Following another (inter)stellar quarter of sales, GameStop's COO Dan DeMatteo says the company is unconcerned about digital distribution, which caused us to instantly "Journeyman" back to 2007 to relive the Penny Arcade strip above. Gamasutra reports that during a post-results analyst call the executive said the revenue stream for digital distribution is "pretty insignificant."

DeMatteo explains that the company doesn't expect digital distribution to be a threat due to current disc-based game sizes and the barrier of long download times. He also believes that the Wii shortage we've seen the last two holiday seasons will shift to Wii Fit this holiday. The planet Earth concurs with that possibility.

Look, it's not that Microsoft's Xbox VP, David Gosen, dislikes the Wii and its parade of people-friendly peripherals. "What Nintendo have done with the Wii is truly fantastic – there is no question about it." No question at all -- but there is a but. "But I think sometimes there is a thin line between gimmick and great gameplay." And there's no question that said but refers to that thing that lets you play games with your butt.

Speaking at a Gamefest UK keynote and later to the folks at Develop, Gosen admitted that while different interfaces, whether they be video cameras or plastic guitars, are important in bringing new players into the market, they need to serve a "truly game changing experience." Gosen went on to cite research which found Wii Fit players abandoned their "digital bathroom scales" quite quickly. "They are not good if they are gimmicks. There is a challenge for us to make sure that all new user interfaces are deep and are rewarding to the end user."

And how do you do that, exactly? Gosen offers, "So we have to get the balance right, because what we are doing is bringing new consumers into the market for the first time in their lives sometimes – and we have to treat them with respect." Get the balance of game design right, huh? Sounds like the perfect Wii Fit game, no?

Are you one of the dozens and dozens of British citizens that wants a Wii Balance Board to play games like Skate It! or Rayman: Raving Rabbids TV Party, but also doesn't want to pay extra for the included Wii Fit game? Well you're in luck! According to a recent Amazon listing, the Njoy G-Board Balance Board will only set you back £64.99 -- a full five pounds less than the £69.99 Wii Fit package. And who needs Wii Fit's virtual personal trainer when you can look down at the G-Board's stylish LCD weight display to see just how unfit you really are?

Seriously, the one advantage Njoy's Board might have over the Wii Fit bundle is availability -- as of this writing, the game's short supply has inflated the package price to £102.99 and up on Amazon's marketplace. Penny-pinching balancers can look for their G-Board's on Sept. 12.

[Via Engadget]

In anticipation of next week's E3 Media and Business Summit, we've prepared bingo cards for each of the big press conferences, filled with some likely (and some not-so-likely) predictions for what each of the big three console makers intends to announce at arguably the biggest trade shows of the year.

Today's card is for Nintendo (special thanks to Wii and DS Fanboy). Our fingers are crossed twice over (trust us, it's painful) for the no-brainer Pikmin sequel. Click on each of the slides above for more information about our predictions. The folks at NWF and DSF got a little carried away, so check out their full predictions (Wii, DS).

Nintendo's E3 2008 press conference begins Tuesday, July 15, at 9:00am PT (that's 12:00 pm Joystiq Time / ET). As always, we'll be liveblogging the event, so you can play along in real-time with us. (Also: check out all our press conference bingo cards, including some for Microsoft and Sony!)

Download a copy (PNG file) and play along!

The starting zones in World of Warcraft are incredibly bleak and terrifying locales. Spend five minutes in one of these wastelands, and you're bound to see some half-naked adventurers begging for "teh g0ldenz", or people ruthlessly butchering all manner of local wildlife in search of some nice pants. At the very least, you'll see an uncoordinated young player, desperately a-jigglin' about as he tries to understand the game's controls.

However, perhaps there's something more to this clumsy rookie than an unfamiliarity with the WASD keys -- perhaps he's one half of an eccentric pair of German researchers who have grown fascinated with Nintendo's latest peripheral, the Balance Board. Perhaps he's demonstrating for a rapt YouTube audience how the board can be used to tool around Azeroth with the grace of an overweight alpaca, and would serve little use in the game's "high stress" situations.

Then again, perhaps he's just fantastically drunk.

Before you question how you're able to read Shigeru Miyamoto's thoughts (let alone visualize them in a speech bubble in clear, easy-to-read text), we would like to ask you about your thoughts on Wii Fit? Do you have it? Want it, but can't find it? The latter story seems to be the one most can identify with right now, so we figured we'd compile a list of some alternatives, which consist of past combinations of gaming and exercise (exergaming, if you will), along with a little bit of our own flair tossed in.

Oh, and for those of you who enjoy free stuff, check out our latest Virtually Free giveaway. We're hooking one person up with My Life as a King.

