Spong dice: "no megat0n for you!"

Another day, another mystery 19th Dec 2002

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Megaton fails to register as gossip frenzy engulfs Nintendo

Much strangeness indeed. Nintendo of Japan is remaining tight-lipped on everything and anything concerning, well, anything. Today has seen a fresh bout of rumblings emanating from Kyoto, all of which vary hugely.

Overnight, gossip stated that Nintendo did indeed own at least a percentage of the PlayStation brand, following a failed relationship with Sony to develop a CD add-on for the SNES way back in 1992. This is, at least for now, widely disbelieved. The talk is that Nintendo will be suing Sony for a ludicrous sum, with which it plans to fund a collection of gaming super-brains to power the console future. The latter part of this story carries some weight. Allow us to explain...

You may remember that last Friday, we brought you news that certain loose-lipped NEC staff members had been speaking in Japan about a possible deal with Nintendo to develop the next home console from the firm. Nintendo at the time vehemently denied this.

Then, further gossip stated that Nintendo had disbanded its team that was initially charged with research and development of future systems. In news breaking today, it would seem that Nintendo is indeed poised to make the announcement that it will be partnering with NEC to form an R&D studio of some sort. Furthermore, the Kumamoto facility, originally used for the production of Sega's doomed Dreamcast console, has been pegged as the centre for the alliance.

In all of this, the supposed Megaton Announcement seems to have become somewhat derailed. Insiders at Nintendo Europe, speaking to us directly, claim that nothing is in the announcement pipeline, as far as they are aware. These are the same people, working out of the firm's German headquarters, that disclosed the first details of the next Game Boy release to us earlier this year.

And so the wait continues. Nintendo to Sue Sony. Nintendo to Buy Capcom. Nintendo to Buy Sega. Nintendo to reveal Mario 128. Nintendo to unveil the GBA2. Nintendo to unveil the GameCube 2.

If it's anything other than a storm in a teacup, you'll find out here first.