As if it hasn’t been hard enough to find a Nintendo Wii game console this year, rumor has it that a retail chain called Slackers is taking their shipments of the popular console and selling them on Ebay at a jacked up price.

According to Ars Technica an insider with Slackers stated that any Wiis that they receive, at least in the Illinois/Missouri area stores, are not available for the suggested $249 retail price at the store and are instead marked up to $499 on Ebay. Recently reports say that the Buy It Now price has been dropped to $399.99, which is still $150 over suggested retail by Nintendo.

Anyone that’s been interested in buying a Nintendo Wii this holiday season is aware of just how difficult it has been to get one and people are capitalizing on that fact, and so are many retailers. I purchased a Wii months ago that I had to stand in line one early morning to get, and even then I had to buy the $250 console bundled with two games for a total of $350. The Wii has seen a shortage for a year now and Nintendo says the lack of consoles available to meet demand is tough on planning for the company including creating any planning or promotions for new games. However, I can think of worse problems than having a consistently higher demand than supply.

According to Reggie Fils-Aime, president of Nintendo of America, Nintendo is also discouraging the practice of bundling the console itself with other items since the Wii loses its price advantage over competitor consoles like the Xbox 360 or the Sony PS3, but it is ultimately up to the retailers how they decide to sell the console. He also added that the power Nintendo held over what retailer they would ship consoles helped retailers adhere to the companies suggestions.

We get multiple requests here at the ‘Brick with people asking if we know where they can find a Wii console without taking it in the shorts on price, so we’re pretty excited to see some hope in the availability of the console from Nintendo before the year is out.

Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime announced the availability of rain checks for the Wii’s through Gamestop, and although getting one in January might be better than nothing at all there still might be a chance to get your hands on one yet this year. The Nintendo exec announced that seven national retailers should be putting Nintendo Wii consoles on shelves this weekend. The list of retailers include Best Buy, Target, Wal-Mart, Sears, Kmart, Toys R Us and Circuit City.

Maybe it isn’t a marketing scheme and Nintendo really is having trouble keeping up with production for the Nintendo Wii game console. Nintendo is offering hope for some of those still looking for Wii this holiday season, although opening a present with a piece of paper promising a Wii in a month just might not be the same as the real thing.

In a telephone press conference today Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime said they the company is working with GameStop to give out “rain checks” to those looking for an Wii this year with a deliver time frame in January of next year.

The marketing research firm NPD has turned in their analysis of what the top video game titles and consoles were last month and the news is very good for the industry as a whole. Leading the top in sales of new software was Activision’s “Call of Duty 4″ for the Microsoft Xbox 360 which sold an impressive 1.57 million copies. Nintendo’s “Super Mario Galaxy” came in second place and if you combine the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 sales for “Assassin’s Creed” it would actually take the silver medal. Not coincidentally Ubisoft’s “Assassin’s Creed” has emerged as the best-selling new IP for games in recent years.

Nintendo’s handheld DS gaming device sold an amazing 1.53 million units in November which was enough to give it the top of the chart for hardware sales. In second place was Nintendo’s Wii gaming console with 981,000 Wiis sold followed by Microsoft’s Xbox 360 in third spot with 770,000 units finding homes. Sony moved 577,000 PlayStation Portable to give it fourth place and the price drop in the PS3 convinced 466,000 consumers to go out and buy one of the consoles last month.

Time magazine has released its list of the top ten videogames of the year. Can you take a guess at what made their number one spot? If you guessed “Halo 3″ you don’t win a prize. “Like a pebble that has been rounded over the centuries by the gentle splashing of the ocean waves, ‘Halo 3′ has become the perfect hardcore first-person combat simulator,” said Time in their idol worship of the Xbox 360 killer app. “By dint of painstaking labor on the part of its developer, Bungie, it has been refined over three installments to the point where it delivers only pure, unadulterated gaming bliss.” Who knew that the editors at Time were down with playing some Master Chief deathmatches?

Of the titles that made Time’s best of 2007 list six are exclusive to one videogame system, of which three are for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 and one each for Sony’s PlayStation 2, Nintendo’s DS and Wii console systems. Why didn’t at least one PlayStation 3 exclusive title make it on Time’s list? And no “Guitar Hero III” (or is that game now redundant that “Rock Band” is out and lets you play drums as well as guitar?)

Let me start off by saying: Did I fall asleep and miss everyone striking oil in their backyard? Well, apparently so. And it seems that we need still more jewel-encrusted devices(This is worse then the Bedazzler making Jean jacket wearers into Rhinestone Cowboys in the 80′s.), since Crystal Icing wants to embellish your DS Lite with images of Mario and a flying Koopa for $350.

