Welcome to another edition of C-E's least interesting weekly feature- yes, that's right, it's the digest! Apologies for the lateness of last week's installment- a few gremlins were about in our mail system and.. well, you know. These things happen. Order is restored this week though.

Let's kick off with the news that Namco are set to bolster the Gamecube's library of 'true' RPGs with a new title- called Baten Kaitos (presumably it'll be renamed for the Western market) and is set in a fantastical world where humans have wings. The game features five continents in the sky and you play as Kara, a young girl with only one wing. She sets out on a quest to find her long lost family but stumbles upon a massive evil plan as well. So far, so Skies of Arcadia. But that's a good thing. Pre-rendered 2D graphics are the order of the day here, with 3D characters. Even better is that the game is a Gamecube exclusive. Nice one, Namco- it'll be one we'll be keeping an eye on.

Those looking forward to Gamecube-to-arcade connectivity with the upcoming NTSC and PAL versions of the much-anticipated F-Zero GX/AX will be disappointed to hear that it seems that the connectivity features have been scrapped, for reasons unknown at the moment. There is currently no official word from either Sega or Nintendo. An irritating piece of news next; the GameCube version of the threequel to the Rainbow 6 series will be delayed to about Spring 2004, because those kind people at Microsoft have bought out exclusivity rights from Ubi Soft for 2003. At the risk of, but not with the intention of, upsetting Xbox fans everywhere, Microsoft's penchant for doing exclusivity deals is merely a smokescreen for their inability to produce the goods themselves. That's the only point I want to make, and I'm not suggesting Nintendo don't do exclusivity deals with third-parties; but Microsoft's worrying reliance on them hides a deeper malaise within camp Xbox on the quality games front, at least. Alls fair in love and war, I suppose� so don't take my comments in the wrong context.

On the Famitsu front, F-Zero was scored last week. Its result of 32/40 was, while very good, not as high as expected.

Cube-Europe has hit the big time! New on C-E this week is the advent of video previews- an, er, audiovisual extravaganza. Yes. Readers can now access the first two of these here. 56k users, like myself, are catered for too- small-size versions of the video previews are available. Also on C-E on the features front is a new edition of the weekly BitchZone- this week Ben deals with the problems caused by videogame journalism. Worth a read, I'm sure you'll agree. An exclusive interview with Rebellion, makers of Judge Dredd: Dredd Vs. Death is also on the site.

What more can be said about the week in gaming? Not much- its summer, remember? I could excite you by telling you the song list in Disney's Extreme Skate Adventure (or whatever its called) but that would be spoiling you. Instead, I'll offer a nugget of advice to Nintendo on in-store promotion- having had Microsoft invading Game stores all over the country, now Sony are playing a blinder with their promotion of the gimmicky-but-fun Eye Toy peripheral- Almost every Game, HMV, Dixons, Smyth's Toys (large Irish toy shop chain), or even movie-rental shop had a working Eye Toy on display. Some stores even had public demonstrations lined up for the weekend. With promotion at saturating point, is any wonder that the peripherals success is assured? No, it most certainly isn't. At the end of the day, one of the biggest misgivings Nintendo fans have about the company is that they have the best product, but the worst marketing ability. The crux of the matter can be dealt with another day, but Nintendo's marketing failure is reaching an intolerable level now- Nintendo need realize that there are two sides to their business- making games and marketing them. It is noble to concentrate on the former, but nobility counts for just about nothing in today's cut-throat industry, as Microsoft and Sony knew long ago. Just a thought.

See you all next week. As ever, comments or suchlike can be directed to [email protected] and I'll get back to you pretty well immediately. Well, usually�

Mark Cullinane