UPDATE: Nintendo of Europe has said it’s “too early” for its own Q2 list. Expect that at some point in March, probably in two or three weeks.

NOA has released an uncharacteristically early list of titles which will be released in the second quarter of this year, including a date for Punch-Out!!, the announcement of an Excite Truck spin-off and the news that popular Japanese character Starfy will finally be making his western debut this May.

The big surprise - shocking in a where-the-hell-did-that-come-from kind of way - is Excitebots: Trick Racing. Apparently building on the Excitebike and Excite Truck franchises, it “lets everyone in the family use the Wii Wheel accessory in unique and changing environments, play fun minigames and perform crazy tricks”. In other words, it’s about as hardcore as Scouting For Girls, but hopefully not quite so fist-chewingly hateful.

Donkey Kong Jungle Beat gets a five-months-late localisation in the New Play Control range on May 4th, while Punch-Out!! is out two weeks later, and has some rather spiffy boxart, as you can see above.

Pleasingly, Nintendo has made a bit of a fuss about a few titles coming to WiiWare - Bit.Trip Beat and Eduardo the Samurai Toaster joined on the official press release by Swords and Soldiers and a new title named Night Game from the makers of Cave Story - the latter also coming to WiiWare soon.

The launch of Rhythm Heaven alongside DSi is confirmed, while Personal Trainer: Walking is a handheld accompaniment to Wii Fit which includes two pedometers, and the first use of Miis on the DS. Meanwhile, The Legendary Starfy will be released on June 8th - nice to see it arrive, but it’s nothing to get massively excited about. One for the kids, definitely.

It is, of course, a partial list, so best not to get too irate about any omissions, both non-surprising (Another Code, Fatal Frame) and faintly worrying (Wii Sports Resort). With MotionPlus guaranteed to launch before May, the latter is probably pencilled in for an April release - the gap between the New Play Control pairing of Mario Tennis and Pikmin (March 9th) and Excitebots (April 20th) surely a bit of free space for a first-party biggie. One cry-making absentee - Mario and Luigi RPG 3. Let’s hope that one’s just waiting on a concrete date.

Elsewhere, there’s little on the third-party list that’s too surprising, though I’m heartened to see giganto-quiff detective Jake Hunter make a reappearance in a new adventure named Memories of the Past. The first one was pretty naff - albeit charmingly so - but definitely had promise. An improved sequel would go down like a sack of potatoes, to paraphrase a line from the original.

The full list can be found after the jump. Nintendo of Europe, your move.

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Slicing, smashing, bludgeoning and bashing its way to store shelves across Europe next month is Platinum Games’ ultraviolent destroy-em-up MadWorld - publisher Sega announcing today that the stylish scrapper will launch on March 20th.

It’s another valiant attempt by the Japanese giant to bring a bit of Mature action for us Wii owners starved of blood, guts, gore and chainsaws. It might be a slightly tougher sell than House of the Dead Overkill, though - shooting zombies with a gun controller is more immediately appealing to some than monochromatic, faintly satirical beat-em-ups. Hopefully Sega’s marketing department will have something worked out and can get behind it in a big way in the weeks leading up to its release.

With precisely a month until the game’s release, I think it’ll be about another week or so before the first reviews start to trickle in - hopefully some high scores are in the offing. Certainly if Platinum’s past record is anything to go by, we’re at least looking at some critical acclaim if not commercial success.

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“Ha! We’re getting DSi on April 5th!” snort the Americans.”Ner ner ne ner ner!” retort the Europeans, thumbing their noses at their US counterparts as Nintendo announces a launch date of April 3rd in PAL territories the following day.

“We’re getting a blue model, though!” laugh the US residents.

“Ah, but we’ve got white!” is the response.

“Yeah, well ours only costs $179.99!”

“Oh.”

Yep, it’s going to be a penny shy of £150 for us UK residents, which for my money is £20 too much - but then Nintendo is marketing this as a premium option rather than a replacement for the Lite, so the price is hardly a shock. No pricing details have been announced for the rest of Europe as yet, and no further info regarding DSi software is yet available - expect more news in the coming weeks (though probably not from me, sob).

Will you be buying DSi, readers? Do let me know by posting a comment below.

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Nintendo today announced the launch date for DSi in the US - it will arrive Stateside on April 5th, and appears come in laser blue or black variations. What, no white? Madness. Perhaps Nintendo is saving those for Europe.

The official site can be found here, though it’s little more than a press release at the moment - a press release which also confirms that Rhythm Heaven will launch alongside DSi. Interestingly, it talks about the game’s music being composed by Japanese producer TSUNKU, so it seems that an EBA-style makeover is off the cards.

Elsewhere, Kotaku has pictures of the box, whose teeny-tiny icons showing the handheld’s multimedia capabilities aren’t a million miles away from those used by the PSP. If Sony’s really clever, it could do a neat bit of counter-marketing here by pointing out that its console does similar things already. Although you need a separate attachment for the camera, of course.

It’s retailing for $169.99, some forty dollars more expensive than DS Lite. It’ll be interesting if Nintendo tries to phase out the Lite, or whether it touts this as a premium option and keeps the two side-by-side at retail. No news on a PAL release just yet, though Nintendo is suggesting we’ll hear soon, according to CVG. At the current exchange rate, that price probably equates to around five hundred quid.

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It’s looking increasingly likely that Wii Sports Resort will arrive in either April or May, if new information on a Wii version of Virtua Tennis 2009 is anything to go by.