Features

• Wii Fanboy Review: My Pokemon Ranch
  Check out our review and direct-feed video commentary
• Born for Wii: Panzer Dragoon Orta
  We reimagine the game for Wii
• Wii Fanboy Review: Actionloop Twist
  Is this one worth your time, European gamers? We let you know
• Can't find Wii Fit? Try these alternatives!
  Our compiled list of alternatives to the hot new exercise bundle
• Revolutionary: Balance and Options
  Columnist Mike Sylvester churns out another good one
• Brawl Stage of the Week
  Our weekly highlight of user-created stages for the game
• Virtually Overlooked: Rex Ronan: Experimental Surgeon
  We tell you why it should be on the Virtual Console
• VC Monday Madness video wrap-up 6/9/08
  Our direct-feed video and commentary to this week's Virtual Console releases in North America

Video Content

• This might be the best Guitar Hero III player ever
  Seriously
• Current TV on the Wii Fit phenomenon
  Pretty funny skit about Wii Fit
• How to snap a neck in Tenchu IV
  Surprisingly easy!
• A new habit for nuns
  Everyone is into Nintendo's latest console

News of Note

• Best Buy replenishes Wii Fit, Karate Kid stock
  But when will they clear all those Fast & Furious DVDs out?
• Korea's Wii controllers are a steal
  Darn cheap to pick up some hardware in Korea
• WiiWare developer shares rejection letter
  They can't all be winners, can they?

Hey, do you like free stuff? Of course you do! Well, we're giving away a Wii Fit bundle, along with a Nyko Energy Pak, so you need not worry about batteries (and the costly price of replacing them). Wii Fanboy has you covered, so just head on over to the original contest post for the details!

Features

• Awesome Nintendo papercraft
  See what folks are making out of paper!
• Brawl Stage of the Week: Spear TWMX
  Watch out for pointy objects
• VC Monday Madness video wrap-up 6/2/08
  We check out this week's Virtual Console release, Ninja Combat
• Virtually Overlooked: Earnest Evans
  We tell you why it should be on the Virtual Console
• Wii Fanboy Review: Protothea
  The latest WiiWare release gets reviewed

Videos

• Rock Band drum kit mod allows disabled gamers to get in on the action
  Feel-good mod
• Make short work of Mario Kart Wii's Grumble Volcano
  Wow, what a shortcut
• Slug it out with the new trailer
  Mario's baseball title is shaping up nicely
• Friday Video: Samus joins the Ultimate Alliance
  Bet you didn't know Samus almost ended up in the Activision game

News

• Hama planning to manufacture their own Wiimote
  Not too shabby
• Slew of SNK titles, along with Dig Dug, get rated by ESRB
  Coming to a Virtual Console near you

Americans have been buffeted with news of our nation's pending recession and the devaluation of our dollar for months now, but in a market with such standardized prices, the American video game industry and game consumers haven't really felt the effect of our economic instability. However, according to industry analyst and prognosticator extraordinaire Michael Pachter, our pecuniary puniness is the cause for the current American Wii Fit shortage -- nearly four times as many copies of the title made their way to Europe, where the Euro, unlike the dollar, is gaining strength.

In Pachter's own words, "We're seeing companies ignore their largest market simply because they can make a greater profit elsewhere." You don't need to be a revered industry analyst to notice that -- the title, which sells for $90 in the U.S., is speedily selling for the equivalent of $140 in Europe. Pachter also remarks that Americans can afford to wait for future shipments of the title, as Nintendo knows "that Americans will be just as fat a few months from now." Words hurt, Pachter. Words hurt.

Since Wii Fit finally hit the US market, Wii Fanboy has been teetering all over the Balance Board in an effort to work out the best (and worst) aspects of Nintendo's latest. Check out some of that featured coverage, and jog on over to put your name in the hat to win a copy of the game, as well.

	The basics
	Five quick Wii Fit factoids Early impressions, neatly packaged in a single bullet-point list.
	Wii Fanboy Review: Wii Fit Wherein we break it down -- the good and the bad.
	Wii Fit vs. Let's Yoga How does Wii Fit stack up against another recent exergaming title available for a Nintendo system?
	The extras
	Point/Counterpoint: Wii Fit Awesome title or gaming's death knell?
	Wii Fit measures JC's apartment Balance board vs. stuff. Ready ... fight! Er, test.
	Finding space for Wii Fit Sure, the Balance Board is small by itself, but you need space to work out. Let us help you figure out how much.
	Old school
	Peripherals that paved the way for the Balance Board A trip through Nintendo's peripheral-littered past.
	Revolutionary: Balance Boarder Long before the real thing hit, we were making our own thing.

Perhaps avoiding the humiliation of getting back on the board himself, JC Fletcher over at Wii Fanboy has been throwing all sorts of crazy stuff on the Balance Board, and seeing how inanimate objects, and also a kitty, measure up.

What has he learned? For one, the latest year of birth possible in Wii Fit is 2006, and the shortest height is an astounding one foot, eight inches. This means that a two-year-old can actually play Wii Fit which is, if nothing else, creepy.

