Nintendo Wii Fanboy

EB Games/Gamestop/EB Gamestop or whatever they're called these days occasionally gets some inside information before the press. (I say occasionally; please hold off on the "my local EB Games employee told you the Wii was coming out December 17th" tips.) A quick search of Gamestop's online store in the accessories section yields some interesting results, shows as follows:

Wii Controller Glove 9.99
Wii G-Pak Travel Case 29.99
Wii Game Wallet 9.99
Wii HD Premium Component Cable 59.99
Wii Memory SD 1.0GB 59.99
Wii Memory SD 512MB 39.99
Wii S-Video Premium AV Cable 39.99
Wii Sling Bag 29.99
Wii Storage & Protection 1.0GB Kit 69.99

We knew about the Power Glove, but the SD cards just seem like a convenient excuse for Gamestop to take people's money; the prices are quite high. The premium component cable is insanely expensive, but hey, it's premium. Other than that, your classic game-toting sling-bag take-it-anywhere-but-not-really-because-no-one-ever-does-that accessories are on the list. With the immediate need for extra controllers, memory, and games at launch, is anyone going to pick up any of these other things?

[Thanks, Randy!]

[Update 1: Clarified that the SD cards are not officially from Nintendo, and realized that you can in fact get SD cards for far cheaper.]

Next Generation reports that the ABI Research firm believes, via conducted study, that game downloads will grow to $3.8 billion on consoles by 2011. The piece cites that while Xbox Live already has content available via download through Marketplace, it's the PS3 and Nintendo that will come out on top in the online battle for your hard-earned simolians. The firm seems to believe that this is largely due to Nintendo and Sony's free multiplayer gaming, which would leave the user with extra cash to drop on premium content via each respective service.

With the recent inclusion of Sega and TG games for the Revolution's Virtual Console, there'll be a lot of premium content available for download. While this study fails to mention how these numbers were reached, Nintendo will undoubtedly have a much more robust service to offer than its competitors.