VG247.com is reporting that the MotionPlus logo has been seen on the Sega game’s boxart, and given that the third-party release is arriving in May, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Nintendo’s flagship release must be hitting shelves a little earlier.

Of course, it could just be rumour and speculation, but Sega isn’t denying that the game features MotionPlus (despite the non-mention in the official press release) which tells its own story. And it’s a game that would undoubtedly benefit from Nintendo’s new peripheral.

Two plus two equals five? Perhaps. But I firmly believe now that we’ll be seeing Wii Sports Resort in the first week of May at the very latest.

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Precisely two months after its North American debut, European gamers will be getting their Pokem on as the latest in the critter-catching RPG series hits DS.

Pokemon Platinum is a companion piece to Diamond and Pearl - only this offers much more than your average Poke-sequel. For starters, there are new online modes at the Wi-Fi plaza, while the Vs. Recorder allows you to record your most exciting battles and replay them to your heart’s content.

And then there’s the small matter of the Distortion World - I’ve experienced this in the Japanese version, and it really is one of the most exciting and unique Pokemon dungeons ever.

Oh, and there’s a new form of Shaymin - a Sky form, should you be a fan of that rare and unique beast.

Given that a lot of Pokemon games feel like little more than cheap cash-ins, it’s refreshing to have a game where its creators appear to have listened to criticism, with the new game featuring much more post-endgame content - like the Battle Frontier, which is a building full of additional challenges and tournaments, available once you’ve beaten the Elite Four. Not bad.

22nd May is the date for Poke-fans to scribble in their diaries, assuming they can hold off importing the US version out on 22nd March, that is.

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After much wailing and gnashing of teeth on my part about the extreme unlikelihood of us Europeans getting our hands on Another Code: R, along comes a PDF detailing Nintendo’s financial results briefing for the year, and my hopes are suddenly raised.

Scroll down to page 8 of the report, and you’ll see a launch schedule of primary Nintendo products for 2009. Now this list is clearly incomplete, but CiNG’s Wiiquel is definitely on the European schedule, with the release date given simply as ‘2009′.

Also of interest is the DS list, which suggests Rhythm Paradise (changed from Heaven due to religious concerns, perhaps?) will hit Europe in the first half of the calendar year. The Wii list also has Punch-Out!! down for release before June.

Now, it’s too early to start celebrating just yet, but I’d assume that if a European release wasn’t at least considered for Another Code: R, then it wouldn’t show up on the list. I’ve fired off an email to Nintendo UK to ask if anyone can confirm the information, but haven’t had a response as yet.

More tidbits of info: Endless Ocean 2 is another conspicuous absencee from the North America listing though it remains on the schedule for Europe. And somehow, Pokemon Platinum has shifted ten thousand units outside Japan. Lots more facts, figures and tentative release dates here.

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Atlus, publisher of quirky (and often brilliant) Japanese games in the US, has picked up another title to localise. This time it’s one of Marvelous Entertainment’s games, a strange puzzle-platform hybrid named Steal Princess.

It looks as gloriously niche as most Atlus titles tend to do, with the titular heroine swinging, jumping and scrapping her way through the game’s 150-plus isometric levels. The Wi-Fi logo on the box refers to the ability to create your own levels and share them with other players.

Perhaps the most exciting thing about Steal Princess is that it comes from Climax Entertainment, who created rock-hard Genesis/MegaDrive platformer Landstalker - the sort of game which is spoken about in hushed tones by retro geeks, and which appeared on the Virtual Console in late 2007. This looks to feature even more intricate platforming, and should thus offer the kind of old-school challenge that people complain we don’t see enough of any more.

Steal Princess launches in North America on 24th March. No-one’s picked it up for a PAL release just yet, and this may well be one title us Europeans have to import if we want to experience its beautiful strangeness.

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Wow. I was looking forward to grindhouse lightgunner HOTD: Overkill plenty already, but now I’ve seen this forthcoming special edition, I’m even more hyped.

Eurogamer is reporting that the game is now due for a February 13th launch in Europe - somewhat earlier than expected - and then this special edition Bang Bang Box shows up on Amazon Canada.

Various internet reports suggest the Bang Bang Box has also been confirmed for release in Sweden, which would suggest that it will be landing in all PAL territories (apart from Germany) soon. Expect a press release from Sega imminently. In the meantime I’m going to get excited about dual-wielding these ace new Hand Cannons and kicking some serious zombie ass. (While chewing bubblegum, obviously.)

Oh, and that date? It’s a Friday. Friday the 13th. How wonderfully apt.

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Eurogamer has reported that Nintendo of Europe is keeping quiet on release date details for the DSi, after IGN revealed the handheld could be landing in the US as early as April.

Last night’s story from ‘an inside source’ suggested the DSi would cost $179.99 (50 bucks more expensive than the Lite) and would launch on April 4th. Nintendo of Europe dismissed the information as - you guessed it - ‘rumour and speculation’, with the camera-packing handheld apparently bound for release in Spring 2009.

It seems as if Nintendo will be positioning DSi as a premium option for hardcore gamers in the west rather than suggesting it as a replacement for DS Lite, presumably continuing to target the expanded audience with the latter, and bigging up the downloadable games on the former as a nod to the real enthusiasts. Because girls and grans can’t use the internet, can they?

That said, a camera with funny face-morph software is bound to appeal to a wide market, so it’ll be interesting to see how Nintendo markets this - particularly as the DS isn’t facing particularly strong competition from its handheld rivals in the west.

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