Though all eyes are trained at Sin City for 2008's Consumer Electronics Show this week, news are still streaming from other parts of the globe. Last week in the UK, Nintendo continued to reign supreme in individual unit sales, while EA Sports' FIFA 08 kicked off to a grand start and kept Activision's Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare at bay. Head on to the full story for more.

 

If Ms. Kidman making fun of herself wasn't motivation enough for you to get More Brain Training, then maybe two more Aussie celebrities might do the trick. Couple Kieren and Symantha Perkins will also be joining the extensive campaign for More Brain Training from Dr. Kawashima: How Old Is Your Brain?

Nintendo Australia is certainly picking a diverse group of people to promote its product. Kieren Perkins was a former Olympic swimmer, with several gold and silver medals under his belt. He is currently a member of Swimming Australia, and is considered an Australian Living Treasure. His wife, Symantha Perkins, is mother to their 3 children; she's also a TV personality, and a charity ambassador.

More Brain Training, a sequel to Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training: How Old Is Your Brain? and part of Nintendo's Touch! Generations campaign, is scheduled for a July 5 release in Australia.

Nintendo is big time. We all know this obvious fact. Some would ask: how big exactly is Nintendo? Well, big enough to hire Nicole Kidman for Brain Training commercials in the UK.

There is almost no excuse to not knowing who this gigantic star is. Academy Award winner, three time Golden Globe award winner for best actress, Companion of the Order of Australia - she's the ideal actress that many can only hope to be.

Metro.co.uk reports that this celebrity known worldwide will be pulling up her sleeves to promote a game she likes. As if not content with looking grand at 40, she wishes to keep her mind young too. Kidman said, 'I've quickly found that training my brain is a great way to keep my mind feeling young."

Utada Hikaru in Japan, Nicole Kidman in the UK - who's the next superstar Nintendo will acquire? We know for sure, that we'll be seeing cream of the crop on more Ninty commercials to come.

The multi-million selling Brain Training series continues with More Brain Training From Dr. Kawashima: How Old Is Your Brain?, the second installment in the franchise. Featuring all new exercises and DS Brain Age Checks, this is set to challenge even the most trained brains as it launches across Europe late next month.

More Brain Training From Dr. Kawashima: How Old Is Your Brain? uses the same format as its predecessor. The game is held like a book and players use the touch screen and microphone features of the Nintendo DS. The popular numbers game Sudoku also makes a return in this new title.

The DS Brain Age Checks take on a new form in this title as players are tested on three randomly selected exercises such as old school classic Rock, Paper, Scissors which asks you to name the position to either win or lose against the object shown and Speedy Symbols which challenges your memory of symbols associated with specific numbers.

More Brain Training From Dr. Kawashima: How Old Is Your Brain? launches in Europe on June 29 for a suggested retail price of around €30 (GBP 20, US$ 41).

We recently posted an article on some gaming gift ideas for Mothers Day, and one of the things mentioned in that particular post was a Nintendo DS. If you don't have the money for one just yet, then this new contest from Nintendo of Australia might just be what you need.

Up for grabs are a pink Nintendo DS Lite and a copy of Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training: How Old Is Your Brain?. All you need to do to take a stab at winning the prize is to answer the following question in 25 words or less: "Why would you like to win this prize for your mum?" You could also get your mother to answer this question: "As a mum why would you like to win a Nintendo DS Lite and Brain Training?"

Of course, since this contest is sponsored by Nintendo of Australia, chances are this is for Australians only, so those of us outside Australia would have to make do with saving up our money. You also have to be a member of the Nintendo Members Club to join. Click on the "via" link below for more info.

British educational charity D&AD has announced that several Sony and Nintendo titles have been nominated for its prestigious Yellow Pencil design awards. The D&AD Global Awards aim to recognise original, well-executed, and inspiring work which is "relevant to its context."

The nominees from the Sony camp include the PSP title LocoRoco and the PS2 titles Shadow of the Colossus and Buzz!: The Big Quiz. Over on the Nintendo side, DS title Brain Training and Wii title Wii Sports were nominated.

When the D&AD started its gaming awards category last year, a DS title - Nintendogs - took home a Yellow Pencil award. Resident Evil 4, which was released for both the Nintendo GameCube and Sony PS2, also won a Yellow Pencil in last year's awards ceremonies.