If that doesn’t satisfy your attraction to shiny objects, how about a custom Wii console covered with thousands of Swarovski crystals? One Wii pimped out in a Zelda theme was detailed with over 7500 24-Karat gold-dipped crystals. If you are interested in the price, you’ll have to follow the link. I’m too scared to look.

Black Friday seems to have had a positive benefit for sluggish sales of not just Sony’s PlayStation 3 but for Nintendo’s Wii system. Over 350,000 Wiis were sold last week, 50,000 more than what was sold the week before that. The Thanksgiving week represents the second-best sales plateau for Nintendo’s latest game console, beaten only by the launch week of the Wii in 2006.

Meanwhile the sales of Sony’s PlayStation 3 increased in November 298% over the sales in October. Part of that dramatic spike in PS3s finding their forever homes must be from Sony’s price drop of the $399 40GB unit. The price drop even had its effect in Japan where the Wii has been the dominant next gen gaming console for consumers: for the first time since the PS3′s launch more of the Sony consoles were sold to gamers than Wiis.

In a strange bit of Nintendo Wii/Mii news is the tale of the soldier serving in Iraq who sent his Wii home to the states just before he was headed home himself. When he got home his friends told him that his wife might have been less then faithful while he was away. His wife claimed she’d only kissed the suspect, a professional bowler, one time.

He might have dismissed it perhaps, but then he visited the Mii channel and saw a Mii that he didn’t create. Then he went into the Wii message board and saw the calendar option that showed the many nights his wife’s Mii and this other Mii played Wii bowling together. The Pro bowler’s Mii bore a striking resemblance to the man. So the husband has now filed for divorce.

Black Friday is fast approaching and although the Nintendo Wii has held strong as the leader in U.S. game console sales for the past year it may not be the case for long. When we first heard Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime talk about Wii console production shortages we suspected it was part of a marketing plan to create a greater demand for the consoles. After all, creating a sense of urgency is one of the most common sales tactics around.

Now that we are into Thanksgiving week and one of the biggest retail shopping days of the year is within site, where are all the Wii’s at? I’m starting to think that this is not part of a marketing scheme and that Nintendo really doesn’t have enough, although it is still surprising to me. The company has had a clear lead in console sales all year long and have been under demand the whole time. We’ve been reporting about the lack of availability as far back as January and Nintendo has had almost a year to catch up.

Anyone who’s had a chance to play the Nintendo Wii has probably also had the opportunity to represent themselves on the game console as a cartoon-like Mii character. Most probably try to make an accurate likeness of themselves but many create Mii alter-egos or try to recreate a well-known likeness. There’s even been Celebrity Mii design contests to see who can use the Mii editor to make the best celebrity Mii look-a-likes such as the likeness of Jack Black pictured here.

Well, all the fun people are having with these Mii’s hasn’t gone unnoticed by Nintendo and in response on Sunday the company will add the “Check Mii Out Channel” to the Wii menu lineup. For those that have their Nintendo Wii connected to the internet the new channel will be offered as a free download through the WiiWare section of the Wii Shop channel.

Here’s the latest in Wii attachments(It’s like the Wii is a vacuum) from dreamGear. A wireless gun that is compatible with all Wii shooting games and first-person shooters. Basically what they have done here is combine the Wiimote and the Nunchuck controllers into a single device. Of course it can be used by either left handed or right handed players and will kill a large variety of bad guys.

It’s kinda cool looking in a vintage Sci-Fi movie way. Looks pretty comfortable too. The price is $34.99 each. It arrives just in time for Christmas.

Even those who love the wii and own every attachment known to man will have to admit that the Wii fishing rod from Dragon may be taking things a bit too far. It attaches to the end of the Wiimote and even includes a telescoping rod with faux fishing line. If that wasn’t enough, they also saw fit to include a fake plastic fish to dangle from your fake fishing rod.

At $9.95 I guess it’s worth buying for the Wii lover who has to own everything, but be prepared to experience alot of laughter and ridicule from your loved ones. I would at the very least strongly advise you to ditch the fake fish and never speak of it again.

The remote extensions in these Wii accessories from dreamGear are made from a “soft and safe material”. In other words, you can get into the game and still have a working TV when you’re done playing.

Just announced, the kit includes a soft foam bat, golf club, and tennis racket, plus a few bonus items. The bonuses are a Wii fan to keep your system cool and a Wii remote glove for a better grip.

China’s clone of the Wii obviously does not have the same quality control that the Wii does. Just look at it. Now known as the Vii, this high tech knock off will cost less because of it. It is a complete clone of the console and the remote.

I know. Made in China right? Aren’t they the guys that just tried to poison us through the toy trade, among other things? Well, yeah. But we are talking a Vii here. What’s a little lead floating through the air and contaminating your room? As long as some form of Wii is available to you, who cares right?