Mario and Sonic are headed to the winter games

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Now before we all roll our eyes at the news that Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games has been officially announced by SEGA, let’s remember that the original wasn’t bad (it wasn’t good either) it just wasn’t what we had all dreamed of Mario and Sonic’s first meeting being. Luckily Brawl came out and settled plenty of grudges between the two for those of us who wanted a bit more from the greatest rivalry our childhood had. But I digress, we have here the inevitable outcome of two of the top selling names in gaming joining together for a bunch of mini-games and then selling faster than Sonic can run.

Winter Games, which will hit both the DS and Wii, is once again being developed by SEGA with Miyamoto lending a guiding hand (he pokes his head in the door once a month). This time Sonic and Mario and all their friends will be headed to Vancouver, the site of the 2010 winter games, and there will be new characters and events to participate in. I shudder to think how deep into the Sonic depth chart they’re going to have to go to pull out new characters for this game, but if you’re curious we’re promised more info as the year advances.

Much like the original DS game players will be able to compete against each other via wireless and SEGA is promising even richer co-op and competitive gameplay on the Wii. As is expected the big change to this game is that it will be compatible with the Balance Board, instantly catapulting it’s sales numbers even higher. We can all moan and groan about how much of a bastardization this is of both iconic characters, but come winter 2009 we all know this thing is going to fly off shelves.