The Last Word: October 2-6

Last year, the animated Comedy Central cartoon South Park delighted gamers with an episode that feature the then-new PSP. This week, series creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone further touted their gamer acumen with an entire episode sending up World of Warcraft. The episode saw Kyle, Stan, Kenny, and Cartman take on an invincible player-killer in a series of machinima scenes, which used the actual World of Warcraft engine. Parker and Stone weren't above making fun of WOW developer-publisher Blizzard Entertainment, either. When an in-game emergency required immediate access to Azeroth, one Blizzard employee protested, "I don't have a [World of Warcraft] account! I have a life!"

Meanwhile, in the real world, two major publishers did some developer horse-tradin' on Monday. That's when Atari, as part of its ongoing fire sale of internal studios, sold Shiny Entertainment (Enter the Matrix) to rising publisher Foundation 9. On the flip side, Electronic Arts sealed the deal on its long courtship of Sweden-based developer Digital Illusions CE, maker of the popular Battlefield series. The publisher shelled out some 175.5 million Swedish kroner--some $23.9 million--to acquire the "assets and liabilities of DICE," according to a press release. Not a bad deal, considering that the Battlefield series and its expansions have sold more than 3.5 million units on consoles and PCs, according to the latest figures from industry research firm NPD.

Sony made many headlines this week--some good, some bad, and some ugly. On the good side, the company announced that the PlayStation 3's new, rumble-free controller will be called...the SIXAXIS!!! Presumably this is because it senses movement in six directions--up, down, left, right, forward, and backward--not six dimensions, which means it could control three dimensions: time, space, and whatever the sixth dimension is.

In not-so-good news, analysts expressed concerns that the delay of the PlayStation 3's launch in Europe could hurt third-party publishers hoping for a big holiday payday. UBS Investment Research analyst Michael Wallace had estimated that at least 500,000 PS3s would have been sold in Europe by the end of 2006. Given a conservative tie-in of two or three games per console, that's 1 to 1.5 million games' worth of income publishers won't be getting this year. Wallace speculates that this fact may prompt some third parties to postpone their big PS3 releases until next year, but there's no confirmation of any such moves--yet.

Finally, in the ugly news department, Sony's stock got clobbered this week, falling 2.75 percent on Tuesday alone. The drop came after two major analysts downgraded the company on concerns about its gaming division, Sony Computer Entertainment. One analyst expressed concern about the PS3 hardware, citing reports that many of the consoles on the Tokyo Game Show floor froze up after overheating. A Sony spokesperson angrily responded that the "PS3 does not suffer from an overheating problem." However, he did issue a caveat, saying that "the environmental conditions at TGS conspire to test any electrical item" and if "there was the occasional unit that needed rebooting, it was due solely to the adverse environmental conditions within the [TGS] hall."

Sony's rival Nintendo announced this week it is revising its profit forecast upwards by a whopping 20.5 percent. The Mario factory now predicts that its net profit for its entire business year, which ends on March 31, 2007, will be 100 billion yen (about $850 million), up from 83 billion yen (about $705 million). The increase was partially credited to a weak yen and bullish predictions for the launch of the Wii console, which goes on sale in November in the US and Japan.

However, the main reason for Nintendo's revisions is white-hot sales of the DS. For its full fiscal year, Nintendo has raised sales projections of the portable by 18 percent, from 17 million units to 20 million units. During the same period, DS software sales are expected to top 82 million games, an increase of 9 percent from prior estimates.

MONDAY
Atari polishes off Shiny
Burger King orders up Xbox games
South Park gets hooked on World of Warcraft
Report: Prelaunch Wii kiosks only at GameStop
EA rolls DICE for $23 million

TUESDAY
PS3 controller dubbed Sixaxis
Sony stock slides 2.75 percent on PS3 concerns
Q&A: Gears of Wars' hype machine
LGF: Big changes on the way for developers
Service offers GamerScore points for $$$

WEDNESDAY
Sony: PS3 problems 'unsubstantiated'
Eidos spills beans on Chili Con Carnage
Burning Crusade sparks Collector's Edition
Q&A: EA Sports tackles Xbox Live Marketplace
LGF: Sony exec says customization is key

THURSDAY
Pokémon Diamond and Pearl sales near 1.6m
GRAW gets GOTY at BAFTA
Sims 2 Pets brings Hilary Duff home
Q&A: BAFTA-winner & GRAW designer Christian Allen
Ubi dealing R6 Vegas demo

FRIDAY
Report: Wii production way ahead
EA shuts down DICE Canada
Analyst predicts sunny September NPD report
Uru fans celebrate its resurrection
DS browser comes to Europe

RELEASES
Shippin' Out 10/2-10/6: FIFA 07, Star Trek: Encounters

CHARTS
US PC game charts: September 17-23
Bestbuy.com best sellers: September 24-30
Japan game charts: September 25-October 1
UK Game Charts: September 24-30

RUMORS
Star Wars: Battlefront going next-gen?
Ninja Gaiden Sigma 360-bound?