Level Up's 'NPD Quarterback' Take on NPD July

[Sullla]

I thought that this was the most interesting observation:

What's interesting is that a lot of our cohorts in the gaming press--an admittedly unrepresentative sample--aren't playing their Wiis much. Unless they have friends come to visit, they're pretty much forsaking their Wiis for Xbox 360, DS and some Playstation Network from time to time. Wii fans regularly complain that enthusiast outlets--most notably, the gang over at Ziff-Davis' 1UP Yours podcast--are paying insufficient attention to their console of choice, and in fact spend too much time mocking the Wii for what it's not (its lack of HD graphics; the fact that it's become a dumping ground for mini-games; the trend towards porting PSP games to Wii) rather than applauding what it is: a refreshing change from the way games used to be, which is attracting new people to this hobby. But with Guitar Hero III, Rock Band and SingStar PS3 coming this holiday--and, as you point out, a bizarre lack of new games to capitalize on the Wii Sports phenomenon (sorry, EA, but jamming those controls into your pro sports titles doesn't really count)--I wonder how many of us in the media will be playing Wii Sports and Wii Play when friends come to visit.

All this portends a sharp divergence between the people who faithfully cover games and the next-gen console with the most momentum, making the gaming press increasingly out of touch with what's really going on in the world. Has Game Informer put a Wii title on the cover since Red Steel? Has EGM put any Wii titles on its cover? I don't know for sure, but the bulk of the covers I see are for games that are leading on Xbox 360 and shipping simultaneously (cough, cough) for PS3. Wii games are relegated to cover lines or the guts of the mags. I don't think any of this is cause for Nintendo to be concerned, but I do wonder when the coverage is going to reflect the sales charts, if at all.

Granted, it's something that we've discussed here on these forums a number of times, but still good to see that some of the mainstream press is starting to acknowledge as well. Some of the major gaming websites (especially 1UP) definitely are looking more and more out of touch with what consumers are actually buying and playing. That's not a good sign!

How about the reference to vgchartz in the middle of the article:

Those folks are reading the same tea leaves we are, and if the unofficial reports from certain Web sites are correct, global hardware sales for Wii have surpassed those of Xbox 360.

An oblique reference in passing, to be sure, but TheSource is correct - it can only refer to vgchartz and NeoGAF.