The LoZ.com Economy Crisis is over. After trying several methods such as stimulus packages and reform bills and whatnot, we were finally able to stabilize the economy and actually improve upon it!

We now have a working Rupees system that is quite new and improved upon our former system, with full integration into the Arcade, the Gameroom, and the new Triple Triad card game!

For those of you in the know Triple Triad is a very popular card game first introduced in Final Fantasy 8. Various versions of it have been created outside the game by TT enthusiasts and we now have it here at LoZ.com for your enjoyment. The rules are simple and the game is very easy to learn. For anyone who is interested in learning the game send me (Last Chance) a PM on the forums and I’ll be happy to not only help you learn, but grant you funds for a starter pack of cards so that you dont have to wait to get going!

Finally just as a note for anyone who’s lived under a rock, we have in fact upgraded our Shoutbox as well and after much trial and error I believe we’ll be keeping it as it is now so you can all put away your torches and pitchforks. Chance has corrected the errors and improved upon the old, outdated systems so that hopefully everyone will be get a lot more out of the games and features on the LoZ.com forums.

For anyone who’s not a member yet, what are you waiting for? Go sign up and become a part of one of the most active forums in the Zelda community!

Well the title is pretty self-explanatory really, the Wii has overtaken the NES as the best selling console of all time. The figure for this is 67.45 million Wii units sold worldwide. This is on top of the success of the DS which has sold 125.13 units which exceeds the entire Gameboy series of 118.69 units. And just to throw this in, it looks like President Iwata has not had any thoughts about an HD-Wii as he questions whether or not it would actually sell better from upgrading the hardware in such a way.

Source: IGN.com

For many of you who use our forums, you have often wondered, “What is reputation used for?” It’s a question that has been thus far easily answered with, “Nothing.” However, all that is about to change. The Sheikah now have the ability to leave positive and negative reputation at will, and will be encouraged to do so. Now, you may be wondering: What will reputation be used for? That much is up in the air. For now, this is just a trial of the way things will go. If it doesn’t amount to anything, then Reputation will continue to be pretty useless. However, if this should go well, as in it isn’t abused and it’s actually used, then Reputation could factor into a number of things. Perhaps in the future you’ll need not just a certain post count, but a certain reputation to use the Shoutbox? Or you’ll need a high reputation to become a Sheikah? Nobody knows for certain yet! Time will tell all. =D

Also, congraulations to LuisaRafidi who earned the Fanart Spotlight for the month of February!  We had received 8 submissions this month.  Check them out by clicking here.

Now its your turn, would you like to have your artwork on display? Every month we will select a new piece of fan art from our gallery to feature and promote! All you have to do is PM your work to Zelda on the forums, or email it. Every month we will look at all the new art we’ve received and select one to shine our spotlight on!
So start sending your fan art in and have your work seen by the thousands of people who visit LoZ.com every day!

Satoru Iwata has dissed the iPad, 3D gaming and High Definition upgrades, saying the former was “a bigger iPod Touch,”", and dismisses the latter two, doubting “whether those features would be enough to get people to buy new machines.” Iwata delved specifically into the issue of 3D gaming, commenting on how “[he has] doubts whether people will be wearing glasses to play games at home. How is that going to look to other people?” Despite this, he welcomes the idea of 3D Movies, such as James Cameron’s latest hit “Avatar”

Source: NY Times

“How is that going to look to other people?” Iwata showing that he’s never seen anyone play the Wii.

For those of you waiting patiently for part 4 of our Spirit Tracks walkthrough, it is here! Thank you to Sword of Faith for working hard and getting this walkthrough done for us. The journey through Spirit Tracks becomes even more interesting here, and hopefully as it progresses, will only continue to become even better!

In related news, the groups over at our forums have been terminated in the last couple of weeks. However, this news does not mean anything negative for the impact on our forum community: users are as active and excited as ever. Why don’t you come on over and join in our fun? The links for the forum can be found at the end of this post, or at the top of the page. From talking about what we think the best Zelda game is to our favorite kind of pizza, at the forums you can talk about anything. Be sure to join to keep up with the latest here at LoZ!

I just read a wonderful article over at the Escapist Magazine website. Apparantly the people who developed the Natal hardware pitched to Nintendo a few years ago, and whilst they were impressed they turned it down because of price point. I think the best point this article makes is pointing out the SNES-CD to Playstation incident. For those of you who don’t know Nintendo once had a deal with Sony to produce a CD add-on for the SNES. The problem here was when Nintendo reviewed the contract they realised that Sony would practically control all titles developed for the SNES CD-ROM. As a result they cancelled the plans with Sony and allied themselves with Phillips (Hence the birth of the CD-i).

So the question is although Nintendo have been good to consider price point for the consumers, have they let go of a potentially big investment by letting go of Natal?

Source: Escapist Magazine

Many years ago on one of my  many trips to Hong Kong I went to a maritime museum in Macau as part of a short excursion. I took some photographs of models over there and one of the ships that caught my eye had a familiar symbol on it. Upon closer inspection it was none other than our favourite gaming series most important symbol, the Triforce. Unfortunately I think that photo was lost in my old hard drive (R.I.P). So I did a little fishing around when I remembered that to try and find out the significance of this. I have found out that the symbol is in fact a ‘mon’ which is our equivalent of a family crest. The Triforce belongs to the Hojo family which had a huge clan in Japan. This clan was so influential you can see them in various areas of media, fans of Final Fantasy VII may remember a certain Professor Hojo.

Hojo's mon

Nearly every console line worth it’s salt has a budget line. Sony has the Platinum range (Greatest Hits in the US) and Microsoft has the Platinum Hits range (formerly Greatest Hits). But what about Nintendo? Meet the Everyone’s Recommendation Selection! [read the full story]

Our friends over at ZeldaInformer have put up some POTENTIAL leaks concerning Zelda Wii, which is said to come out later this year. They credit these leaks to a Japanese site called 2chan (related to 4chan, probably) where rumors have often come true before, as ZeldaInformer will tell you. [read the full story]