Wouldn't it be better if more things were like Super Mario Galaxy?

In other news I just worked on this post for like five hours and now I have to go do my real job.

Industry and multi-console news

New media: Lego Batman screenshots, Dynasty Warriors 6 English trailer

• Still another video interview with Yoshinori Ono finds him talking about taking Street Fighter IV multiplatform.
• EA has completed its acquisition of Bioware and Pandemic. They will go on to create ten new franchises for the company before being dissolved into an amorphous goo by EA's digestive juices.
• An argument that began over a 360 led to a father shooting his son with a rifle. Admittedly, the 360 is kind of incidental to the whole thing.
• Metafluence has a guide to modding your Rock Band drum pedal to use a real pedal instead.
• GameSetWatch has another gallery of developer greeting cards, for New Year's as well as a couple leftover Christmas ones.
• The Christian Science Monitor has an article about what video games contain that is worse than violence: the lack of moral consequence.
• For your future reference: Best Buy insists that video games are not toys.
• Frank Provo has left Gamespot over the Jeff Gerstmann thing.
• Sierra's Prototype will be the first game with Neural-THX 7.1 surround sound.
• Somebody bought a Final Fight PCB that ended up being a Mexican hack that lets you play as enemy characters. You can see videos of it in action here.
• LSU and Tennessee State football players are training with a custom football simulator game using the Madden and NCAA engines.
• Circuit City is having an $8.96 clearance sale on games. The link has the full list of games that are included.

PC and mobile news

New content: Hard to be a God demo, Kane & Lynch: Dead Men demo, Ghost in the Sheet demo
New media: Stargate Worlds trailer

• Far Cry 2 and Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway will be compatible with Philips' amBX's environmental immersion system.
• Lord of the Rings Online will be the first MMO with DirectX 10 support.
• Alienware showed off a 2880x900 curved monitor with a .02 ms response time at CES.
• If your problem with MMOs is that they don't contain enough gore, you'll be happy to know that Requiem: The Bloodymare (seriously) is coming the US in early 2008.
• CVG has an article looking at the best and worst user-created Portal maps.
• Amazon has the World of Warcraft Battlechest on sale for $29.99.

Nintendo news

New Virtual Console titles: StarTropics, King of Fighters '94
New media: Advance Wars: Days of Ruin trailer

• It seems the Island Yo-Yo was changed to the Island Star in the Virtual Console version of StarTropics, for some reason. Also, in case you were curious, they did find a digital method of handling the dunk the letter in water bit.
• Next Generation looks at the games of 2008 for the Wii.
• The release of No More Heroes has been bumped up a couple weeks. It will now ship on January 22.
• Majesco has announced a Wii exclusive called Our House a home building and decorating simulation title.
• Gamasutra has an interview with Konami's Shingo Mukaitoge, creator of Elebits and Dewey's Adventure.
• Smash Bros. Brawl commercials are starting to air in Japan.
• Images have surfaced purporting to show a Smash Bros. Brawl demo channel. Naturally, there's a 99.99999% chance it's fake.
• Even Queen Elizabeth II is playing the Wii now.
• The Mechanically Separated Meat blog does the math on the physics of Mario Galaxy.
• Amazon's deal of the day is Driver: Parallel Lines on the Wii for $14.99.

Sony news

New content: Rock Band tracks (Die, All Right! by the Hives, Interstate Love Song by Stone Temple Pilots, and a cover of Iron Maiden's Number of the Beast)

• Kaz Hirai says that PS3 component costs are coming down, and that he'd like to shoot for PS3 profitability in the next fiscal year.
• The ESRB has rated Street Fighter Alpha for the PS3, meaning it's likely coming to the Playstation Store.
• Sony has announced that they sold 1.2 million PS3s in the period beginning on Black Friday and continuing through the holdays.
• The PS3 version of Devil May Cry 4 will include achievements and Sixaxis support. And a 5 gig mandatory install.
• BioWare says that they could make Mass Effect for the PS3 if they wanted to. But right now, they aren't.
• Inside sources tell Eurogamer that LittleBigPlanet is coming in September.
• Playstation Network games based on game show IPs are being developed by Sony Online Entertainment.
• The PSP GPS receiver is coming to America.
• Sony has announced a 16 gig memory stick for the PSP.
• Amazon has PS3 HDMI cables for $9.99.

Microsoft news

New content: Stranglehold maps, skins and achievements, Rock Band tracks (Die, All Right! by the Hives, Interstate Love Song by Stone Temple Pilots, and a cover of Iron Maiden's Number of the Beast)
New media: Rez HD screenshots

• Bill Gates' big keynote at CES that was rumored to contain a major 360 announcement, possibly in the form of a new model, had no such thing. He did announce ABC and MGM were brining content to the Live Video Marketplace and that IPTV was coming to British 360s, but that's about it.
• Really, the best thing to come out of the keynote was a seven minute video of Gates making fun of himself with the help of a dozen or so celebrity friends.
• In addition to the previously announced Omega Five, this week will also see the release of a port of the arcade game Tron.
• Major Nelson has released a list of the best selling Live Arcade titles of 2007. Would you believe that number one is the TMNT arcade game?
• While they're in a counting mood, they've also released a list of the top 25 Gamertags on Xbox.com, ranked by hits. Are you on the list? (Hint: No.)
• A demo of The Club is coming to Live tomorrow, but only for Europe and Australia.
• Retards from Texas are suing Microsoft over the Live downtime to the tune of $5 million because they are retards from Texas.
• According to EGM's rumor column, a secret first party game is in development for the next Xbox console.
• Rare is working on a Live Arcade title called The Fast and the Furriest. Yes, that's the title they're going with.
• Lode Runner is in development for Live Arcade.
• Xbox Live Diamond cards will no longer be free, costing $6.95 per year.