Yes, the once-vague "fall" launch window for the pedometer-infused pokéremakes, Pokémon Heart Gold and Soul Silver, has evolved into a much more specific Japanese release date of September 12. The game will be catchable if you've got 4,980 yen ($50) to spare, which seems an exorbitant price, but is actually the standard cost of Pokémon titles in Japan, thanks to that completely unwarranted Adorability Tax.

North America hasn't gotten a release date or price for the remakes -- probably because Nintendo has yet to formally announce the games in the States -- but we'll let you know when it finally does. You'll know which post contains this announcement, because it'll be written in bold all-caps to reflect our uncontrollable excitement.

Like Forrest Gump, who ran from coast to coast to help a nation believe in love, the DSi is going on a national tour to help spread the gospel. At special events across the country, you'll be able to give the system a spin as part of the Nintendo DSi Mobile Tour (so much better than last year's fatally flawed DSi Stationary Tour).

Look for the system at Summerfest in Milwaukee, Wisc. (June 25-29), the Rothbury Festival in Rothbury, Mich. (July 2-5), the All Good Music Festival in Masontown, W.Va. (July 9-12), and the Pitchfork Music Festival in Chicago (July 17-19). When more dates are slated, you'll be able to find them right here.

We all know that emulation download sites are disease-riddled virtual cathouses, designed to inject your unassuming computer with any number of viruses, spywares and trojan horses -- that's why we can't help but be intrigued by this recently unveiled USB adapter for SNES game cartridges, which was lovingly crafted by modder matthias_h.

The adapter looks incredibly easy to use -- plug in a game cart, then boot or copy the SMC file found therein. Just like that, you're playing your favorite SNES titles -- and without contracting incurable cases of e-syphilis from "russian porn sites." Check out the video demo after the jump!

[Via Engadget]

Nintendo's Yoshio Sakamoto, who's been involved with every 2D Metroid game since co-creating the original, tells Game Life that the latest in the series -- Metroid Other M -- will (in addition to looking awesome) help flesh out the character of Samus Aran. Bridging the gap between Super Metroid and Metroid Fusion in series canon, the game's plot goal is to depict the legendary bounty hunter as "an appealing human character," according to Sakamoto, and the joint Nintendo / Team Ninja production team will be "explaining a little bit about what happened in her past as well as the characters that influenced her."

The Metroid Prime games haven't been devoid of story, but we get the sense from Sakamoto's comments -- "The story will play a big part," he said -- that Other M will offer something meatier, perhaps through more cinematics ... and no scanning. In fact, we hear that any planned instances of scanning in Other M have been replaced with badass.

[Via 1UP]

Speaking to CNBC, Ubisoft big cheese Yves Guillemot says that development costs on the next generation of games are going to be huge. With large games currently costing up to $30 million to develop, Guillemot believes that cost could rise to $60 million by the time the next hardware cycle arrives.

Regarding Natal, which Microsoft is treating like a new console, Guillemot says that consumers will soon "take the other step - pushed by the environment." Guillemot is happy to keep working with current hardware, saying, "I'd like to stay with this generation as long as possible, but my customers will want the best machine possible."

One thing that might push the next generation of games out sooner than expected, according to Guillemot, is the potential of new online consoles like OnLive. "If OnLive manages to make this work," said Guillemot, "we will have a next generation of systems sooner than currently planned."

Still, Ubisoft is in no hurry and plans to develop motion controlled games for all the current consoles -- up to 80 percent of Ubi's lineup will likely be motion controlled, actually. That's a lot of Rabbids.

Luminary Shigeru Miyamoto hasn't lost his shimmer in the eyes of game developers, with a recent industry poll finding the Nintendo icon to be without equal. The survey, commissioned by organizers of next month's Develop Conference, asked 9,000 devs to name their game development hero, with nearly a third of respondents pointing to Miyamoto as the man with the plan.

The popularity contest also named id Software's John Carmack as the next most idealized developer, followed by Maxis and now Stupid Fun Club brainpan Will Wright. The top ten list of industry highlights was rounded out by Braid dev Jonathan Blow, who's likely too busy rewinding time (to see if he can somehow land higher on the ballot) to care.

Nintendo E3 2009 checklist:

• Mario? *check*
• Zelda? *check*
• Metroid? *check*

Are we missing something? Head past the break to find out!

We love that we live in a world where an almost universally loathed character like Tingle could continue to get work. For our part, we adore the idea that a 35-year-old man obsessed with fairies continues to appear in Nintendo games, though we get that not all of you share our adoration.

