In this edition of This Week in Video-Game Hstory, we highlight a few noteworthy ups and downs for major developers, Nintendo and Sony crushing dreams with their home consoles, and Uwe Boll destroying another franchise with a terrible movie. 

January 23

2008: The No More Heroes soundtrack is released.

January 24

1989: Nintendo obtains a patent for the master-slaver chips comprising their NES cartridge security system. This put a very big dent in Atari's Tengen plans and triggered a series of legal battles.

2006: Bethesda announces that they have exclusive rights to make a series of Star Trek games. I only ever played Star Trek: Encounters on the PlayStation 2. That was a pretty OK game.

2007: Sony announces that the PlayStation 3 will cost around $836 in Europe, or £425. I feel very sorry for all European gamers. They get the short end of the stick every time a major release happens. 

January 25

2005: Take-Two announces the acquisition of Sega's 2K sports game line. 

2006: Japanese pop singer/fashion model Gackt's single "Redemption" is released. Gackt's likeness and song were both featured in Final Fantasy 7: Dirge of Cerberus. Gackt was the model for Genesis. 

January 27

1966: Pokemon creator Ken Sugimori is born. On top of designing a substantial number of Pokemon characters, Sugimori is also the illustrator for the long-running manga series. 

1972: The Magnavox Odyssey is officially released, making it the world's first home game console. Yeah, it mostly played Pong, but gaming had to start somewhere. 

January 28

2005: Uwe Boll's bastardized film adaptation of the Alone in the Dark series hits theaters. I made the mistake of going to see it. 

January 29

1996: Duke Nukem 3D is released. You can now play this game on Xbox Live. Perhaps that's as much Duke Nukem we're going to see until Gearbox finally releases that demo they promised Borderlands Game of the Year edition buyers....