Expert assures us that games do, in fact, tell us stories that engage our minds.

Game designer predicts poor sales performance for high-profile FPS

Hollenshead isn't sure the Wii is a viable platform

Outspoken producer mounts swear-tastic attack on the Big N

It seems that many diehard Cave Story fans have recently become divided over the slightly updated artwork that will be used in the upcoming WiiWare version of Cave Story. Many fans have already expressed their dislike of the more detailed look Daisuke Amaya has given Toroko, feeling that it takes away from the classic old-school look the game has always featured.

Over on Microsoft’s XBLA, there is an action puzzler called Braid doing the rounds at the moment. It has attracted rave reviews all over the place. I keenly downloaded it and completed it 100% and can verify that this is a top notch game providing hours of entertainment.

As we reported earlier today Luc Bernard plans to take a break from the videogame industry for personal reasons. Given the mixed reception around the release of his debut game Eternity’s Child on Steam he feels it is time to hang up his golden joypad for now and move on to other things in life.

Some rather upsetting news has reached our ears today. Luc Bernard – the creator of WiiWare title Eternity’s Child and a firm friend of the site – has announced via his blog that he is quitting the videogame industry. He will be pursuing a career in graphic novels instead.

Frontier Developments maestro David Braben has rained praise on download services like WiiWare, commenting that LostWinds would probably have been cancelled had it been earmarked as a traditional retail release.

Microsoft's Chris Satchell must be an easily confused guy, because he’s recently gone on record to state that he’s downright stumped by Nintendo’s WiiWare service and the strategy the company is employing when it comes to nurturing developers.

Ever wanted to know the time gamers spent playing one of your favourite WiiWare titles, or how many times played? Well now you can in the Nintendo channel (and live in North America!)

We only reported a few hours ago that Nintendo of Europe’s Managing Director Laurent Fischer’s recent ‘Geeks and Otaku’ comment had caused God of War creator David Jaffe a certain amount of annoyance, and if the news we’ve just received is anything to go by, it would appear that Jaffe’s subsequent tirade has worked. Fischer has issued an apology, which runs as follows:

Did this news story annoy you? Of course it did. It also annoyed God of War creator David Jaffe, who went as far as to post a cutting reply on his blog page.

Xiotex - the small indie developer that was the focus of our rather shocking news story recently – has posted another entry on its/his blog page regarding this sorry state of affairs. It would appear that the tiny devco didn't expect the original blog post to cause such a kerfuffle.

When we first brought you the news last month that a game based on Beer Pong would be coming to WiiWare many of you had a good laugh at the stupidity of it all.

If you asked the average Wii owner what they wanted most of all from life, a large percentage would probably say something like “heaps of cash” or “a naked mud fight with Angelina Jolie”, but there’s a chance many would also say “a Goddamn hard drive to store all my Virtual Console and WiiWare games on, please” before ranting and raving about how much Nintendo is screwing them over.

Remember when Nintendo announced WiiWare? Do you recall the grand spiel? WiiWare is a platform for small developers to really get their products out there and truly shine, you don’t need to be a big studio, yadda, yadda, yadda. Of course you do. It’s for this reason that many people got excited about the service; after all, smaller devcos are more likely to create fresh and innovative ideas.

When WiiWare was first announced Nintendo proclaimed that it would revolutionize the way we buy our videogames. This was more than mere hyperbole; digital distribution undoubtedly allows smaller developers and publishers to get their product to consumers with the minimum of expense. However, it would appear that the process of getting games onto people’s machines is running a lot less smoothly than Nintendo might have you believe.

Well it was inevitable really, along with the first pieces of pricing information for the Japanese WiiWare lineup we are now already hearing about WiiWare microtransactions.

As part of its WiiWare Week, Develop has been getting reactions from studios that have signed up for Nintendo’s new service and the responses have been somewhat surprising.