You're just going to indulge us then as we squeal for glee at the site of this Famitsu ad, which seems to hint at a new outing for our favorite fairy lover. Not that we'll ever get to play it.

If there was one driving theme behind this year's E3, it was that motion controls are too cool for school. However, even with both Microsoft and Sony jumping onto the bandwagon with their own gesture-based antics, Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto tells the BBC that he's "not worried at all" about being left behind.

In fact, the brain trust says that Nintendo's "very flattered" by the competition. Still, Miyamoto barbed his comments, stating that, based on what he's seen so far, neither competitor's motion controllers "have the type of depth that we're able to provide with Wii Motion Plus." Sony. Microsoft. You hear that hitting the floor? That's the gauntlet.

[Via 1UP]

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata mentioned in a recent interview that the company had a new handheld all set to go in the last three years, but ultimately decided to scrap the plan. Speaking with CNBC, Iwata declined to give any further details about the product, but did say that the most important thing for Nintendo when releasing new hardware is to maintain "momentum." Iwata implies that the new handheld would not have accomplished that goal.

History lesson time: Many moons ago Nintendo discussed the "three pillar strategy" for its hardware. It was to be the console (Gamecube, then Wii) and the two handhelds (Game Boy and DS). With the runaway success of the DS, and now the DSi, it seems the third pillar became vestigial. Perhaps one day we'll see what this mysteriously scuttled handheld was meant to be.

Listen -- not every game at E3 is a winner. The Joystiq heavyweights get to go play all the big games and interview all of the developer hotshots, and that's the stuff you love reading about. But some of us are down in the trenches, doing all of the demos that no one else wants to do, checking out all the games whose names are read around the schedule planning table, and answered only with the silence of bloggers who have better games to play.

That's not to say that Mario and Sonic at the Winter Olympics is a bad game -- its audience will probably enjoy it. Just like the previous Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games, it offers multiple Olympic sports-based minigames featuring popular Nintendo and Sega characters, controlled by various Wii and DS motions. People who like buying that kind of thing (parents wandering a videogame store looking for wholesome family entertainment) will probably enjoy it. But even though most of the Joystiq staff passed on this demo (and your faithful blogger bravely attended it), it was one of the more surreal things we've seen this week. Our strange experiences, let us show you them.

The announcement of Super Mario Galaxy 2? Pretty much out of this world. Even better? Seeing for yourself what the game looks like in action. Yoshi swinging by his tongue, Mario making flowers grow -- it's all here on some truly fantastic-looking new worlds (along with some fresh takes on returning ones). Excited? You should bee (suit). Let's-a go!

The man who gives voice to Mario, Sir Charles Martinet (not actually knighted - nor a sir), was on the E3 show floor early yesterday and doing his thing. Speaking of his thing, we wanted to know if after bringing the unmistakable sound to Mario's virtual cords for the last decade if he still gets work at the Big N.

Martinet told us he just recently did voice work for five games (not Super Mario Galaxy 2, yet) and flew out to Kyoto for three and two in Tokyo. He enthusiastically expressed that although the publisher sometimes reuses some of the voice, "most of the time it's usually a new recording." We asked if he has to do different voices for Mario in a tennis game compared to something like Galaxy. He told us, "It's always the same. It's always just right in there. They show me some actions and I go, 'OK.'"

He tells us that most of the time he goes to Nintendo's headquarters in Redmond to do his recordings and sometimes he does it from his studio at home. All in all, over the last decade plus, he's only gone between four and six months without recording the latest "Woo-hooooo" or "It's a me." Check out Martinet's name badge after the break.

Wondering where the in-development Zelda for Wii was at this morning's Nintendo E3 keynote? At an invite-only developers event with Shigeru Miyamoto, the revered designer confirmed that the title wouldn't see release until at least 2010. "We hope to bring it to you next year but it may take a little longer," he said through a translator. "To be honest, at E3 we wanted to announce a new Zelda game for Wii." Unfortunately, that desire didn't earn the title a spot in Nintendo's keynote and it was instead relegated to the developers event. He also said that the title could "possibly" be a Motion Plus exclusive – though if he's not sure, we don't know who would be.

The "announcement" included artwork – we weren't allowed to take pictures of (sorry!) – which was Twilight Princess-esque, featuring Link and a female Zora character. Here's the bad news: the more astute amongst you may remember that Miyamoto took the opportunity at last year's E3 developer's event to reveal a new Pikmin title for Wii in development (not the Wiimake) and, almost a year and two major keynotes later, we've yet to hear about it again.