The first time we all saw big headed Mii's strolling around the plaza, we imagine we all had the same thought: Animal Crossing on the Wii is a lock. But here we are, a year-and-a-half after the system's release, and we still haven't gotten to use a Wiimote to rock with KK Slider. However, if we're reading a hint in UK's Official Nintendo Magazine right, the wait may nearly be over.

The magazine's latest issue features a still from the Animal Crossing-verse with the quote "It's been a while! It's time to revisit an old friend. How's your village doing these days?" Is that enough for us to bet on seeing a new Crossing game at E3? Yes. But it should also be known: We're addicted to gambling.

We're a bit torn between whether the above image is horrifying or brilliant. On the one hand, someone clearly drew massive eyebrows on this poor animal, whose uncanny likeness to Animal Crossing's resident musician K. K. Slider is certainly no fault of his (or her?) own.

On the other hand, someone did look at this dog, and realize that with the slightest modification they could create a most excellent cosplay. In either case, consider us in awe. Now all he/she needs is an adorable guitar, and a puppy-sized stool. But we suppose the poor thing's been through enough already.

[Via DS Fanboy]

According to Nintendo financial documents, "social networking MMO" Animal Crossing and a new Kirby title will hit the Japanese Wii this year, along with some other notable titles. ShackNews posted the Nintendo financial docs showing that beyond Animal Crossing and Kirby, there is also Wii Music, Disaster: Day of Crisis, Super Mario Stadium Family Baseball, and Everyone's Common Knowledge Television -- that last one sounds like it might stay in Japan.

The document also shows that Mario Kart Wii is still expected for the spring in North America and Q2 for Europe, but there isn't much more beyond that at this time. That doesn't mean Nintendo doesn't have something up its sleeve, just that it isn't on this financial document from Nintendo Japan.

Animal Crossing: Wild World for the DS loves guilting its players. Turn the game off before saving? Mr. Resetti shows up to give you a piece of his mind. Go several months without playing the game? Your once-beautiful town will be overrun with weeds that you'll have to pluck one by one if you want to re-beautify the landscape.

Today's video shows just how absurd this process can be. It reportedly took 35 non-stop minutes to remove all the weeds that had grown over eleven months of non-play. Still, our videographers aren't without compassion: to alleviate the sheer tedium of the process, a clever editer has chosen to depict the entire process "Benny Hill" style. You can still see how ridiculous it all is, but at least now you can giggle instead of pulling your hair out. Check out the wacky gardening antics after the break.

Update: Fixed the number of months.

[Via DS Fanboy]

We're not going to lie, this story moved us - not only for its content, but also because someone managed to use the YTMND format in a way that actually enhanced the storytelling process. This touching tale tells of the impact that Animal Crossing had on an ill family member. We don't want to spoil it, so check it out for yourself.

The story is from "a member in IGN" and illustrated by ONESOUND from This Is Game. If YTMND isn't your thing, you can also view a full-sized copy of the comic here and save it for later, or print it out and show your loved ones.

Update: As reader RySenkari has warned, the YTMND link had been "altered" to shy people away from the link, and the subsequent imagery was NSFW (try going to the site via Digg and you'll get an idea of what we're talking about). If you're sending this to family members or just don't want to risk seeing such things, we recommend either typing the URL in a separate window or just taking a look at the full-sized comic that we're hosting at the moment.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

Reputable European publication Edge magazine is reporting that the upcoming Animal Crossing for Nintendo Wii is indeed going the MMO route, as previously rumored by fellow Future Publishing siblings Next-Gen. "A Japanese source has confirmed to Edge that the upcoming Wii iteration of Animal Crossing is set to be a social networking MMO," reports the magazine.

No other details are known at the time, Nintendo has not provided any official confirmation. The article is found on page nine of the latest issue, which prominently features the PlayStation 3 on both the front and back covers.

Could Nintendo's Animal Crossing for the Wii take the form of an MMO? Well, of course it could, but will it? Well, we don't really know for sure, but how cool would that be?

Next-Gen joins in the rampant speculation with some tiny tidbits that they feel point to the inevitability of an as-yet unannounced Wii Animal Crossing MMO with social networking elements. We don't exactly share their utter confidence in that point, so either they know something we don't, or they're just heavily invested in the scraps of information collected thus far.

In addition to the fact that Animal Crossing's universe fits well into massively-multiplayer conventions, Next-Gen reminds fans that Katsuya Eguchi -- the man heading up the game's development team -- has previously gone on record expressing a desire to expand connectivity to mobile phones and computers. Again, not the hard-hitting evidence we were hoping for, but we'll honor their enthusiasm for the sake of solidarity (and as an excuse to use the above image).

We've perused doc18's Flickr account before, and now we return for an adorable, bug-catching Animal Crossing village buddy to give happiness to what looks to be the user's Mac. Check out the highlights for today:

Joystiquery
SXSW: Serious Games: Can Learning Be Hard Fun?
Today's best-looking mech video: Armored Core comparison
Weekly Webcomic Wrapup, now with a case of the Mondays

News
ONM says 'world exclusive' not April Fools prank
Take Two mulling sale of company
New games this week
Study: Racing games may spur risky driving
Army of Two = 1 part innovation + 1 part bad dialogue
Excitebike, Splatterhouse, Beyond Oasis join Virtual Console line-up
Bungie talks us down from Halo 3 Legendary ledge
Miyamoto talks user-generated content, critical of PS Home
PS3 firmware 1.60 adds background downloading; due March 22nd
Pandemic unveils Saboteur, a 'different' WWII shooter
Game Park is dead, long live Game Park Holdings
Devil May Cry 4 no longer a Playstation 3 exclusive

Rumors & Speculation
Nintendo on Wii hard drive: 'pure rumor & speculation'

Culture & Community
Puzzle Quest demo sneaks online
Entire SNES game collection on eBay
More LEGO Halo goodness -- Warthogs and Spectres, oh my!

