The Nintendo Wii again has lead the game console sales in Japan selling 245,653 units in the first four weeks with the Sony PS3 trailing at 81,541 units. That’s about a 3 to 1 lead that Nintendo has over Sony’s console sales which is actually good news for Sony as that ratio has been shrinking the past couple months.

In June Nintendo sold around 6 times as many Wii’s compared to the Playstation 3 in the Japanese market, and in July that ratio dropped to about 4 to 1. The PS3 with its Blu-ray player has been behind Nintendo in console sales since they were introduced last year, likely due the PS3′s higher price and lack of popular game titles, but Sony’s plans for the coming months may help keep this trend going. The company is planning to add a number of games towards this holiday shopping season to hopefully entice more PS3 sales, including the very popular Gran Turismo 5 which will go on sale in October.

Microsoft made an announcement today at Comic-Con International that they will be cutting the price of not the Xbox 360 itself, but the Xbox 360 HD DVD player. Effective August 1 the HD DVD player price will drop by $20 from $199 to $179. In additional to the $20 reduction Microsoft will be extended the “Perfect Offer” from Toshiba, the maker of the HD DVD player, which gives a mail-in offer for five free HD DVD movies.

Microsoft had a couple of other related announcements regarding the launch of “300″ and “Heroes: Season 1″, both on HD DVD. “300″ will be available on-demand through the Xbox Live Marketplace on August 14th and the Heroes pilot episode along with other promotional footage will also be available for download through the marketplace.

A couple of weeks ago Microsoft started banning mod’d Xbox 360 game consoles from Xbox Live (just the consoles, not the user accounts). The modified consoles were able to play copies of games which Microsoft felt was not fair to everyone. Due to this Microsoft started detecting the game consoles when users would log on, and banning them from Xbox Live when found.

Now, in just a matter of days the hacker community has volleyed back to Microsoft with firmware called called iXtreme Firmware 1.0 which when installed will prevent Microsoft from detecting the modified game console and hence avoid any potential banning. I’m sure it’ll now just be just a matter of time until Microsoft retaliates. Game on!

Source: Xbox360FanBoy

Until recently Xbox 360 owners were able to download a firmware hack which allowed them to play backed-up games and essentially boot-legged copies of games on their game console. They were also able to participate with them on Xbox Live seemingly without any notice from Microsoft, but that appears to have changed.

Apparently with the recent Spring Update earlier this month and coinciding with the beta release of Halo 3, Microsoft has shown that they are able to detect and ban those consoles with modified firmware. When consoles with the modified firmware is detected users will receive an error code (Status Code: Z: 8015 – 190D). As a result, Microsoft is permanently banning modified console from the Xbox Live service, but they are not banning the individual user account. When trying to connect through the modified …

Now that the Simpsons have a new feature film heading for the big screen Fox has teamed up with Microsoft to make a shiny yellow Simpsons-themed Xbox 360 to help promote the movie. The 360 case and controller have been given a glossy coat of Simpsons-yellow paint along with a big picture of the top half of Homer’s head on the side.

For those of you that are Simpsons collectors or Xbox Collectors, actually getting your hands on one of these Simpson’s Xbox’s might prove to be difficult as Microsoft is only making 100 of them. The units that they do make will be used to be given out and different events and promotions for the Simpsons movie.

According to Engadget the Simpsons game will actually not be coming with the unit as you might think, and Microsoft has skimped a little bit on the …

Microsoft has released the Spring Update for the Xbox 360 which is now available for 360 owners to download through their console. The Spring Update promises to increases communications through integrating with Windows Live Messenger and cut down on downloads that are not intended for your geographical area.

With the Messenger compatibility, Xbox 360 owners will be able to add up to 600 Messenger contacts to their Live account in addition to the 100 gamertag contacts. Up to 20 contacts can be on the same conversation and as many as six conversations can be held at one time.

Some other features in the updated dashboard include achievement pop-ups that contain more details such as showing what the achievement was and it’s value right in the pop-up. Microsoft has improved on providing downloadable content, including the ability to watch …