In a recent article in the Independent, a UK daily newspaper, they listed their top 50 video games of all time. Surprisingly, they said Wii sports was the greatest game of all time...
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Destructoid writes: "In a tragic turn of events, the American Council on Exercise released the results of a 2008 study, which revealed that WiiSports burns fewer calories than actually playing the real sport equivalent. MTVMultiplayer found the results via the PDF that was released yesterday. The meat of the findings was in this passage:

'Compared to golfing at a driving range (3.9 calories per minute), playing Wii Golf burned 0.8 calories less per minute. Actual bowling burns nearly twice as much (7.2 calories per minute) as Wii Bowling, while baseball burns 7.3 calories per minute and Wii Baseball burns 2.8 calories per minute less. Similarly, Wii Tennis burns 2.8 calories per minute less than the actual game (8.1 calories per minute). Finally, Wii Boxing burns about 3.0 calories per minute less than conventional sparring at 10.2 calories per minute.'

Captain Obvious was so busy with the nature of these findings, that he forgot how to fly and ate some pavement. Captain Obvious will be fine after his accident, but you may not be if you consider WiiSports a part of your exercise regimen. I have to say, as a gym addict, nothing can possibly replace what free weights, elliptical machines, or treadmills can do for your body in terms of calorie burning. A point of interest from the study reveals that they made participants in the WiiSports part actively play the game. That means, no sitting on the couch and waggling."
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New York, New York. So good they named it twice and decided to charge upwards of $2000 (£1000) a month for a poky studio flat.

Now Manhattanites fed up with breaking crockery or putting an arm through a wall of the city's famously petite apartments while playing their Nintendo Wiis can lash out to their heart's content.
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The Ohio AP reports: Sweat drips down Renee Mershon-Wollerman's face as she eyes a boxer across the ring.

She ducks left, punches. Her opponent, a Japanese amateur, throws an uppercut. Mershon-Wollerman counters. Jab. Right hook. Her opponent hits the canvas and doesn't get up.

Mershon-Wollerman goes to a neutral corner, but there are no high-fives, no celebration. Just a simple request from her trainer, Kristen Perusek: Pause the video game for a second and rate yourself on an exercise exertion scale.

Perusek and five other Cleveland State University students received a $6,000 grant from the school to conduct research this summer on how technology can help increase physical activity, especially among children. The students recently focused on how a Nintendo Wii boxing video game compares with a boxing bag workout.
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New research suggests that when it comes to frantic wrist-waggling, Americans are in a league of their own.

The American Council on Exercise (ACE) has just revealed the number of calories burned by a team of students playing virtual sports on Nintendo's Will console: digital bowling burns 3.9 calories (strictly, 'nutritional kilocalories') a minute, tennis expends 5.3 calories, while boxing KO's the opposition with a mighty 7.2 calories burned every 60 seconds.
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The American Council on Exercise has just released a small study suggesting that the Wii Sports games are better than sitting on your butt but not as good as doing the sports themselves.

In descending order of caloric burn, Wii's version of boxing burned an average of 7.2 calories a minute, tennis burned 5.3 calories a minute, baseball about 4.5, bowling about 3.9, and golf about 3.1. (That means 30-minute workouts burn 216, 159, 135, 117, and 93 calories, respectively.) That's less than the real-life activity in all cases; real bowling actually burns about twice as much as the Wii version. And only Wii's version of boxing counted as strenuous enough to meet the ACE's guidelines for endurance-building exercise.
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Nintendo's press conference held few surprises, but a new Animal Crossing, Wii Sports, and the announcement of Wii Music show that Nintendo is more dedicated to the casual market than ever. Ars reports from Nintendo's E3 press conference.
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Video games -- often regarded as nothing more than mindless entertainment for lethargic kids and teens -- are proving to be an effective, new tool to motivate patients to perform rehabilitation exercises. Rehabilitation therapists from the William Randolph Hearst Burn Center at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center are using the motion-sensitive Nintendo Wii video game console, along with traditional methods, to help patients recover from life-changing injuries.

Patients hold wireless remotes that control actions on screen. Players swing the controller to simulate realistic motions, like swinging a tennis racquet, swatting a baseball for a home run, among countless other motions. For burn patients or any patient with a skin graft, moving and stretching the skin is very painful, but imperative for a successful recovery.
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It's the first time a games console has made it into a club and that is, the Nintendo Wii. At the GATE complex in Newcastle, the bar "Mood" was advertising a Wii Sports lounge
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Ladies, forget "Sex and the City."

