Hello again, folks, and welcome to another Sunday edition of the Weekly Digest- Cube-Europe's look-back at the last seven days in the world of videogaming.

It's been one of those weeks where not very much happens- aside from the release of Star Wars: Rebel Strike, not all that much has happened. There wasn't even an amusing Nintendo press release to keep us amused. No, all in all it's been the wonderful F-Zero GX keeping us entertained. The highlight of the week was actually the release of The Matrix: Revolutions- what a great end to a great trilogy. What's that? I'm going off topic? Ah well, on to business then.

Cube-Europe was lucky enough to attend an exclusive interview with some of the developers of the up-coming sure-fire hit, Mario Kart: Double Dash!! For the GameCube. It's well worth the bother taking a look: here's the link. Those of you feverishly anticipating the release of Activision's excellent True Crime: Streets of L.A will have to wait just a little while longer. The Cube version has been pushed back all the way to the 21st of this month. Rest assured, all the indications are it'll be worth the wait.

Nintendo of America announced during the week that since cutting the price of its GameCube console, its market share has risen from 19 percent to 37 percent.

George Harrison, senior vice president of marketing and corporate communications at Nintendo of America was the man who announced it. "In a tough economy, we've found the sweet spot on pricing, and players are grabbing Nintendo GameCube systems off the shelves at the fastest rate since the console's debut," said Harrison. "With an $80 price advantage over other systems and the impending launch of the mega-hit Mario Kart: Double Dash!!, this offer is just too good to resist."

In America Nintendo GameCube year-to-date sales for 2003 are two percent higher than last year while Game Boy Advance sales have increased 25 percent. In contrast, sales of Microsoft's Xbox dropped three percent and Sony's PlayStation 2 dropped 17.5 percent.

This is all very good, but remember that when it comes to manipulation of figures, Nintendo have considerable talent- the market share can and will fluctuate a lot- all we need Microsoft to do now is retaliate with some selective number crunching of their own, eh?

Speaking of which, Nintendo are continuing to produce GameCubes once again. You'll remember that a few months back production was stopped due to sluggish sales. Good to see things back on track for the time being. New Mario Tennis details have surfaced! It seems like ages ago that Mario Tennis was revealed- since then, we've has next to no news on its progress. Until now, that is�Nintendo Dream magazine in Japan spoke with Nintendo spokesperson Mitsuaki Hagishima. He revealed that that Mario Tennis is nearing completion for the GameCube and is already 75% complete and fully playable with all characters. He continued saying that the game's producers Hiroyuki and Shugo Takahashi are currently focused on adding extra elements that take advantage of the GameCube's capabilities. Super. Expect a European release in about 5-6 months time.

There are a lot of you out there itching to get hold of the new Zelda bonus disk. Well, Ninty in the U.S have revealed exactly how American punters will be able to get it. Here's how: 'The Legend of Zelda: Collector's Edition' will be available for $99.99 and will contain the disc and a GameCube. Alternatively Americans can update their subscription to Nintendo Power from November 17th. That can be done by clicking http://www.nintendopower.com/zelda. The final way is for Americans to purchase two of Nintendo's holiday titles, Mario Party 5, Mario Kart: Double Dash, Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga and 1080: Avalanche. They can then register them at http://www.nintendo.com/zeldaclassic/ from November 11th. Nintendo also let slip that the disc will contain a movie looking back at the history of Zelda, featuring interviews and footage from the games. There is a high probability that Nintendo will eventually use the game registration system above in Europe- it seems nonsensical that only those willing to buy a new GC and Mario Kart will be able to get the disk. Expect some news on this shortly.

According to NoA, Mario 128 might not come to the GameCube. In a recent interview with CNN, George Harrison, NoA's vice president of marketing, suggested that Mario 128 (originally seen as demo footage at SpaceWorld in 2000) may not come to the GameCube at all. However, Mr Harrison did say that the game is still under development, and could still perhaps come to the GameCube, but this is very uncertain at this point. One thing I'm pretty sure of is that launching the N5 (or whatever it ends up being called) must launch with a new, original Mario title- the GC suffered at launch with the lack of a 'killer app'- Mario would certainly give the N5 a flying start.

Here that sound? That's the sound of Activision cancelling more games. Apparently, the company has had a bit of a rough ride in terms of their financial situation of late, which has led to them pulling the plug on a few of their upcoming titles. Ron Doornink, President of Activision said, "We had a light release schedule for the second quarter, however, our main focus for this fiscal year remains our third quarter releases -- Tony Hawk's Underground, True Crime: Streets of L.A., Call of Duty and Empires: Dawn of the Modern World, which represent some of the strongest, most innovative games in our company's history. Overall our competitive position remains strong as we continue to make progress with our quality enhancement initiatives." Doornink continued saying, "Specifically, we have cancelled the development of 10 games, which we believe are unlikely to produce an acceptable level of return on our investment. This will enable us to focus and increase our development and marketing resources on those franchises with the greatest potential. We believe that this realignment will enhance our position to capitalize on the opportunities presented by the growing mass-market."

The titles cancelled are Trinity, Shaun Palmer's Pro Snowboarder 2, and Street Hoops 2 on all platforms- now there's a turn up for the books, eh? Usually it's just the GameCube version which gets canned.

Well, that's about it for this week. As ever, your emails are welcome at [email protected]

See you all same time next week.

�dh m�r,
Mark Cullinane