Wii nears record

The Nintendo Wii is well on the road to becoming the most successful game console ever, after reaching 200 000 unit sales in just 50 weeks, says The Age.

The enduring PlayStation 2, which will soon celebrate its seventh birthday, and the market-leading Nintendo DS handheld, both took 55 weeks to hit 200 000 units.

Andrew Milgate, games analyst at market-watcher GfK, said if Nintendo kept selling the Wii at a similar rate, it would become the fastest-selling console of all time.

A class action lawsuit has been filed in the US, claiming Microsoft`s blockbuster game Halo 3 is responsible for crashes on the Xbox 360 console, says The New Zealand Herald.

The lawsuit has been filed in California under consumer protection legislation. It alleges a breach of "statutory implied warranty of merchantability" and "statutory implied warranty of fitness for a particular purpose".

The lawsuit claims Halo 3 is, in fact, not compatible with the Xbox 360 - the console for which the game is specifically and exclusively designed.

Gamers are now being paid to kill - at least, virtually. Over the past year, a series of over-18s servers have launched, that pay a player for every kill they make, while putting a price on every death, says The Guardian.

Although attracting gamers from around the world, the servers are all mainly based in the UK, where they are exempt from the regulations of the 2005 Gambling Act - being categorised as skill-based as opposed to chance.

Although free from regulation, this has also given the companies taking the first steps a problem with trust. Instinctively, hardcore PC gamers do not trust each other. Players suspect one another of installing third-party software.