Mega Man 9, Niko Bellic is a rapist, and more.

Busy week?  No worries.  Here are the most noteworthy news items of the past week.

Monday: Kotaku’s Stephen Tolito wrote an interesting piece on figures now available from the Wii’s Nintendo Channel.  He highlighted some surprises, the greatest being that people actually enjoy Wii Play to the tune of nine hours logged per person.  Carnival Games was another unexpected winner.  Most compelling, indeed.

Tuesday: EGM’s Quartermann is reporting one hell of a rumor this month.  If their sources are correct (and their hit-to-miss ratio is decent), Microsoft might be looking to farm out Xbox 360 hardware production to third-party manufacturers.  So… if respected Japanese companies started producing these units, could that change the landscape over there?  Probably not.  But it sure as hell would be interesting.

Wednesday: The New Haven Advocate reports that Connecticut Sen. Gayle Slossberg (D) is on the warpath.  She firmly believes that there is rape to be found in Grand Theft Auto IV.  It’s the type of rape for which the player is rewarded, no less!  A more stringent warning system is needed!  Her argument loses a bit of credibility on the grounds that such content does not exist, but who cares?  It’s GTA IV.  Blame it for whatever.  After all, owning up to your shitty parenting skills is so last decade.

Thursday: Sony had a pretty stellar showing on the Japanese hardware sales charts last week.  It was a quick burn and fizzle, though.  Only around 20,000 units were moved this week, putting it well below Wii and DS sales figures.  If it’s any sort of consolation, the PSP is still doing extremely well… so well, in fact, that it is sitting pretty at the top of the list.

Friday: Friday was a slow news day, so here’s a tasty left-over morsel from Thursday that’s guaranteed to satisfy:  Mega Man 9 is real.  And it will be really old-school.  Nintendo Power reports that the title will be dropping on WiiWare (later reports also confirmed XBLA/PSN releases), and it will look exactly like the NES iterations.  It’s a beautiful time to be alive, friends.

This blog article should be recognized as the sole opinion of the editor and does not necessarily reflect GotNext’s official position on the subject.