Last week's American Virtual Console versus European Virtual Console competition was an easy decision for me, Europe got Super Mario Bros. 2, but my winning vote goes to whichever team has Streets of Rage 2. Which is why, even though America got ActRaiser, Kid Chameleon, and J. J. & Jeff, I've got to go with the European Virtual Console releases this week: Streets of Rage 2, ToeJam and Earl in Panic on Funkotron, Kid Chameleon, World Sports Competition. The first three are all available for 800 Wii Point, and the World Sports Competition will cost you only 600 Wii Points.

In other Virtual Console news, so far Nintendo has sold more than 4.7 million Virtual Console games, at a rate of over 1,000 downloads and hour. They've finally reached their 100th game retro re-release, and on Monday they plan on making the triple digit release plunge with Zelda II – The Adventure of Link. Of all the Zelda games ever released, Zelda II has generally been accepted as the worst in the series, but at least we get another Zelda game to revisit.

Damn you, Nintendo. Just as I had started to get tired of your addictive Mario Kart games, you give us a wacky Wiimote that will probably reinvent the wheel for another year of multiplayer mayhem. According to Jeux-France, Nintendo plans on revealing the next Mario Kart game for the Wii at the upcoming E3 event. The rumors also point to Nintendo finalizing the release dates for Super Smash Bros. Brawl and Super Mario Galaxy, and hopefully presenting plenty of videos for each game as well. In closing, the Nintendo rumor mentioned a "large revelation on the Hardware level," which some are already guessing to be a hidden audio translator chip in the back of the Wiimotes.

Normally when a game has new pictures and a new video clip, I'll put the video up top and the pictures down below. However, when a game like Manhunt 2 looks like shit, the last thing you want to see is Rockstar taking a shit on screen. It's like they had lessons from Uwe Boll himself. I finally took the time to refresh my memory on how good the graphics looked in the first Manhunt game on the PS2 in 2003, and I honestly can't tell any noticeable difference between the quality of the 3D models in the two games. The Wii might use slightly more detailed texture maps, but it seems like that's it.

You can see the video here, although no new plot is revealed in it. I'm more interested in these pictures -- the bloodiest Nintendo game pictures I've ever seen. And by bloodiest, I mean most excessive cheap use of red color filters on screen. I'll probably still buy this game due to its decent sounding storyline, but Manhunt 2 deserves a new title for its efforts to bring out the worst in the Wii. If it dethrones Red Steel of that trophy, then I'll start referring to this game as Red Shit, just so nobody mixes the two up.

As a blog named after the lamest college sport ever established, I didn't expect Varsity Basketweaving to be able to count past six. Yet they were able to successfully depict all seven Tetris pieces as college party stereotypes, and even break them each down further into their pro and con party qualities. Of all the college characters listed, my favorite description is the elusive I-block who's responsible for so many high score peaks and pitfalls in my past:

I-Block: The gorgeous cheerleader. Pros: The most sought-after invitee inspires everyone to clear a path for her arrival. Can bring as many cheerleading friends as she wants without a single complaint from you. Four rows of guys want nothing more than to leave with her, and she might just oblige. Cons: Plays hard-to-get; doesn't appear at your parties nearly enough. God help you if she's drunk and stumbles into an awkward crowd in the middle of everyone; she'll cause such a fuss, she'll distract you from the rest of the party.

It's especially true because whenever you get her on her back, you're fucked. Waiting an eternity for an I-block to show up when you need it is my third most frustrating gamer memory. Number two is, of course, not using the I-block the right way when it does come along, and the most frustrating memory of all goes to that damn Duck Hunt dog. To read the other six Tetris piece personas, you can check out the full list here.

You've had more Super Smash Bros. Brawl updates than you can handle? Too bad, here's more racist updates. I say racist, because if there is one set of people I'm racist towards, it is most definitely Delfinos. Fucking hate those Delfinos. I don't care what color Delfino you are, you're fat, and useless, and I hate you. Oh look, a level all about Delfinos, just what I wanted:

"This is the central town of Isle Delfino, the tropical setting of Super Mario Sunshine. Wow! That blue ocean is bright on the eyes. Ahh… It makes me want to swim. This particular battle stage flies around the skies above the island. Fly here and there as you look down on the town below. After a thrilling landing, it becomes a normal battle stage. There are several landing points. This flight path repeats, providing great sightseeing and brawling. The changing scenery is so beautiful, you get absorbed in it. You really feel like a tourist!"

I'm a tourist? Worst tour ever. I hope ten year old terrorists masturbate to goats and then shoot me -- bonus points for telling me what movie that's from. The picture above is just a combined zoom in of two of the four new pictures. I couldn't stand to look at all of Delfino at once, let alone ask you to look at it in all its failure, but if you're feeling daring, feel free to gaze at the gallery below.

Now that they're announcing levels for their game, what other game environments do you want to see make the cut?

