Nintendo released its earnings report for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2013, revealing that it had taken a loss much like it did in the last fiscal year. Nintendo recorded a 36.4 billion yen operating loss ($366 million) for the fiscal year, with less than expected sales of the Wii U continue to have a "negative impact on Nintendo's profits." Thanks to a depreciation of the yen, Nintendo's net income was 7 billion yen ($71 million). Net sales for the year were forecast at 635.4 billion yen ($6.38 billion), down from the year before.

Nintendo announced today that it will discontinue five channels on the Wii in June due to what it calls a "very low participation rate" of its customers. It will also kill one service that apparently very few people use. A handful of original Wii channels and some network services are soon to be no more. Nintendo announced today that due to a "very low participation rate," the company has decided to discontinue the following applications beginning June 28, 2013.

Earlier in the week we reported that Nintendo announced plans to bring the budget minded Wii Mini to the United Kingdom after launching it in Canada back in December. One of the things we did not know was just how well the scaled down console was performing at retail in Canada. Popular Nintendo-focused web site Nintendo World Report offers some insight on that today. According to NWR, the Nintendo Mini has sold 35,700 units across Canada - from launch to January 31.

The Wii Mini, the feature-disabled version of the Wii that no one was clamoring for, is nonetheless coming to Europe. The special version of the console was released in Canada last year, though how it performed there is anyone's guess because Nintendo has not released any sales data on it yet. Nintendo announced that it will release the Wii Mini on March 22, and will also be releasing a budget range (dubbed "Nintendo Selects") of games that includes such popular titles as Mario Party 8, Wii Sports Resort, Mario Power Tennis and Super Paper Mario...

Rayman creator Michel Ancel and staff members from Ubisoft Montpellier have joined fans in protesting the delayed release of Rayman Legends on the Wii U in order to simultaneously release the former Wii U exclusive on the PS3 and Xbox 360. Apparently the Wii U version is ready to go, but parent company Ubisoft wants to keep it locked down until the other versions of the game are done. Our pal Andrew Eisen shared his thoughts on that yesterday in this amusing video...

Earlier this week we reported that the Chinese government was considering lifting a 13-year ban on game consoles in the country. While there's plenty of black market devices and software for Chinese consumers, there's no way to legally buy a PS3, Xbox 360, or Nintendo device in the country. The story from a few days ago was based on a China Daily report that quoted an anonymous source inside the Ministry of Culture.

Citing a government source, the 13-year-old ban of consoles in China may be coming to an end. According to sources cites by China Daily the seven Chinese government ministries that banned the sale of consoles in the country in 2000 are opening up discussions on allowing them to be sold to Chinese citizens.

While many think that the Nintendo Wii has won the overall race in this current console cycle against Xbox 360 and PS3 in the United States, one research firm says that it will ultimately be Microsoft's console that sits at the top of the mountain. DFC Intelligence's new report predicts that more Xbox 360s will be sold in the US than Wiis by 2017. The research firm is forecasting that Xbox 360 will have sold over 46 million units in the US by 2017, while the Wii is estimated at just over 42 million. Sony's PS3 comes in at 33.5 million.

The results are in, the votes have been tallied and the sole light in my mom's windowless, basement bathroom burnt out while I was taking a shower this morning.  It's time to reveal which of the current consoles GamePolitics poll participants think has the dumbest name!

A particularly light and fluffy question for this week's poll, GP faithful:

Which of the current crop of video game consoles do you think has the dumbest name?

Is it the Wii?  It's the Wii, isn't it?

Yeah, it's probably the Wii.

Seen anyone wandering around with 7,000 Wii consoles?

If you have, pick up the phone and give the SeaTac, Washington police a call because those units are probably stolen.

Sgt. Cindy West told ABC News that thieves pulled up two 53-foot semi-truck trailers and a large box-truck van to a Nintendo distribution warehouse in Seattle Air Cargo last Saturday evening and, using forklifts on site, loaded up the vehicles with approximately $2 million worth of Wii consoles.

Then they left.

Nintendo of Canada communications manager director Matt Ryan tells Polygon that the Wii Mini lacks important features such as GameCube backwards compatibility and online connectivity because the firm wanted to keep the cost low so that "families" and "non-core gamers" could afford the device. Nintendo announced the pared down Nintendo Wii recently as being only for Canada and set at a suggested retail price of $99 CAN.

It turns out that the rumors about a new pared down Wii console were true but there are several caveats. For one, the new console will be released only in Canada for some reason. It will be released to our wonderful neighbors in the northern kingdom on December 7 and will retail for right around $99 CAN. So what are the other caveats? For one it does not support backwards compatibility, which means it is not capable of playing those old GameCube games. It is also not online capable, which means you can't use any services such as Netflix or Hulu Plus...

While there has been a fair share of bad news related to the Wii U's North American launch on Sunday, today we offer a story that is good news for anyone that wants to play some of those older Wii titles on the system: they look better on Wii U. According to the video to your left - pointed out by this NeoGAF forum thread - the Wii U appears to upscale Wii games.

With the Wii U launch less than a week away, many game publishers have strong opinions about Nintendo's newest platform. In an upcoming interview with GamesIndustry International, CEO Yves Guillemot offers his. While Ubisoft is one of the biggest third-party supporter of Wii U at launch, the company's CEO Yves Guillemot acknowledges that Nintendo may have to lower the price of the console.

