Pocket Gamer reports that a "development source" told the site that Nintendo and Nokia worked on a "skunkworks" phone project in the early 2000s. The two companies collaborated on R&D for a proposed phone-console hybrid, before the release of the N-Gage, and while Nintendo was apparently doing early research for the DS.

The project was ongoing until it was shown to the Nintendo board of directors, who rejected it. "You have to remember Nintendo is a very conservative company," the anonymous developer told Pocket Gamer. "It always has various R&D projects on the go, but most of them are eventually rejected. It's just how it operates." Conservative, maybe, but to even consider supplementing or supplanting the Game Boy line with a cell phone back then is a bit out there. Consider Sony Ericsson, who are reportedly working on a PlayStation phone this year.

In any case, if the research went on to inform Nokia's development of the N-Gage, it would seem Nintendo made the right call in just making the DS instead.

EA has announced its lineup for GamesCom, both to be shown on the show floor and behind closed doors, and Dragon Age 2 is on both lists. If you plan to attend the August 18-22 event, you'll be able to meet (someone's version of) protagonist Hawke for the first time. Other games on the floor include Rock Band 3, Darkspore, the newly dated Crysis 2, and Star Wars: The Old Republic.

Meanwhile, EA will have private showings for Bulletstorm, EA Sports Active 2, EA Sports MMA, The Sims Medieval, and more. Perhaps press will get an opportunity to interact with whatever Epic's "Bulletstorm-sized unveil" is -- though we don't necessarily want any of our colleagues' heads to explode. See the full list of showings after the break. Your head will ... be perfectly fine, but intrigued!

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Good news, fans of ... things popping out of your television screen and totally flying at your face! L.A. ophthalmologist Dr. Mark Borchert, member of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, recently told Gamasutra that prolonged exposure to 3D displays is "not likely to cause any permanent harm to vision." Unless, of course, you're watching on Bravia's controversial new set, the Eye-Poker 3D 5000.

Borchert explained that 3D displays aren't completely without risks, stating "there are people who get uncomfortable with it, and get eye strain or headaches, or on much rarer occasions, a sense of imbalance or nausea, but there's no evidence it can cause permanent harm to your vision or use of both eyes together or anything like that." So, there you go. It probably won't make you blind, but it may make you feel like vomiting every time you use it. Man, the future's gonna be awesome.

Ghost Trick and Phoenix Wright cross over! ... in these sketches by Shu Takumi, creator of both series. Capcom shared a series of Ghost Trick-related drawings made by the producer, featuring Sissel as a shadow and a Christmas tree, as well as various slices of (after-) life from the other characters.

The one here even features a bonus literary reference. The caption above is a quote from a haiku by Matsuo Basho, which translates to something like "I wonder how my neighbor lives?" And now that we've taken a brief detour into seventeenth-century Japanese poetry, you can find a video of Takumi drawing after the break.

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If you're mystified by how the Nintendo 3DS could display two images, one for each eyeball, simultaneously, without relying on glasses to divide them up, you're not alone. But you will be alone after everyone else has watched this video by Kombo's Jeff Grubb, which explains not only the 3DS's parallax barrier system, and its effective range, but other stereoscopic 3D displays as well.

You'll also get to see a bit of off-screen 3DS footage, though looking at the 3D effect through a regular camera's view of the system just results in a kind of blurry image. And as a bonus, try to spot our own Ludwig Kietzmann! Surely you recognize the back of his head?

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Compared to last year, July's NPD numbers are fairly static, with overall video game industry sales down just 1% from $850.6m to $846.5m. While software sales were down a sizable 8% with newcomer NCAA Football 11 bringing in the top two spots for a combined 667K units sold, hardware sales were up a hefty 12%, mostly on the back of the newly redesigned (and, ostensibly, fixed!) Xbox 360 S. Looks like there was "unprecedented demand," like Microsoft said.

Most notably, that July sales surge resulted in a minor 2% drop in Xbox sales while every other console suffered double digit drops. This, as you can see in our lineup below, has earned the Xbox 360 the rare opportunity to best the Nintendo DS as the best-selling piece of video game hardware last month. To put things in perspective, NPD analyst Anita Frazier notes, "It's the first time since September '07 (Halo 3 launch) that the 360 was the top-selling hardware platform."

While the list of software sales only charts console and portable SKUs, there is one other game that deserves to be mentioned: StarCraft 2. Despite just five days on the market in July, the much-anticipated RTS sold an impressive 721K units at retail in July. Of course when you factor in digital and global sales, it sold a lot more than that.

• 360: 444K, down 9K (-2%)
• DS: 398K, down 113K (-22%)
• Wii: 254K, down 169K (-40%)
• PS3: 215K, down 90K (-30%)
• PSP: 84K, down 37K (-31%)

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Nintendo announced its lineup for this month's GamesCom event (August 18-22). Finally, those of you attending the convention in Cologne will have something to do there! And that something is "see Charles Martinet."

Or, you know, play The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, Metroid: Other M, Donkey Kong Country Returns, Wii Party, Professor Layton and the Lost Future, Tetris Party Deluxe, Golden Sun: Dark Dawn, Kirby's Epic Yarn, Art Academy, and Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Miniland Mayhem. If Mr. Martinet is busy. Nintendo is showing pretty much its whole E3 lineup, with the exception of Mario Sports Mix.

Why would anyone put their money into a GBA e-Reader and a remake of Super Mario Bros. 3, a game that everyone on Earth already has? The video after the break makes a pretty good case for why people did so, and for why you'll be headed to eBay momentarily.

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Nintendo announced the European release date for Professor Layton and the Unwound Future, the third game in the Professor Layton series today: October 22 (with the slightly altered title Professor Layton and the Lost Future).

If you're in Europe and want to play it sooner, you can either follow in the Professor's footsteps and use a time machine ... or just order a copy from the US, where it'll be available September 12. Of course, European Layton fans have the advantage of being able to watch the Professor Layton movie to help pass the time, so maybe the wait won't be so awful.

If you've always struggled keeping your XIIIs and IIIs straight, you might just need the assistance of a few handy flash cards. Hey, the covers of all the Final Fantasy games that Amazon just discounted across multiple platforms should suffice! Check out the full list of offers below, courtesy of Thrifty Nerd.

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