In case the plethora of colors available for Nintendo’s killer handheld, Europe will be getting a silver version on October 12th.

Nintendo DS has become Europe’s best-selling games console, with over 14 million sold to date and in many markets across Europe it is the fastest selling handheld games console in history. Strong sales are being maintained even in traditionally slow sales periods in the video games industry’s seasonality and this is being seen with software as well as hardware.

I’m convinced the DS really does print money.

Hit the jump for more…

Guitar Hero II is a real fun game and when I heard you could download games it got even better, until I heard the price tag of the songs. Many people have expressed the same level of dislike in the pricy songs yet here we are with more than two million single songs accessed through the Xbox LIVE Marketplace since April. That is a lot of downloads of items people complained about and with Guitar Hero III scheduled to feature Master Tracks, Original Songs and more Downloadable Content, Activision will be swimming in cash in no time.

From the press release:

SUNNYVALE, Calif., Sep 11, 2007 – Downloadable Xbox 360 video game song packs for Activision, Inc.’s (Nasdaq:ATVI) Guitar HeroTM II hit multi-platinum status with more than 650,000 downloads through Xbox LIVE Marketplace® in less than five months, as defined by the music industry’s RIAA. Each downloadable pack contains three individual songs. Individual songs combined have topped the two million mark, making the Guitar Hero II packs some of the most downloaded content on Xbox LIVE Marketplace.
Hit the jump for more…

Looks like the outcry of early adoptors hearing of the price break has worked. The Apple Inc. CEO Steve Jobs publicy apologized and offered $100 credits this afternoon to customers who had already shelled out the $599 full price for their iPhone. Many were unhappy when the company unexpectedly slashed the price $200 in a push to boost holiday sales. At least a $100 rebate is not a bad compromise and a great show of good faith by Apple, think of the extra $100 you paid as a fee to get them first.

The PS3 looks to be gaining some ground since it’s price drop last month. In June, Sony’s console sold roughly half of the Xbox 360’s 200k units. In July, they closed the gap a ton. Neither one can catch the Wii though, which is now the fastest selling console of all time. Here’s how they all stacked up in July:

• Wii – 425k
• Nintendo DS – 405k
• PlayStation 2 – 222k
• PlayStation Portable – 214k
• Xbox 360 – 170k
• PlayStation 3 – 159k
• Game Boy Advance – 87k

Hit the jump for more…

Sony’s CFO Nobuyuki Oneda sure knows how to put a spin on a bad situation. Because the company did not sell as many PS3’s as expected, they didn’t have as much of a loss for the gaming division as expected. Sony loses roughly $200 on every PS3 sold. Taking a loss on hardware is typical for all console sales, but that’s a pretty big number.

Looking on the bright side, Oneda said, “Sales of the PS3 have risen but we booked losses due to our strategic decision to price it below the (production) cost. Actually, because the number of units sold was not as high as we hoped, the loss was better than our original expectation”.

Way to turn something crappy into a semi-positive there buddy. It would be much better for the company to sell a ton of PS3 and take that loss as they regain some market share.

Double Fusion, who is basically the Michael Jordan of video gaming research has just conducted a breakthrough research project that will forever change how marketing is done for future games. Why is this important? Chances are if you are reading this, you are the ones being targeted for their findings. Here are some of the major highlights in the study:

• 75% of gamers engage with at least one ad per minute across most, but not all, game types; 81% of gamers engage at least every other minute
• Less-cluttered ads are three times as effective at garnering gamer notice than ads that are either cluttered or within cluttered environments
• While both contribute positively to ad engagement, placement of the ad in the primary camera plane (eye-level) is more important than large size ads
• Not all ads are created equal – dynamic billboards, around-game interstitials, sponsorships, and interactive product placements all offer different levels of user engagement and pervasiveness in the game
• The data obtained from the study forms the basis for a new view on gaming measurement, which will allow gaming media plans to be constructed in a way that is both comparable and additive to other media plans

It seems that the focus will be for in-game advertising or product placement. Some examples are the Axe ads or GM cars in Rainbow Six Vegas.

“The program we conducted for Double Fusion measures actual viewing and gives precise information on how to plan for ad units, how to design ads, and what to expect in terms of gamer engagement,” commented Michael Dowling, CEO, Interpret. “

Furthermore, it was also reported that Eidos has hired Double Fusion to help with ad placement in no less than 10 of their upcoming titles.

I suppose the moral of the story is that you will see A LOT more ads in games, so don’t feel like your developers are selling out, they are just trying to meet sales quotas. On the other hand, if I see a Home Depot sticker on a Warthog, I am going to be thoroughly disappointed.

Sources close to Game Informer have dropped a little tidbit of information… Nintendo is looking to move it’s sales and marketing staff out of their home in Redmond, WA. Nintendo has had all of it’s US staff in Redmond since 1982.

The move, expected to happen as early as this fall, could see new offices opening either in New York or San Francisco.

From Game Informer:

Employees of Nintendo of America were told on Thursday that they would have to decide by June 1st whether or not they would be willing to relocate or accept a severance package. Our sources indicated these new offices would be opened as early as this Fall.

I think this is a smart move, since most game companies are based around those two cities. We’ll see how it pans out.

The PS3 launched in PAL territories last Friday, and we’re not getting reports of sales numbers from Europe.

In the UK, we now have a new leader for the fasting selling launch console ever. The PS3 sold 165,000 units, trouncing the competition in it’s opening weekend. The Xbox 360 sold around 70,000 units in it’s opening weekend in the UK, with the Wii seeing around 105,000 units sold in it’s opening stint.

This is pretty surprising, given the media coverage for the PS3 launch in Europe. All reports were of slow sales, but this turns those reports around.

In the same breath, PS3 games are leading the UK sales charts, with Resistance and Motorstorm claimed the top two spots.

Maybe the PS3 isn’t so doomed after all…

In a recent issue of Reader’s Digest there was an article discussing the overall video game sales last year being estimated at $12.5 billion dollars. Now that is a lot of Double cheeseburgers. Not only were the sales of video games on the rise, but also the number of professional leagues and tournaments as evidenced by the rise in popularity of Major League Gaming or the MLG. Some pro gamers can earn upwards of $250,000 a year and even get paid $150 an hour to “teach” people to play games. So the next time your mom or wife yells at you for playing games just let her know that you are in training, shit even Jordan has to shoot hoops to get better. Game on!

The PS3 is launching in Europe this week, to little fanfare. A quick glimpse online will show that pre-orders for PS3 in the EU aren’t going as planned for Sony. It’s a couple days before launch, and retailers still have more consoles in stock than pre-orders. Doesn’t bode well for Sony.

Not to mention the fact that the PS3 is being outsold by the GBA in North America (according the February NPD sales numbers). Sony needs to step up their game. I don’t think Home is enough to boost sales of the console.

Even Sony’s head honcho, Howard Stringer, isn’t completely convinced the PS3 is gonna make it. In an interview with SmartHouse, he said: 

And when asked about the popularity of Nintendo’s Wii vs. PS3 , Stringer said, “Wii is a wonderful device, but has a different target audience. If we fail, it is because we positioned PS3 as the Mercedes of the video game field. PS3 is after a different audience and it can be whatever it wants — a home server, game device, even a computer.”

Ummm… that’s not very convincing. You have Phil Harrison saying the PS3 is going to dominate the market, etc. etc. Then you have Stringer saying “If we fail…”. There’s some confidence for you. Not saying “If we aren’t number 1″, the man is preparing people for failure. Either he chose his words very poorly, or he sees the writing on the wall.

We’ll see how things go in the rest of the world later this week.