Now there's Wii Sports Boxing¿ and the city.

Last night, Nintendo invited women around the Big Apple to participate in a "Wii Sports Boxing in the City" competition (similar to last year's Wiimbledon). The event was held at a bar and restaurant located in midtown Manhattan, and Nintendo touted it as a chance for females "to throw a virtual punch or two while unwinding from a long day at work."

Seven women. One free Wii. Fourteen furious fists.
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Wii Sports has been recognized across the globe as one of the most approachable Wii titles. Furthermore, the game was one of the first titles from Nintendo in what appears to be a continuous supply of the "Wii ____" entitled brand. Even though Wii Sports was released more than a year and a half ago, one possible "effect" from the gameplay may be surprising. In a recent article from Kasidie, a claim is made that Wii Sports produces sexual tension. "Unlike many other games, Wii Sports strongly encourages physical activity among players. The games generally require movements modeled after the actual sports you are playing. This provides numerous opportunities for physical intimacy and heightened sexual tension ("Here, let me help you perfect your bowling stance. Let's start with those hips¿")."
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Today showed that Nintendo really does know no bounds, as along with John Stewart making his usual writers strike, Iraq and political references at the show he also was seen playing a game of Wii Sports on the huge screen that adorns the stage at the 80th Annual Academy Awards.
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When not planning an offensive on the UK games industry (allegedly), British Prime Minister Gordon Brown likes to engage in a bit of Wii Sports action in his living room with his four-year-old son.
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Famitsu via VGChartz reports from Jan 21st to Jan 27th, 2008, the hardware sales in Japan were as follows:

Console :

Wii : about 79k
DSL : about 75k
PS3 : about 29k
PS2 : about 11k
PSP : about 61k
360 : about 4.2k

Top 10

1. Wii Fit (Wii) : about 96k (total about 1.21m)
2. Winning Eleven: Ubiquitous Evolution 2008 (PSP) : about 70k
3. Lucky Star: Ryouou Gakuen Outou-Sai (PS2) : about 61k
4. Mario & Sonic at Beijing Olympics (DS) : about 54k (total about 145k)
5. Wii Sports (Wii) : about 28k (total about 2.69m)
6. Mario Party DS (DS) : about 26k (total about 1.56m)
7. Yggdra Union (PSP) : about 22k
8. Dora Base (DS) : about 22k (total about 141k)
9. Monster Hunter Portable 2 (PSP) : about 15k (total about 1.58m)
10. Wii Play (Wii) : about 14k (total about 2.15m)

New releases out of Charts(Top 30):

Exit (DS) : about 5.5k
Juiced 2: Hot Import Nights (PS3) : about 5k
The Sims 2 (DS) : about 3.7k
TOCA RACE DRIVER3 THE ULTIMATE RACING SIMULATOR (PS2) : about 0.75k
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Wii

Wii Sports - 17,850,000
Wii Play - 9,230,000
Super Mario Galaxy - 5,190,000
Mario Party 8 - 4,350,000
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess - 4,300,000
Super Paper Mario - 2,160,000
Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree - 2,000,000
Mario Strikers Charged - 1,650,000
Metroid Prime 3: Corruption - 1,140,000
Link's Crossbow Training - 1,070,000
Wii Fit - 1,050,000

Nintendo DS

Nintendogs - 17,790,000
Pokemon Diamond & Pearl - 14,170,000
New Super Mario Bros. - 13,140,000
Brain Age - 11,710,000
Brain Age 2 - 9,840,000
Mario Kart DS - 9,670,000
Animal Crossing Wild World - 9,200,000
Super Mario 64 DS - 5,780,000
Big Brain Academy - 4,610,000
The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass - 3,820,000
Pokemon Ranger - 2,610,000
Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time & Explorers of Darkness - 1,540,000
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Canadian students have given each other a Wii workout to see if the top-selling videogame console can get couch potatoes to work up a sweat.
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Famitsu reports via VGChartz, that the weekly sales between Jan 14th to Jan 20th in Japan were the following:

Console :

DSL : about 91k
Wii : about 76k
PSP : about 65k
PS3 : about 32k
PS2 : about 13k
360 : about 4.4k

Software:

