.e. anyone not in the serious games industry or academia.) Let’s hope to see better PR for this in the future.

Steve Wozniak, David Jaffe and Nolan Bushnell are guest starring in Code Monkeys, an “8-bit style” gaming and pop culture parody cartoon debuting July 11th on G4. The show follows the employees of “GameAvision” and is apparently rife with industry in-jokes. Looking forward to it! :-)

BioWare is developing a Nintendo DS RPG based on Sonic the Hedgehog. If any company can pull this off (and that’s not a given), it will be Bioware. Kudos to SEGA for trying something different, and for having the sense to sign a world-class partner.

There’s a three part interview of me published on XBLArcade.com. If you’re interested in Xbox Live Arcade, you will probably enjoy it. If not, feel free to pass. :-)

BTW, I’m sorry that I have written so infrequently as of late. I confess to: A) being smitten by summer fever, and B) being a bit preoccupied. I’ve accepted an invitation by Pearson to write a book about business and video games. Not the business of games per se, but a book about how businesses of all kinds can take advantage of games. By, for example, using games to train their employees, using games to advertise to their customers, using games to crowd-source, etc. I’ll be co-writing the book with a brilliant friend, Ethan Mollick, who has graciously agreed to work with me. Which is great, because otherwise I might still be writing this book ten years from now.

(Actually, I couldn’t. These pesky publishing contracts appear to include deadlines.)

• Wizards of the Coast has launched Gleemax, a portal with a focus on self-expression (show off your D&D character, your Magic deck, etc) and community — both local and international. Wizards hopes that local gaming stores will sign up, promote themselves, and organize events through an online calendar that will automatically populate local players’ pages with upcoming events.
• MTVN has launched its fifth virtual world in a year, “Virtual Lower East Side,” a very detailed replica of the actual Lower East Side in NYC. It will apparently focus on music/bands.
• Gamasutra’s analysis of the latest NPD numbers for the game industry.
• Capcom will distribute games via Steam like several other major publishers. And speaking of Valve, they’ve joined forces with startup Tournament.com to offer wagering services to players of skill-based video games.
• EA is bringing some of its top titles to the Mac and sim-shipping Madden NFL 08 on Mac & consoles. Steve Jobs must be pleased about that.
• SCEA launched PlayStation.Blog, which features posts from an assortment of SCEA insiders (somewhat like Microsoft’s Gamerscore blog). Everyone is quick to call it “long overdue” but it won’t take long for the blog to gain readership.

It recently occurred to me that video game publishers might be well served by having an internal advocate for different demographic groups. (The details: i.e. is it one specific person or several people with other responsibilities are less interesting to me than the idea itself.)

The idea came to mind when I was thinking about Marble Blast Ultra, one of our XBLA games. I have heard it said on more than one occasion that “if Marble Blast Ultra included a sandbox mode in which there were no penalties, no timers, etc, it would be a perfect kid’s game.” Conversely, when playing Pokemon Diamond, I’ve often thought “if only there were a way to speed up the rather slow and repetitive feeling of battles (among other related issues), this game might have some chance of appealing to more adults.”

(Those of you who’ve played Pokemon will understand what I’m talking about here. How many times do I need to sit through the same animation of the same attack? Is it OK to be bored after the 500th time I’ve watched the “throwing my pokeball into the field” animation? The repetition is valuable to kids but adults might enjoy a “skip” option…)

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• Some information about the size of the market for casual MMOs for children.
• I’m really excited about Fracture, a shooter being made by LucasArts. Your weapons dramatically deform the terrain around you, with tactical implications for all involved. LucasArts is also promising a “richer narrative”… let’s hope they deliver!
• The History Channel is accompanying each episode of the new show Dogfights with game episodes that mirror the content of the show. Watch a famous dogfight, then participate in it.
• Fun “crayon” game, done in under a week by the talented Petri Purho.
• EA announced the establishment of EA Casual Entertainment, a new division focused on casual games, headed by former Activision Publishing president Kathy Vrabeck.
• A report by Game Informer suggests that 90% of Nintendo’s sales and marketing staff will choose to leave the company rather than leave Redmond (as part of a previously-announced group relocation.) This includes three top executives. The whole thing’s a bit of a head-scratcher.
• 2K Games has developed HistoriCanada, a Civ3 mod that teaches Canadian history. It will be packaged with copies of Civilization III and donated to 100,000 Canadian high school students.
• Nice article about business simulations, including thoughts on the serious and not-so-serious. (For those who read it: I played the beer game during my Sloan orientation. Ah… memories.)

• The Sims is being made into a film by 20th Century Fox. Seems like they intend to work the “god game” angle for the film. Probably the only way to handle it, given the nature of The Sims. Even so, I’m dubious.
• Steam has 13M+ “active” accounts. I’d like to know the definition of “active.”
• According to Nintendo, female purchases of the DS have increased 42 percent. Purchases by people 30+ are up 127 percent. Some interest info about the Wii in there, too.
• Nintendo also recently unveiled a bunch of games; the one that caught my eye was Drawn to Life, which lets you draw your in-game character, weapons, create moving platforms to help you traverse pits, etc. I’m consistently more impressed with DS titles than Wii titles; hoping that changes soon.
• The NY Times is publishing ‘newsgames’ created by Ian Bogost’s Persuasive Games. The games appear in the op-ed page (for paying subscribers only.) First up: FDA-themed Food Import Folly.
• Director John Woo and Warren Spector team up to create a game and movie called Ninja Gold. Easy to get excited about those two working together! That said: is it just me, or does “Ninja Gold” sound like the name of a $2 scratch-off lottery ticket?
• Google Maps: now letting you navigate urban areas in 3d, photo-realistic splendor. Pretty cool! Watch out for the avalanche of effusive blog posts declaring the imminent advent of google maps 3d MMO gaming. ;-)
• Microsoft just unveiled “Surface”, a tabletop display that’s extremely scratch-resistant, sensitive to touch, capable of “reading” printed information placed on it, and able to identify and interact with other digital products (like cameras). I’ve had the opportunity to play with Surface in the lab; it’s almost impossible to communicate how awesome it is in a few lines. This is going to be my new coffee table the instant a consumer model is available… and I almost never buy first generation tech products (Microsoft’s or otherwise!)