This week features a long podcast, as there’s a ton of news to report. Jonah tries air quotes on a pure audio podcast, while Paul refuses to believe The Legend of Zelda: Skyword Sword failed to hit the top 10 in software sales.

In addition, the Gaming Flashback checks out the JRPG Ys.

This week’s news includes:

• Ubisoft polling gamers for next Assassin’s Creed setting
• Electronic Arts bans a user for saying “badass”
• Newell: Piracy is “almost always a service problem” and not price, DRM agitates
• Christwire makes mock petition asking Pres. Obama ban Skyrim
• Holiday shopping madness sees woman pepper spraying for 360
• Microsoft refunds victims of Marketplace phishing scam

All this, and a bunch of reader feedback, as well as the Question of the Week: “Did you buy videogames as holiday gifts for friends and family?” Let us know.

We received a new franchise in 2007 called Assassin’s Creed, it was way hyped and released with mixed success, you either love it or you were bored to tears. We loved it, but many were bored to tears. Many assume Ubisoft learned a lot from their first release and will fix some of the repetition from the initial game with Assassin’s Creed 2 if one were to be created.

Ubisoft was asked by gamespot if they’d release a date or confirm the 2010 release of Assassin’s Creed 2 and Ubisoft had a very simple answer: “we’re not answering that question” and “what we just can say is that we are working hard on the product.”

They won’t promise a date for Asassin’s Creed 2 but this at least gives us an indication that they’re working on a game to follow up the initial release. There are plenty of creative concepts that can be done even better in a second game release including branching out the quests to make them a bit less tedious and repeating. The graphics were stunning, the moves were fluid and the battles were a dance of blades.

We’re waiting. Bring it on Ubisoft.

Sony’s been putting a lot of effort (read: money) into the PlayStation 3 product line with very little impact in the market. They’ve got this “10 year plan” but haven’t really executed a strong plan for their first two years of said plan. Sony’s plan seems to be “outlive the competition’s technology” while all of its competition stomps on their sales and market share with older and a bit “outdated” products.

Thus far there have been five spins of the PlayStation 3 hardware with price cuts only coming as a result of a “fire sale” of old hardware revisions. Sony, like many, believes the Nintendo Wii isn’t a direct competitor in their space; the outstanding sales of the Wii probably haven’t impacted the PlayStation 3 sales too much. The Xbox 360, however, has definitely cut them deep in all regions of sales.

Microsoft has built some unexpected momentum in Japan with Square-Enix making them a few console seller titles and the price cuts in Europe boosted sales over 200% all while the US continues to buy into the 360 hardware despite its most obvious red-ringing flaws. Microsoft has great partnerships with some fabulous companies, Bungie and Epic for instance, to build them exclusives that move even more 360 units.

Motorstorm is one of the PlayStation 3′s best games, selling over 3-million copies. While, as of January 2008, Halo 3 sold 8.1 million units for the Xbox 360. Now, Metal Gear Solid 4 has sold roughly 3.94 million copies since August of 2008 yet unsubstantiated rumors exist stating MGS4 could make its way to the 360. Combined awesome titles for the PlayStation 3 may not even exceed one of the competitors best selling products; where is the PS3 excitement?

Little Big Planet, Rachet and Clank, Resistance 2 and, someday, Massive Action Game (MAG) could produce some buzz around the PS3. By far, Little Big Planet has been the gold nugget Sony has been looking for and was published by Sony so they’re able to take full glory of this might-be console mover. What else do they have up their sleeve?

One or two blockbuster titles would compete well in a smaller market like last generation, but with Microsoft dragging in huge sales in all regions, Sony is going to need a real momentum killer. They’re already stating we’ll have no price cuts in 2008 leaving us asking, “why am I going to invest in a PlayStation 3?” Sony needs to figure out a long term battle plan and that involves blockbuster game titles which cannot be played on another console.

If Sony is willing to throw money out the window to keep the PlayStation 3 alive in this competitive market, why not spend it on their future? With a 10-year plan in place, that plan should involve picking up a company like Ubisoft. Ubisoft is a well respected public developer and publisher founded in 1986 and now consists of many well established smaller studios whom they’ve picked up along the way.