Also, Fletcher's bagless vacuum cleaner is sadly underweight, with a body mass index of 7.11. His cat, on the other hand, could stand to lose a few pounds (BMI of 21.5!), and has very poor balance. Check out the post for a few more fun experiments, such as how Wii Fit performs on Wii Fit. The mind boggles.

Did the long-awaited dream suddenly become an inescapable nightmare? Speaking to Next Generation, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot describes the recently announced Beyond Good & Evil sequel as a game done "for the new generation that's come into videogames." That's not you or me, folks, that's the person over there doing yoga on a Wii balance board. Yves notes that the game will be made "more accessible," a supposed improvement from a title that was "probably a little too difficult for the general gamers at that time."

Says Guillemot: "We had a different audience at that time. We had more core gamers than casual gamers than we have today." Let's not be dense about this -- Beyond Good & Evil was a beloved, abysmal commercial failure that caused the industry to bust a gut whenever a continuation was mentioned. We can hardly begrudge Ubisoft for wanting loads of people to actually buy it this time around. However, it's is a very fine line to walk, and the desires of core and casual gamers don't necessarily agree. Guillemot himself admits that "so many customers were extremely happy with the game," and we can only hope that he doesn't see Fit to pull their pants down just because it'll make the casuals giggle.

For now, we'll have to trust in series (OMG it's a series now!) creator, Michel Ancel, being able to deliver the game as he envisions it. Heck, the man's paid his dues in Rabbids by now, hasn't he? Ubisoft owes him.

As you can imagine, all of us at Wii Fanboy have been celebrating the release of Nintendo's Wii Fit. We've got a ton of coverage, including retrospectives and a handy guide to make sure you have enough space to work out in. We even take two sides of the issue, for and against, in our Point/Counterpoint feature. It's been one great ride!

For those of you who could care less, we've also got some nice links for you further down.

Wii Fit features and coverage:

• Wii Fanboy Review: Wii Fit
  We make a stance on Wii Fit (ynuck ynuck)
• Peripherals that paved the way for the Balance Board
  Take a trip with us down Memory Lane
• Point/Counterpoint: Wii Fit
  A positive and negative slant on the product
• Finding space for Wii Fit
  Let us help you get some workout space set up
• Australians prefer Wii Fit to GTA IV
  Seriously
• Wii Fit vs Let's Yoga
  Popular DS title Let's Yoga goes head-to-head with Wii Fit
• Five quick Wii Fit factoids
  Some things you may not be expecting when opening that box

Stuff that isn't Wii Fit:

• Virtually Free: Ransomed
  We're giving away River City Ransom!
• Wii Fanboy Review: Table Tennis
  We put the Aksys title through its paces
• Sam and Max in motion
  Direct from the Everyone's Nintendo Channel
• Helix springs onto WiiWare
  A promising rhyhm-based title?
• Barack rocks the Check Mii Out Channel
  The people have spoken!
• Wii, meet goo: Japanese web portal offers content for Internet Channel
  Another reason to envy Japan

Nintendo tells GI.biz that it will replenish the UK's stock of Wii Fit "as soon as possible." A Wii Fit shortage in the UK became quite obvious this past week as the fat-reduction simulator practically disappeared from the UK sales charts. Meaning, either citizens of the UK made a collective Borg decision to stop purchasing the game life-altering product or stock sold out.

A Nintendo representative put semi-adequate spin on the situation stating that there are "pockets of stock shortages" around the UK. When a game goes from the #2 spot on the sales chart to dropping off the Top 40, that appears to be more than just "pockets" of shortages. Nintendo claims that fat little girls around the UK will be able to pick up a Wii Fit soon enough as the company continues to replenish stock on a weekly basis.

One Man's Journey recovers from the Rock Band disaster of '07 and releases another tale of self-realization. This time, the overly-optimistic Matt Downham is looking to lose some weight and (feeding into the hype) believes Wii Fit is going to get him to do that -- just like he wanted Rock Band to turn him into a rock star. Matt's faithful companion, Friend, joins him again on this adventure of self-discovery, standing by his side and offering his own special brand of support.

Of course, similar to what happened with Rock Band, Matt's hopes and dreams of Wii Fit curing his weight condition lead to what the movie advertisements refer to as a "roaring rampage of revenge" (after catching his breath from walking up the stairs). He roars. He rampages. We just hope Friend survives for the next big game launch sporting a plastic peripheral.

Nintendo informed GameTap late yesterday that Wii Fit's official launch has been moved to tomorrow, May 21. Although there may be some exceptions, Nintendo told the site that Wii Fit was only available at the Nintendo World Store in New York for its much hyped May 19 launch.

Some members on staff who pre-ordered Wii Fit from their local brick and mortar store were told their units may arrive today. We're also checking with Amazon.com to find out if its copies have been sent out. Another piece of Nintendo hardware with an apparent supply chain issue? We're shocked.