Wii Ware Pokemon, Sonic Brawling, Wii Fit Priced

Nintendo of Japan has just delivered a lorry-load of top quality news announcements to the faithful in its homeland, revealing a bunch of new games, more details on the forthcoming Wii Ware service, pricing and release details on Wii Fit and the fact that Sonic the Hedgehog is set to appear as a playable character in the forthcoming Super Smash Bros. game on Wii.

Yes. You read that right. Sonic! Read on for a quick round up of the most important Nintendo news this month.

Firstly, Nintendo of Japan revealed three new games currently in development: Fire Emblem on Nintendo DS, Wii Music and Super Mario Stadium Baseball. Wii Music is not really ‘new’ as such, as SPOnG remembers seeing it at the initial Wii demos way back in 2006 (ah, remember those days?!) but it is good to see it is still on the radar.

Satoru Iwata, Nintendo's president and CEO, went on to reveal that the Wii Ware service, set to launch in March 2008, will feature a new version of Dr. Mario, Star Soldier R and, most notably, Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles: The Little King and The Promised Land from Square Enix.

Next up, Wii Fit, Nintendo's super yoga toy for girls, is going to cost 8800 yen (around £37) and will be released in Japan on 1st December. It should be spotted in UK stores around Spring next year, no doubt priced a little higher around the £50 mark if current industry chatter is to be believed.

Super Smash Bros. Brawl featuring SONIC THE HEDGEHOG is out in December in the United States and Europe, but not out in Japan until January 24. That makes a nice change then!

In yet more big announcements, Iwata told the gathered Japanese journalists that Japanese fave Monster Hunter 3, is coming to the Wii next year, though some confusion is still in the air about whether or not this will be an exclusive deal or whether the game will still see the light of day on PS3. SPOnG will be clearing this matter up in due course (ie we are frantically phoning Capcom, Nintendo, Sony and anybody else who might tell us something right now!!).

Last but in no way least, Iwata announced a new Pokemon title for Wii Ware, called Pokemon Bokujyou (Pokemon Farm) so fans can transfer their Pokemon from their DS to their Wii and look after them on their very own farm. SPOnG guesstimates that this will make around five trillion earth dollars by 2010. Oh, and Mario Kart has slipped a bit (it won’t see the light of day till March in Japan and most probably even later in Europe and the US, though we’ll be confirming this with Nintendo UK today) and – taking a leaf from PGR4’s book – it is set to feature bikes for the first time. Cool!

Stay tuned for more news from Nintendo of America’s press briefing to follow later this week.