The Christmas season, in the video game industry, is more about big sales of blockbuster titles, console launches, and a bit of rubbing-it-in-the-face for people who perennially spell Nintendo’s doom. (The 3DS is already outpacing sales of the DS in its first year.) If you’re a kid, subsequently, it means new video game time! Vinnk and Sean talk about their favorite Christmases, the games they got, their favorite Christmas games (yeah, there are a few), their most HATED Christmas games (there are even more), and more!

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With a slow shift to digital-only content, and the inability to share such content like you would lend a book or a disc, and publishers deliberately devaluing their game content through the use of activation codes and central server authenticaion, will there ever come a time when used games become a thing of the past? Sean and Vinnk explore why console games cost so much, why iOS games cost so little, and the ruin that would be visited upon the gaming industry if no one could lend out their games or buy used ones ever again.

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Should Nintendo be scared? Since the launch of the iPhone — which encouraged the rise of the Android platform — smartphone gaming is set to become a majority of the handheld market, eclipsing Nintendo for the first time since the release of the Game Boy in 1989. Sean and Vinnk explain their misgivings with GameStop, why they’re sure Nintendo expects Xenoblade to fail (or at least doesn’t care if it succeeds), and actual precedents that should exonerate Nintendo for being so cautious.

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Should Nintendo be scared? Since the launch of the iPhone — which encouraged the rise of the Android platform — smartphone gaming is set to become a majority of the handheld market, eclipsing Nintendo for the first time since the release of the Game Boy in 1989. Vinnk and SeanOrange take a look at the data, how the mobile gaming pie is growing, why smartphone gaming has been so successful, and what (if anything) Nintendo can do about it.

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aDam, Ernie, Zac, and Zero go off topic for an hour.

We’ll talk about Black Friday, Wikipedia, Rugrats, Super Mario, Saints Row The Third, Gears of War, Batman, and much more.

Let us know if you think this episode was not as good, just as good, or better than previous episodes. Because we didn’t plan this one at all and if we can avoid that in the future, we can save a lot of time.

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Direct Link:Powetcast 110: Information That Doesn’t Matter

End music: “i’m gone” by Kenna

Is the Wii U touch controller a naked attempt to try and compete with the iPad, and if so does it stand a chance to succeed? Sean and Vinnk go through a brief history of touch panels in consumer devices, from the Apple Newton to the Tiger Game.com, the Nintendo DS, and — of course — Apple”s iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad.

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Is there a right way to introduce your child to the world of video gaming? It might be a more difficult proposition for the children of adult gamers, whose boundaries are a bit less clear on the subject, but their non-gamer spouses (if indeed they are non-gamers) might keep them in check. Maybe. With Vinnk already a father of a 2 year old daughter, and Sean a father-to-be in 2012, we try to tackle those questions. How young is too young? How much is too much? What’s appropriate, and what’s deemed okay? Plus, in an audio bonus exclusive to the website, Sean tells the tale of how a camcorder gave birth to Puppy Star Trek, and helped to shape the rest of his life.

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After a recent performance of Video Games Live, Sean and Vinnk talk about the merits of bleeps and bloops, the chiptunes musicians who still love them, hidden music in Nintendo’s titles (including one hidden for the last nine years in the GameCube menu screen), and the more symphonic offerings of the 16-bit age and beyond.

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