The winners of this year's Yellow Pencil awards will be announced on May 24.

And a-here we go! Mario's definitely pumping up his white-gloved fists by now.

The Wii console has topped the Amazon (UK) charts for the most searched-for term during 2006. Heck, in just one week of the Christmas period, the Wii was searched for 300,000 times, bumping "Star Wars" and "iPod" off the "searched-for term" pipeline (considering the console was launched only on December 8 in Europe, that's a huge feat!).

The success even spills over to the DS as some of its titles have been able to sit comfortably on the top 10 selling items of last year. Right on top and reigning as king of the list is Brain Training, followed immediately by Lego Star Wars II and Sims 2: Pets.

Amazon reports how these numbers give us an insight of how consumers' buying habits have changed nowadays:

As systems such as the Nintendo Wii and DS expand the appeal of gaming beyond the traditionally perceived audience of teenage boys, sales of videogames on Amazon.co.uk are reflecting a real change in the types of games Brits want. 2006 saw top-selling violent games of the past, such as Grand Theft Auto and Medal of Honor, replaced by more family-friendly titles with broader appeal.

Fair enough. But how long would Nintendo reign supreme on the Amazon UK charts? Nintendo has barely begun their epic adventure with the Wii. Remember, this year alone (hoping, that is), we could see the likes of Super Mario Galaxy and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption hitting retail shelves. Keep it up, Nintendo!

MCV reports that Christmas week of 2006 proved to be the biggest ever for UK games retailers, with sales up nearly ten per cent by units and nearly five per cent by value. The rise during the week before Christmas was even more evident, with both unit and value sales improving by over 30 per cent.

EA's Need for Speed: Carbon led a massive push for the games market in the final week of the year, eclipsing the company's own FIFA 07 for the top spot on the ChartTrack All Formats Top 40. An EA title has claimed the top spot on the charts a total of 26 times throughout 2006, making the year EA's most successful one in the UK charts.

Konami's Pro Evolution Soccer 6 got third place in the charts, ahead of Activision’s Call of Duty 3 in fourth. Another EA title, Sims 2: Pets, is at five, with THQ’s WWE Smackdown vs Raw in sixth place and Midway’s Happy Feet in seventh. At eighth, the DS title Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training climbed three places to overtake Gears of War, which in turn fell two places to ninth. LucasArts' Lego Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy claimed the final Top Ten position.

Thanks to continued console shipments, a lot of Wii titles also got a push up the charts. Most notable is Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess which climbed one place to 11th.

Nintendo's definitely starting their Korean invasion. The Korean Nintendo website has finally gone live, complete with a celebrity (in this case, Korean actor Jang Dong-gun) doing some heavy-duty DS promotion (he's playing Brain Training on a crystal white DS Lite).

The website, which in our opinion is rather pleasing to the eye, also includes some "experience" videos to give people an idea on how the DS works. You can also check out a list of available titles on the site. Although the list is quite short at the moment, Nintendo has said that future games are sure to see localizations, so that list is sure to balloon soon enough.

Different color variants of the DS Lite (including "Noble Pink") are also showcased in the website (I still cannot pinpoint the exact time in history when pink became associated with the word "noble").

Who said video games were bad for you? Your mother might be trying to pry you away from your console or handheld, but things down under are quite something else. For the Greenhills Primary School at Melbourne, Australia, they're actually encouraging their students to own up to their gaming addiction - to an extent, of course.

Their students of Grades 5 and 6 are getting their hands on the Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training game and all 150 students involved in the preliminary trial are enjoying it. James Penson wrote Nintendo a proposal of letting their students incorporate it into their curriculum since their school believes in the same concept of "working daily to improve and grow our brains and minds." He has this to say:

These has been really great benefits. The kids were very reluctant to practise times tables, whereas now they can't get enough of it (as part of the game). It's really good for some of my students who are weaker in maths. I have found it has got them up to speed and has given them a lot of confidence.

Trial as it still might be, both the students and their parents will be evaluate the test run by the end of the term. Safe to say, there hasn't been any objections on the "video game workshop" so far. Chances are, their curriculum just might get approved and fully incorporate the game into the education system.

Don't you wish you could go back to elementary school now, huh?