Looks like video games are finally in the mainstream media for good. CBS has renewed their contract with the World Series of Video Games, and will televise matches for a second year:

"The 2007 deal will expand WSVG coverage to four separate hour-long events timed after the three major U.S. events and the finals in Sweden. They will air as part of the CBS Sports Spectacular on Sunday, July 29; Sunday, August 19; Saturday, November 17; and Saturday, December 15. Each episode will feature competition footage for featured titles such as Blizzard’s World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, Activision’s Guitar Hero II and EA Sports Fight Night Round 3. Segments on the competitors themselves will also be included."

I wonder how long it will be before video game events of this size get covered in Vegas regularly, with money lines, point spreads, prostitutes and everything else that's essential. I'm still hoping that one day Vegas can work out a deal with Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo to allow them to let multiplayer games be used for gambling. Video game gambling could tear Vegas apart. No more obnoxious sports betters and old dudes throwing away their retirement money. Anybody can be a gamer, so in ten years it might be the number one Vegas attraction. Prostitutes would ditch their pimps and take this up as a more profitable career, launching a whole new era of gaming. WSVGSTDs.

Maybe Vegas could even use this as leverage to lower the legal gambling age to help get in gamers while they're still young. Slot machine profits would rise drastically once again, but not because of bored wives. Half the ten year old world champions would need their moms to fly them to the events, and while their kids are out supporting the family with their trigger fingers, Vegas will steal it all back through their bored mothers at the slots.

Hopefully the televised show goes over well and we see this happening more and more soon. I don't see how there's any CSI crimes left to be solved, housewives left to be banged, or islands left to survive on. Even America is sick of American Idol, we need some new form of entertainment to take over television, and if we're lucky video games will claim reality TV's dying throne.

The Last Boss's brother site With Leather spotted this geek sport event:

"Wiimbledon is Brooklyn's first -- nay, the world's first! -- Wii tennis tournament. Or maybe it just has a cool name. We're clever like that. Sign up for the email newsletter above, and we'll let you know when the next tourney is."

The Wiimbledon Wii Sports tennis tournament takes place on Saturday, June 23rd, at some random bar in Brooklyn. That's the who, what, where, and how, but I want to know why? Combining Wiimotes and alcohol in a bar has to be some kind of liquor license sports violation. They might as well start a beer bottle fencing league and a fantasy fencing fatality league to bet on who survives each bracket. Besides, everyone knows Wii Baseball is better -- they should make it Shot Glass World Series, where you have to down a drink after every inning.

If you live in New York though, they plan on giving away a Wii to the winners of the singles and doubles tournament, so you might as well check it out. You can find out more information and sign up here.

Ever pay for a movie and then wish you could give all five fingers of your opinion to its director? If you live in San Francisco, and are already despising the upcoming Postal movie, then you'll get your chance soon. On August 11th, Uwe Boll will actually attend the U.S. premiere showing of his Postal movie at the San Francisco Festival of Fantastic Film, which in my opinion, is missing a few more F's in its title.

I can't wait to see how the first audiences will respond to his film, I'm sure plenty of people will walk out before its over. Things should heat up even more after the ending credits though, because after the premiere Uwe Boll plans on giving a "lively" Q&A session. And by lively, I hope it means he'll put on boxing gloves and let his viewers fight him for their refunds. Headlines of "Director Mauled by Moviegoers" would make my day.

The BBPS found this fake Punch-Out! video of Michael Jackson versus Macaulay Culkin in a battle I'm glad I've never played. Fighting as Little Macaulay instead of Little Mac, and changing the last boss from Mike Tyson to Michael Jackson, makes this one of the most disturbing parodies I've ever seen. I was scared for Macaulay's safety against the Jester Molester formerly known as the King of Pop, but the Home Alone kid puts up a good fight. Thanks go to Mike L. Mayfield, whose 2D animations make me never want to play 8-bit boxing ever again.

While speaking with id Software's Todd Hollenshead, it was revealed that the legendary coder John Carmack is hard at work once again:

"We are working on an all-new franchise: it's not Doom, it's not Quake, it's not Wolfenstein, it's not Enemy Territory, it's not even Commander Keen. It is a new id brand with an all-new John Carmack engine and I think that when we show it to people, once again they'll see, just like they saw when we first showed Doom 3, that John Carmack still has a lot of magic left. . . . The new stuff that we're working on does have a brand new engine that John has been working on, actually is still working on today. We can’t really talk any details about it; we'll see about when the timing is right for an announcement. We like to be able to talk about stuff that we can show at the same time and it's not really ready to show yet."

That means we might not see this game in stores for five more years. I'm glad John Carmack is still putting his skills to use, although I was hoping to see another Wolfenstein game be next in line. Not too long ago Carmack mentioned that he was working on a PS3/360/PC game that focuses on gameplay and artificial intelligence, so don't be surprised if this year's QuakeCon brings their official announcement of yet another shooting game. Any guesses on what setting their secret project will have?