More like if car companies also were in control of all gas stations, gave you a car for free, and charged $15/gallon for gas.

The genius of the Wii was that instead of having to fight with Sony and Microsoft for market share, Nintendo basically went and found a whole other market (casual gamers). Where they didn't think this through is that casual gamers are not the kinds of people who upgrade their consoles every generation, especially one with expensive hardware like the Wii U's new controller. Time will tell but the next console generation is probably going to seal Nintendo's fate.

Oops, formatting fail:

• EU November 18, 2011
• NA November 20, 2011
• JP November 23, 2011
• AU November 24, 2011

According to Wikipedia: EU November 18, 2011 NA November 20, 2011 JP November 23, 2011 AU November 24, 2011 As you can see, Japan is in fact not first, and the proximity of the release dates doesn't seem to fit in with your theory that working on localizations is the reason for the staggered launches.

I say solely, you say soley.

What's going on is that SW:TOR and GW2 are going to be out within the next 6 months or so. Pandas are basically their "in case of fire, break glass" plan.

I actually wonder about this. Seems to me that technology has made the 2nd amendment much less impactful. 250 million armed civilians won't get you very far against tanks and fighter jets.

Ever played Magicka?

Haven't there only been 2 seasons? Also, it has never been good.

Your sig is deliciously appropriate for this story.

Apples and oranges. For one thing, addons aren't one of the key selling points of WoW.

To add to your list, Assassin's Creed and God of War would make great movie franchises. Also, there's that Warcraft movie with Sam Raimi that keeps getting talked about but never seems to actually go anywhere...

The enemy's gate is down.

Oh sure, evading 6 billion blind people is easy enough, but what about 7 billion???