Despite what those rascally anti-videogame folks would have you believe, all modern video game consoles have parental controls and Nintendo's Wii U is no exception.

Available for purchase in North America this Sunday, Nintendo's new console puts the parental controls right on the Wii U's main menu as opposed to burying it somewhere in system settings.  It's that pink icon in the second row.

Here's what the controls can do:

Looking forward to playing around with Wii U's online features?

Well, you're going to have to perform a system update first.

According to IGN (and confirmed in this morning's Nintendo Direct presentation), online features like Miiverse, Wii U Chat, Nintendo TVii and the system's eShop will be enabled with a Day 1 system update.

Unnamed sources speaking to C&VG are sounding alarm bells today that the United Kingdom may face a shortage of Nintendo's Wii U consoles when it is released in November. A "retail source" told CVG that the company he or she works for does not have enough Wii U units to fulfill pre-orders. That source claimed that they would be receiving around 25,000 units.

As is usually the case with new consoles, Nintendo's Wii U will initially be sold at a loss to the company when it releases in November. Nintendo President Satoru Iwata confirmed during the company's financial results briefing this week that the Wii U would be sold for far less than it cost to make, but the conventional wisdom is that the company will make most of its money on software.

If you thought you could play an Electronic Arts game on Nintendo's upcoming Wii U console without having an account on its Origin network then you are so very sadly mistaken. A change in EA's privacy policy reveals that Wii U users who want to play Wii U games online will need to have an Origin account and a "Nintendo Network ID." Of course, this also means that - by signing up for an Origin account - you give EA permission to collect your email address, Mii information, friend list, country, language, and date of birth.

In Episode 25 of the Super Podcast Action Committee hosts Andrew Eisen and E. Zachary Knight talk about what happens when a fully funded Kickstarter project (in this case the game Haunts: The Manse Macabre) fails to become reality, the wisdom of knowing when to shut down a failing Kickstarter campaign (the focus of that topic being Loot Drop's attempts to fund the 'Old School RPG'), the latest on the "six strikes" copyright enforcement scheme adopted by U.S. ISPs, Andrew's latest video, and the horrors of using voice chat on Nintendo's Wii U.

Earlier this week we reported that Foxconn - the company that helps build many of the products that are popular in the West from companies like Apple, Sony, Samsung, Microsoft and Nintendo - reported that it found underage interns working in one of its plants in Yantai, China. Today we have learned that that plant is responsible for assembling Nintendo products.

Nintendo announced this morning that it has slashed the price of the Wii to $129.99 in the United States. The lower-priced SKU also comes bundled with two games - Wii Sports and Wii Sports Resort along with one black console, and a black Wii Remote Plus controller and Nunchuck - of course. The two games will be included on a single disc - just like they did with Duck Hunt and Super Mario Bros. on the NES. Look forward to seeing those packed-in discs for sale at GameStop in about a month....

When Nintendo first started advertising the newest Mario game for the Wii U - Super Mario Bros U - it claimed that the game was capable of being displayed in 1080p. It turns out that that little advertising bullet point isn't true, and now Nintendo is pulling the claim for any advertising related to the game.

A message on the game's official website stated:

"Experience Mario like never before... in full 1080p HD, only on the Wii U console!"

Nintendo has revealed more specific release dates for the first wave of Nintendo Wii U titles available at launch or within the first quarter of 2013. The company says that at least 23 games will be on sale at around the same time the Wii U is released on November 18 (North America) including Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Skylanders Giants, Transformers Prime, Wipeout 3, Disney Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two, FIFA Soccer 13, Tekken Tag Tournament 2 Wii U Edition, New Super Mario Bros.

If you haven't had the chance to pre-order the Wii U and were planning on heading over to Gamestop.com to sign up, you can forget about it for the time being. GameStop has stopped taking pre-orders for both version of the upcoming console as of yesterday. While there are likely retailers out there taking pre-orders still, it is curious that the world's largest games retailer would stop so quickly after opening them up late last week.

In Episode 21 hosts Andrew Eisen and E. Zachary Knight ponder the excitement levels of the Wii U amongst early adopters, wonder why Walmart and Amazon are not stocking certain products like Kindle Fire and Wii U pre-orders, and look at twenty predictions on future consoles. It's fun for the whole family... Download it now: SuperPAC Episode 21 (1 hour, 13 minutes).

More details about the web browser you will use in the Wii U when it is released in November have been revealed, with some sad news for anyone that likes Flash: it's not supported. The news comes from footage of the Wii U's internet browser functionality that is part of the Japanese Nintendo Direct presentation.

Andrew Eisen reacts to the details of the new Wii U including the two different models, pricing, release date and more. Get ready for a rollercoaster ride of expression. You can catch more of Andrew's thoughts on the Wii U on Episode 20 of the Super Podcast Action Committee.

In Episode 20 hosts Andrew Eisen and E. Zachary Knight throw all conventional limitations on time out the window as they discuss the "Adults Only" ESRB game ratings category, political ads in games, and all the news about the Wii U. Download it here: SuperPAC Episode 20 (1 hour, 27 minutes).