Vinnk from 4 color rebellion, when not covering Nintendo, spends time in his other life as an English teacher in Japan. From that life comes this quirky anecdote of his school outlawing Animal Crossing (Doubutsu no Mori, locally).

We understand outlawing gaming in school, but why specifically Animal Crossing? Turns out, some school officials have been checking the link history found in the computer lab and found that kids were spending a lot of time looking AC-related sites and not studying.

With what else those children could be looking at -- porn, flash games and Joystiq come to mind -- is Animal Crossing the premiere threat? Sure it promotes mass violence and filthy lifestyles, but couldn't officials just set up a firewall or turn the internet off? Leave Tom Nook out of it.

There are few things more uplifting in the world of online games than Nintendo's Animal Crossing. We can't help smiling whenever we hear that theme tune. In Japan, where the DS version of AC has patterned the floors of three million households, Tom Nook and pals are leaving town and are headed for the big screens of Japan's movie theaters. Doubutsu no Mori: The Movie will be showing in cinemas across the nation as of December 16th. Tickets are already on sale at our local convenience store. We should go to see the movie on Day One, really, but we have a fishing contest to attend. Shame. Seems the nation's future generations of forest-dwelling fishermen and fisherwomen are all mad for it, though:

Doubutso no Mori: The Movie Japanese TV commercial 1
Doubutso no Mori: The Movie Japanese TV commercial 2
Doubutso no Mori: The Movie Japanese TV commercial 3

If Nintendo's desires are realized, it won't be too long before the image of Grandpa hunching furiously over his DS Lite and murderously screaming "Blue" joins that of the bespectacled nerd in the ranks of uninformed gamer stereotypes. In an effort to reach out to those who would normally shy away from electronic devices and their confusing beeps and boops, several forthcoming and readily available DS games have recently been shoved under the Touch Generations banner. The range highlights Nintendo's popular "non-games", titles that are meant to be approachable by any person, regardless of their previous gaming experience.

In North America, games like Nintendogs, Brain Age and Sudoku Gridmaster seem to gravitate towards the label quite naturally, but it seems that the selection differs significantly from that of other regions. Anthropomorphic neighbour sim, Animal Crossing: Wild World, slots right in with Electroplankton in Europe, but the choices of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney and Trauma Center: Under the Knife seem to fit in less comfortably. The latter two titles are far more traditional, with linear stories, clear conditions for success and failure and, in the case of Trauma Center especially, a more pronounced difficulty level that requires intricate stylus strokes--lest your patient's internal organs become reduced to a bloody mush (technical term). In other words, all the stuff that the mythical casual gamer doesn't want.

The Japanese selection is almost the exact opposite, filled with English trainers, dictionaries and travel guidebooks. If you looked up "game" in one of those dictionaries, you'd likely find a description far removed from most of these titles. It raises an interesting question, then: What constitutes a game that, according to Nintendo's mantra, anyone can pick up and play? Is it a game that almost exclusively relies on intuitive touch screen controls? Or is it something with simplistic gameplay mechanics? Perhaps it's not even a game at all. Nintendo's pretty clear about the kind of people they're chasing with the DS and the Wii, but things seem less vivid when it comes to matching specific games with specific audiences. With games being such unique and often personal experiences, it's doubtful that the line between hardcore and casual will ever become especially obvious. 

Several new releases are sitting pretty in the Japanese charts this week, with newcomers holding the top three spots. Mother 3, described by Famitsu as the "Most Wanted" game in Japan back in March, unsurprisingly rocketed to the top with over 200,000 sales; a spinoff from the popular Dragon Quest VIII is in at number two, after selling 127,500 copies.

The ten bestselling games in Japan for the week ending April 23:

1. Mother 3 [GBA]
2. Dragon Quest: Shounen Yangus no Fushigi na Daibouken [PS2]
3. Final Fantasy XI:  Aht Urhgan no Hihou [PS2]
4. Brain Age 2 (Kahashima Ryuuta Kyouju Kanshuu: Motto Nouo Kitaeru Otona DS) [DS]
5. Dragon Ball Z: Shin Budokai [PSP]
6. Okami [PS2]
7. Brain Age: Train your Brain in Minutes a Day (Kahashima Ryuuta Kyouju no Nouo Kitaeru Otona DS Training) [DS]
8. Animal Crossing: Wild World [DS]
9. DS English Training [DS]
10. Pokémon Ranger [DS]

The corresponding hardware sales (cumulative sales for 2006 in brackets):

Like other virtual sandboxes which foolishly let us have some degree of control, living in an Animal Crossing town means that that town begins to take on aspects of our personality. With the wireless capabilities of Animal Crossing: Wild World, it's easier than ever to see what crazy dreamscapes your friends have built and to get an extra insight into the workings of their minds.

This 1up article does just that, looking at a few different towns along with the horrors and delights that lie in store. Whether you prefer mixing red wallpaper with orange carpet, you've collected an entire museum's worth of fossils, or you prefer to go au naturel and let weeds flourish, you might find yourself reflected in one of these secret lives. Either that, or there's an internet quiz meme waiting to be born.

Rare's next project is apparently an original IP concerning living piñata animals that will be featured in a Saturday morning TV/3-D/CG show and then in an Xbox 360 game debuting this holiday season worldwide.