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Though I personally have mixed thoughts about Microsoft's Achievements and Sony's Trophies, with the release of Nintendo's Wii U console now impending, many are wondering if Nintendo will introduce its own accomplishment-tracking system. Can you imagine a Zelda game encouraging players to "slice 10,000 blades of grass?" Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime recently mentioned to Kotaku that the achievement system on Wii U will be completely game-specific and furthermore developers won't be required to include them.

As I'm grinding out a season of Tecmo Super Bowl on my Famicom (which, ironically, plays host to a Japanese version of the game that is literally identical, text and all, to the U.S. release), I concretely decide on my literal future. I plan it out right there, as I blip video Phil Simms around on the screen. This is the power Tecmo Super Bowl has over me now, these ancient players, my perpetual heroes, and I find myself being mentally sucked away to 1991.

I think there's something magical about the convenience of pulling my phone out of my pocket at any moment in the day and indulging in a few minutes of game time. A recent survey (link goes to PDF) by PopCap Games indicates 59 percent of mobile users have used their phones or tablets for gaming this year. That's a 13 percent increase since last year. I think this marks the year when console gaming was finally diagnosed with a terminal illness, its days numbered.

What kind of gamer am I supposed to be? I guess I'm having a bit of an identity crisis. I've been playing pretty fervently since the 80s, so maybe I'm a traditional gamer. I enjoy a nice challenge and a deep assortment of systems, so certainly I'm a core gamer. Sometimes I'll play an old NES game, does that make me a retro gamer? And I own Wii Sports, and played it with coworkers and family, I guess I'm also a casual gamer.

“What a bunch of jokers!” I've heard that phrase a hundred times in Xenoblade, an epic Japanese RPG published by Nintendo, yet I can't get enough of it. Dialogue that is frequently repeated is supposed to be the bane of the video game industry, but something about this title makes formerly irritating matters a joy. Perhaps my opinion is tainted by the fact that Xenoblade is one of the best games ever released on the Wii, but I think the real answer is more subtle than that.

As we line up for our tickets to enter NintendoLand this Christmas, the company's most recent E3 showing may suggest it's time to accept an unnerving truth. All signs point to the fact that Nintendo no longer employs executives who can relate to or understand long-time gamers. Which shouldn't come as a surprise—after all, they've spent the past six years hiring executives and management who have an intimate understanding of casual gamers and casual tastes.

I don't know about you, but when I find myself here in Japan where I have somehow been for the last three years, and I am desperately scanning the shelves for a drink, oh god anything will do. That's why I naturally gravitate toward the bottles of stinkwater that have free toys latched onto the tops. This method has ensured the adorning of my various man bags, murses, European carry-alls, bropouches, and fanny packs with a variety of mind-numbing baubles running the gamut from tiny rubber sushi to a bear dressed like a chef to the plastic likeness of a brown-suited salaryman literally on his hands and knees begging for forgiveness.

Last August I imported the European release of Pikmin 2 on the Wii. I had given Nintendo of America two and a half years to release it domestically, but since I was importing Xenoblade Chronicles around that time anyway, I decided to finally bite the bullet and accept that NOA had left me high and dry. (Against all conceivable rationale, NOA finally released the game this past Sunday, more than three years late, but that's neither here nor there.

Goomba corpses have littered the Mushroom Kingdom for decades. The poor things are usually on their way to work or school when they meet their demise. They barely even put up a fight, just keep on walking into Mario's cruel squish-zone. What if they weren't such mindless goons? Jacob Minkoff, lead designer on the new action-adventure game The Last of Us, is exploring technology that might ensure such a future isn't as far off as we think.

Though all we got out of Nintendo regarding karaoke during their preshow was the distinctly western-centric Sing, it's not at all hard to believe that a more Japanese-oriented implementation of karaoke could be just the ticket to trojan horse the Wii U into homes across Japan. One needs do little more than enter a karaoke box in any number of the massive buildings peppering Japanese city streets to see the resemblance between commercial karaoke gear and what the Wii U will—very shortly—be ushering into homes.