Due to a weird interpretation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), Nintendo and the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raided 32 locations in 16 states in search of mod chip makers and distributors.

Their interpretation? and why is US Customs involved? Because the chips violate the region encoding on the consoles. And also the belief that the chips were being “imported”.

This warranted all-out raids and arrests. Yeah. Screw the courts system, we’ll just raid everyone for this extremely violent crime. Mod chips are, after all, a gateway drug.

Guess which department “US ICE” is under. The Department of Homeland Security. Good ol’ Patriot Act to the rescue again!

Nintendo supports the raids, and they should because they were the ones that initiated contact with US ICE about doing this kind of thing in the first place.

I really need to get a Wii.

As I’ve said on here a million times, I’m not much of a console gamer. Or at least, I don’t really consider myself one. I played all the classic Atari, Coleco, and Nintendo titles, but things got banal and monotonous for me after the Sega Genesis, and even that console had a vast pit of crappy games to go with the few gems.

I got the Xbox only after it had been out awhile, had dropped in price, and specifically to use as a media player/linux pc platform. I never even bought the PS or PS2, although I’ve played them a few times.

But there are three genres of games I prefer on consoles: Driving, Sports, and Fighting. Those just aren’t as fun on a PC, and translate much better to sitting in front of the TV with a controller.

My favorite fighting game series is Soul Calibur. I bought that game immediately after buying the Xbox, and it is definitely my most played Xbox title. It had stunning graphics and animation back then, and still looks and plays damn good today.

And now comes Soul Calibur: Legends for the Wii. We all know about the controller and we anticipate great things to be done with it. A couple weeks ago the trailer for the new Lego Star Wars on the Wii showed a first taste of what lightsaber battles could be like. But I had no idea they were going to integrate a Soul Calibur title to be used with it. This series stresses melee weapon combat, and does it better and more varied than any other fighting game. Now we can wear ourselves out swinging the staff or whipping Eve’s sword. I can only picture good things ahead. At least, after I finally get ahold of a Wii.

In a move everyone could predict, Sony swallowed their pride and finally dropped the price of the PS3 to $500. Just a bit higher than the most expensive Xbox360 package. This move should increase their sales somewhat, but as usual, they are making broad, boastful claims about it:

“Our initial expectation is that sales should double at a minimum,” Jack Tretton, chief executive of Sony Computer Entertainment America, said in an interview.

Well, whatever. But I guess they figured it was safe to lose some money per console, as Microsoft dropped the big bombshell of extending everyone’s warranty on the XBOX360, costing them over a billion dollars, last week. Plus, Sony doesn’t exactly like being ignored at E3, which starts in a few days.

And the Wii, well you still can’t even find it in stores. Keep on truckin’.