Black Friday kicked off the holiday shopping season and, for third straight year, Nintendo's Wii console remains a smoking hot gift choice, according to PriceGrabber.com.

The well-trafficked price comparision site lists top products searched for by consumers. Its most recent results, which include Black Friday data, show the Wii at #1 and the Wii Fit exercise board/game at #4.

Despite recent economic conditions, a press release cites an 11% uptick in Black Friday traffic at PriceGrabber over 2007's numbers. Pointing to sales driven by retailer discounts, PriceGrabber Ron LaPierre remarked:

Louisiana game publisher Nerjyzed Game Studios is readying the launch of an Xbox 360 version of its Black College Football Experience game, reports The Advocate. The release of BCFx will mark the first-ever publication of a console game by an African-American owned studio.

A national ad campaign for Black College Football Experience will kick off today during the Bayou Classic as Southern University and Grambling square off in their 35th gridiron tilt. BCFx debuted last year on the PC. Of today's launch, Nerjyzed CEO Jacqueline Beauchamp commented:

Some gamers have been burned by bootleg games unwittingly purchased on Ebay, warns Aeropause.

Writer Stephen Munn reports a recent scam to which he fell victim:

I was thinking about that Harmony of Dissonance cartridge that failed on me not so long ago, and how strange it was to open the thing up and find the battery soldered to the board. I only had a very passing understanding of what a bootleg GBA cartridge looks like at the time... A failed battery is a common sign of a bootleg game, but there are more specific ways to tell while the game is still working. Unfortunately, these things don’t tend to leap out at you in an auction listing, but there are a few things that are a clear tipoff that something’s not right.

Say it ain't so, Houser Bros.

IGN reports that the upcoming PC flavor of Grand Theft Auto IV will install the dreaded SecuROM 7 copy protection on gamers' computers.

On an up note, however, the number of times that the game can be installed will not be subject to a limit. GamePolitics readers will recall that EA's much-awaited Spore came with a three-install limit. At least, it did until a gamer revolt prompted EA to relax the resrtiction.

Regarding GTA IV's SecuROM, an unnamed Rockstar spokesperson told IGN:

With the t-shirt serving as the centerpiece of many a gamer's wardrobe, The Examiner's Carol Orsini pens a fun article listing her choices for the top 10 gaming shirts for the holidays.

With the holidays right around the corner, nothing says 'I love you' to that special button-masher in your life more than the gift of garb. As one fanatical gamer to another, these are the absolute best t-shirts that loudly proclaim; 'Yes. I play games.' ...And as an incentive to you non-gamers, buying your gamer a shirt rather than a game equals more time they spend with you wearing it and less time that they're glued to the TV.

Used game sales and trades have been much in the news of late, with some consumer-gouging game industry types decrying the practice.

But, as Gamasutra's Leigh Alexander reports, GameStop CEO Dan DeMatteo insists that game consumers should continue to have options once they've finished with a game. Here's what the CEO had to say on the topic:

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The publisher of a sex game has taken the video game industry and its U.S. content rating board to task.

As reported by Spong, D-Dub Software, which publishes BoneTown, claims that it will create an "adult video game industry." The sex game company says that it is frustrated by restrictions put in place by console manufacturers and the ESRB.

Currently, the big three system makers won't license games which are rated Adults Only (AO) by the ESRB, leaving only the PC as a potential development platform. However, major retailers won't stock AO games on any system, leaving online distribution as the only viable option for such products. D-Dub CEO "Hod" says that the company will pursue the online model:

The British Minister of State for Science and Innovation, Lord Drayson (left), endorsed the work of the Serious Games Institute during a visit last week to SGI, which is located at England's Coventry University.

A University press release reports:

During his visit Lord Drayson... learnt about the use of virtual worlds and simulation games to train doctors and clinicians in a variety of applications including triage and serious injury trauma.

State Senator Leland Yee (D), author of California's contested video game law, has issued a press release urging parents to avoid violent video games when shopping for their children during the holiday season.

In doing so Yee referenced a recent longitudinal study which linked violent games to aggression in Japanese and American children:

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When gamers last heard from Bill McCollum, the Florida Attorney General was fretting that the motion-controlled Wii version of Manhunt 2 would have a generation of kids practicing to be killers. As GamePolitics reported in June of 2007, McCollum apparently got that idea from Jack Thompson.

These days, McCollum is, like many political colleagues in other states, urging parents to follow ESRB content ratings while shopping for holiday gifts. A press release on his official website quotes the Republican A.G.: