Nintendo Wii Fanboy

It's an odd pairing for the weekend for European gamers -- the punk-influenced Air Zonk and the classically adorable Paper Mario! What do they both have in common? A light-hearted approach to gaming and solid offerings for their respective genres. That's something we can get behind.

• Air Zonk -- Turbografx -- 600 Wii points
  
• Paper Mario -- Nintendo 64 -- 1000 Wii points
  

The N64 version of Paper Mario is soon to hit the Virtual Console, according to a recent magazine article.

If you've just finished Super Paper Mario and are after some more dimension-shifting hyper-realism , then this is the place to get it. The 2001 classic is more of an RPG than its younger sibling, with turn based combat, so bear that in mind if you're thinking of shelling out the Wii points.

No news on release dates as yet -- we'll keep you posted.

OK, we may be incredible Nintendo fanboys, but this is just something that flew under our radar. We never had any idea that these mods were actually out there, trying to make N64 games better. Of course, they're working with ROMs and other illegal materials, but we're sure some of them out there are doing this in a legit fashion, not to mention that these individuals must actually love the game, what with investing so many hours into giving it better textures and whatnot. We're not here to argue either side of that coin.

But no, instead we're here to ask a question: does the Virtual Console kill the N64 modding community? Probably not, considering that years of being discontinued has hardly gotten in their way. So, we doubt digital distribution is going to be the one that finally finagles a wrench into the cog that is this modding community. And we can't say we condone piracy in any way, but those higher-res shots of Ocarina of Time really look nice.

What say you all?

GamesRadar has just put up their list of historical Nintendo blunders, and ... wow. We hope they're wearing flame-retardant clothing. The list has seemingly noble enough intentions: to analyze how Nintendo went from the absolute biggest name in video games to pretty much third place. Ultimately, it's probably meant to incite arguments, and they'll get plenty of them.

But if there's anything we've learned from years of being on the Internet and from specializing in Nintendo discussion, it's that any negative word about Nintendo will summon a cacophony of fanboy hate. Never mind that a lot of the things on the list (with one very notable exception) are definitely huge mistakes and probably did contribute to Nintendo's semi-downfall in the pre-DS days.

Let's try to buck the trend here. Let's have an open discussion about Nintendo's missteps, instead of screaming at naysayers and trying to spin the Virtual Boy as a good thing.

Skull Kid was such a huge pain in the ass in the Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask that we weren't too happy to see his, er, face, being a beautiful nine inch tall figurine or not.

On second thought, he looks quite incredible. Not as incredible as the Fierce Deity Link but really darn close. Being the Zelda freaks we are, we still find it hard to drop $100 on this figurine. Still, it is pretty awesome.

[Thanks Alex!]