Here’s some hype up if there ever was any: Microsoft predicts they’ll sell 3 to 5 million units of Kinect this year, which will actually surpass launch sales of the Xbox 360 (and the Wii, and the PS3). Optimistic? Sure as hell. Realistic? Not the slightest. For one, there aren’t many games for Kinect out there yet, and this situation won’t get better this year. Second, Kinect retails at $150 — which is a lot to ask of folks who have already spent hundreds on the Xbox 360. There’s also the problem of delivering 5 million Kinects and not causing shortages.

EA has released a new trailer for the upcoming Dead Space 2, and it sure looks scary. Hopefully the PC version won’t be a bad port as it was last time.

EA’s Ben Cousins had an interesting tweet the other day, where he kind of hinted at a new Battlefield game, which would be announced tomorrow. His tweet reads “Flying to London later today to show a new, unannounced #Battlefield game to the press. News goes public on Friday. (NOT #BF3)”. Obviously, we’d love if it was BF3, but we’ll see tomorrow.

Finally, gamers get to relive their good moments with GoldenEye 007, which was released on the N64 way back in 1997 and was the title that took console FPS games by storm. The remake however, isn’t just a direct port wiht some new graphics and controls, it is, in fact, a whole new games, not based on the N64 title, but on the movie GoldenEye. Only this time, it’s with current Bond Daniel Craig, who provides not only his likes but his voice as well.

The campaign in GoldenEye 007 plays out like a well-structured campaign with great levels, lots of intensity, a mix between action and stealth and vehicle sections, not to mention solid controls with the Wiimote. In fact, the single player campaign alone is one of the best Bond game campaigns ever, which makes the game one of the best, if not the best FPS game on the Wii. Sadly, hard core fans of the original will find that the new version is quite updated, for instance, it uses gameplay mechanics similar to Call of Duty (it actually feels like CoD a lot) and borrows extensively even from Halo (like the regenerative health). Of course, games evolve, but we somehow felt that all the new additions and upgrades took away some of the nostalgia of the N64 title.

But it’s certainly enough to attract the current-gen audience to the Bond franchise on the Wii, and GoldenEye 007 will undoubtedly do that. The visuals are wonderful — it’s still a Wii game, and that shows — and the controls are precise and intuitive. The soundtrack is Bond like as expected, but the voice acting in particular is great, and coupled with the decent cut scenes, the game appears very cinematic, something most games aim to achieve. On top of that, there’s multiplayer, and finally, online multiplayer on the Wii as well, which is always welcomed. Overall, GoldenEye 007 for the Wii is a lot more than a remake, as it offers a lot more than the N64 version, although some of the great nostalgia feel of the N64 title gets lost in the way.

The Good:
A lot more than a remake
Wonderful visuals
Good controls with the Wiimote
Great campaign + multiplayer

The Bad:
Some N64 fans won’t appreciate the big changes.
Some online lag
No voice chat online

Overall score: 9/10

EA has finally admitted what was always evident: NBA Elite 11 has been canned and won’t see the light of day. The NBA Live series have, honestly, sucked over the past years, and renaming it to “NBA Elite” won’t help. Neither will the fact that NBA 2K11 is the best basketball game to date. EA announced that development of the title has been moved to EA Canada, which is known for the Madden franchise. Look forward to NBA Elite 12 next year.

There have been reports of Gran Turismo 5 facing another delay, which would have been, what, the 800th delay now? However, GT5 creator Kazunori Yamauchi has come out and said that the game has in fact gone gold and that GT5 discs are being “stamped as we speak”. Good. Because we seriously cannot wait any longer. Seriously. No more wait.

The red ring of death is a console classic at this point, with millions of Xbox 360s killed by overheating issues. The new Xbox 360 runs much cooler and is not capable of RRODing, because it doesn’t have any red lights at all. Via Reddit.

Microsoft has announced, or rather, confirmed the Xbox 360 bundle containing Alan Wake and Forza 3 for the US market. The bundle will be released in the next few weeks and will include the new Xbox 360 S console with 250 GB hard-drive, and a copy of the two games mentioned. It will retail for $299 — a pretty good deal if you don’t own an Xbox 360 yet.

Red 5 Studios released the first trailer of their new game, Firefall, a team based shooter which will be released for free next year. Red 5 is comprised of former Tribes and World of Warcraft developers, and the game will have several MMO features. We can’t wait to try it out. And it looks pretty good too.

Nintendo’s Satoru Iwata has said that Nintendo plans no Wii price cut in the near future, despite Wii sales being somewhat slower than last year. Iwata said, “”Of course, we cannot say it will never happen, but we are not thinking of it for the near future.” at an investor meeting. However, Nintendo said something similar last year, then weeks later, cut the price of the Wii. We’ll see what happens when the holiday shopping season kicks in.