Ubisoft has some huge titles, Assassins Creed, Brothers in Arms, Ghost Recon, Splinter Cell, Rayman, Rainbow Six, Driver and has published many great titles for smaller studios. Imagine a Heroes of Might and Magic exclusive on the PlayStation 3 or a graphically intense exclusive Prince of Persia. Sony could steal titles away from the Wii such as Rayman and all his raving rabbids. Even 30% of these popular titles, being produced as exclusives for the PlayStation 3, could turn around this console.

Sure, Sony could pay for console exclusives on a handful of these great titles but, at this point, they’re going to pay out the nose to try to hold even a timed exclusive considering how many of these titles would arrive on the 360 in order for Ubisoft to recoup development costs for such a small PS3 audience.

Could Sony drive Ubisoft into the ground by limiting their exposure in the game industry to a single console? Indeed. There is always room for fatal errors when acquiring talent and executing them against your own 10-year plan. It would have to be a very aggressive attack with a very strong plan of execution in order to turn titles around on the PlayStation 3 in fast succession and with large PR hype.

Sony has shown they are willing to spend endless amounts of money all while turning their cheek to the obvious 360 domination. Why not take some of that money and re-invest it in the future of your 10-year plan by buying a company like Ubisoft before someone like EA does it first. With the huge market decline and the US bringing down the global economy, times may be ripe to grab a company and grow them to your own.

The real question would be, could Sony hold the talent at Ubisoft if they were to be purchased by such a large company with a sub-par sale standard console? Throw more money at the problem and bribe the talent to stick around for a few years and perhaps you’ve got a plan.

It was April of 2008 when we saw Assassin’s Creed show up on the PC, however in early February the game appeared on Internet pirate sites causing an estimated 700,000 downloads of the pirated copy of the game. The disc-copy manufacturer has assumed responsibility of the issue after finding an employee in possession of one of their copies of Assassin’s Creed at their home.

First, the disc-copy firm has said they haven’t enforced their high level of security needed to keep copies of the game in their possession. The earliest leaks of the pirated Assassin’s Creed was traced to an employees house, leading Ubisoft to assume “gross negligence” on the part of the manufacturer, inspiring the lawsuit.

To top off matters, pre-release copies of Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed contained a hidden bug to crash the game mid-way through, which makes their title look bad when sent to the mass market pirating audience (do they really need to impress pirates?)

This isn’t the first time copies of a game, music or movies have made their pre-release debut on torrents and pirate sites. As for us, we find it odd that someone who managed to sneak out the game early wouldn’t have simply enjoyed it in the comfort of their own home choosing to pirate it and hurt the industry instead. Hopefully they’ve been given their pink slip for being irrisponsible and hurting everyones reputation. Hope they really feel like a liberated hero now.

(Thanks, gamespot)

In an “unexpected” move, Ubisoft has opted to utilize the 1:1 accuracy of the Wii Motion Plus add-on device for the Wii remote in their next Red Steel sequel, currently called Red Steel 2. It may be most gamers consider this an unexpected move because they thought the series would be dead after the first launch title.

Red Steel was plagued with motion issues, making it a very unexceptable demonstration of the Wii control scheme. Luckily other titles arrived to show off how the controls were supposed to work; Ubisoft tried to make a hit FPS title using innovative control methods but came up a bit short.

This time, they’re hoping to redeem themselves by having the additional resolution of the new controller device, risking their reputation for a second time on Nintendo’s hardware.

“What was missing was the preciseness of the sabre,” Corre said of the first game, “and with this new device, I think it will change the experience.” (1up)

Although many gamers missed the first Red Steel experience because word about the horrid controls hit the streets quickly, this might be a chance to try the series one final time before giving up on it. In Ubisoft’s defense, the US market is very finicky about their first person shooters which helps explain higher reviews in Europe for the original title.

The games controls were tweaked after E3 2006 when people found it lack luster in performance and ability to mimick the users real moves when sword fighting. Ubisoft said it was because they received the Wii controller prototypes one month before the expo.

Will Ubisoft get the Wii Motion Plus in time to put out a highly polished game showing off Nintendo’s new hardware or will this be a second strike against the franchise? Only time will tell.