1. Wii Fit (Wii) : about 108k (total about 1.11m)
2. Mario & Sonic at Beijing Olympics (DS): about 91k
3. Mario Party DS (DS): about 38k (total about 1.53m)
4. Wii Sports (Wii): about 31k (total about 2.65m)
5. Wii Play (Wii): about 19k (total about 2.14m)
6. Monster Hunter Portable 2 (PSP): about 18k (total about 1.57m)
7. Professor Layton and Pandora's Box (DS): about 17k (total 714k)
8. Mario & Sonic at Beijing Olympics (Wii): about 17k (total 474k)
9. Super Mario Galaxy (Wii): about 17k (total about 844k)
10. Mario Party 8 (Wii): about 15k (total about 1.15m)
11. Mario Kart DS (DS): about 14k (total about 2.80m)
12. FF4 (DS): about 11k (toal about 559k)
13. School Days L x H (PS2): about 11k
14. DQ4 (DS): about 10k (total about 1.15m)
15. Prof. Layton and the Mysterious Village (DS): about 10k (total813k)
16. New Super Mario Bros. (DS): about 10k (total about 5.06m)
17. Animal Crossing: Wild World (DS): about 10k (total about 4.56m)
18. Winning Eleven 2008 (PS2): about 9.6k (total about 605k)
20. Rune Factory 2 (DS): about 8.8k (total about 83k)
21. Everybody's Golf Portable 2 (PSP): about 8k (total about 202k)
23. Call of Duty 4 (PS3) : about 7.8k (total about 58k)
24. Star Ocean 1 First Departure (PSP): about 7.7k (total about 183k)
25. Power Pro kun Pocket 10 (DS): about 7.7k (total about 215k)

This week Upcomings :

1/24

[Wii]
No soft is released

[DS]
Nothing special

[PS3]
1/24
* Juiced 2: Hot Import Nights » Read More 

Software Total:
DS: 609,840
Wii: 570,059
PS3: 238,450
360: 203,563
PS2: 134,850
PSP: 24,268

1. Wii Sports (Wii) 119,835 6,379,604
2. Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games (Wii) 96,291 1,322,339
3. More Brain Training (DS) 83,439 3,111,330
4. Super Mario Galaxy (Wii) 68,012 1,563,768
5. Brain Training (DS) 65,928 4,900,545
6. Wii Play (Wii) 55,725 2,715,265
7. New Super Mario Bros (DS) 47,174 3,855,957
8. Assassins Creed (PS3) 46,113 1,137,639
9. Flash Focus: Vision Training in Minutes a Day (DS) 40,318 681,888
10. Nintendogs (DS) 39,444 8,685,024
11. Pokemon Diamond / Pearl (DS)38,614 3,267,347
12. Uncharted: Drakes Fortune 38,285 545,022
13. Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 (PS2) 34,657 2,157,160
14. Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 (PS3) 31,894 928,084
15. Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare (PS3) 30,592 962,322
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January 11 - Nintendo claims eight of the top ten selling games of 2007 in Japan, looking at the latest figures from Enterbrain, publisher of the Famitsu magazine.

Only Capcom's PSP title Monster Hunter Portable 2 and Square Enix's Dragon Quest IV manage to break Nintendo's hold on the top ten.

The list of Japan's Top 10 software of 2007, with their units sold, is posted at MCV.
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Tokyo, Jan. 7, 2008 (Thomson Financial delivered by Newstex) - The value of the computer game market in Japan grew last year by 9.9 percent to a record 687.7 billion yen, led by the sales success of Nintendo Co Ltd's Nintendo DS and DS Lite, magazine publisher Enterbrain said Monday.

The hardware market expanded by 25.0 percent to 327.41 billion yen, while the software market contracted by 1.0 percent to 360.25 billion yen, Enterbrain said in a written statement.

In the hardware market, Nintendo sold 7.14 million Nintendo DSs and DS Lites and 3.63 million Wii consoles last year.

Sony Corp unit Sony Computer Entertainment Inc sold 3.02 million PlayStation Portables.

In the software market, Nintendo sold 1.91 million sets of Wii Sports and Capcom Co Ltd sold 1.49 million sets of Monster Hunter Portable 2. Nintendo sold 1.487 million sets of Hajimeteno Wii, the introductory software package for the Wii console, Enterbrain said.

(1 US dollar = 108.95 yen)

By Kaori Kaneko
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