A University of Michigan economics professor was recently brought in as an expert witness in a class-action lawsuit filed by a pair of gamers that accuses Electronic Arts of using its exclusive licensing deal with the NFL to muscle Madden NFL competitor NFL 2K out of the picture. Dr. Jeffrey MacKie-Mason alleged that EA overcharged those who bought Madden games between US$ 701 million and US$ 926 million from 2006 through 2009. Big numbers there, but analyst Michael Pachter thinks it's nothing more than horse manure.

If the analysts turn out right, then we just might see the fourth consecutive sales decline in the June results of NPD, and then we'll see that price cut happen. Michael Pachter of Wedbush Morgan and Jesse Divinich of EEDAR are synonymous in saying that sales will most likely be down by around 20-23%.

It's quite an emotional rollercoaster, this week really was. Straight off from the news that the King of Pop has died, we went on to have the usual string of gaming news that rocked our own worlds. With the usual news on lawsuits, layoffs, company shutdowns, convicted murderers over consoles, it was looking to be a sad state of affairs. Good thing we've got our own Neverland to brighten things up a bit. And now we've come to the Fourth of July weekend. Time to kick off those shoes, stretch out, unwind and celebrate. You know we all deserve it. Happy FOJ weekend, everyone!

According to the latest survey by the NPD, gaming has attracted a larger female audience in 2009 than in 2008, more significantly in consoles. The number of lady gamers out there increased by up to 4% both in "heavy portable" and "extreme games" as compared to last year. More after the jump.

No, no, no. Don't be confused by the "QuickPeek" in the title. This has got nothing to do with the weekly QuickPeeks we offer you guys. This one's the E3 2009 edition. As in, this is a quick look-back at the things that happened, things that were said, things that would have been better off had it actually occurred -- basically a trip back down memory lane -- on the big 3's E3 2008 experience.

Let's take a look at how Nintendo did in the year following E3 2008.

This is a rather unique position we are in. The E3 is nearing, and yet we've got just about the biggest surge we've had the past couple of months. Okay, that might well be an exaggeration, but still. You gotta agree with me when I say it was a busy past week, yes? Rumors, confirmation of rumors, and surprising - yet at the same time not-so-surprising - NPD results for this month all proved to be the cherry on top for this game-filled, fun-filled week. Hmmm.. imagine all those cherries on top.... Dig in, then.

Now this be crazy! The April results from NPD show that the DS outsold all other platforms combined, thanks to its whopping one million units sold. Satoru Iwata, adopt me now.

The old: the music may be decades old but the most successful band in history charges into the gaming world, showing us its box art and its bundle. As for the new, Nintendo's fancy new controller is not looking back - you're gonna have to get the new games if you want to make full use of Wii MotionPlus since Nintendo won't add support for older games. Meanwhile, Nintendo is looking forward to coming months, where they expect the hardware sales that they've enjoyed for a long time.

Brain food! While you're busy trying to avoid getting crunched by hordes of Majini, Capcom's busy crunching Resident Evil 5 sales figures by the hundreds of thousands: well, one and a half million, to be exact. Yes, the NPD software sales figures for the month of March have already been released, and in that report, we find RE5 on the Xbox 360 and  PS3 bringing home the bacon (and the meat, and the brains, and the guts...). See the full article for the breakdown on software sales.

After exceeding expectations last month, the NPD data for the month of March 2009 now shows a lot of dips in hardware sales. Has the video game industry's resilience to the economic crunch finally been broken?