Month of Metroid kicks off with MP3:C channel, VC releases

Building up hype for Metroid Prime 3: Corruption's August 27th release, Nintendo has declared our eighth month as the "Month of Metroid," releasing a downloadable preview channel for the FPS/adventure title. As shown in the video we've embedded above, you can grab the preview from the Wii Shopping Channel's WiiWare section for free. Two streaming videos should be included with the download -- one a lengthy trailer, the other demonstrating gameplay -- as well as two hidden artwork samples. More videos will be made available this August 13th.

Also on August 13th, as we predicted, Nintendo plans to bring the original Metroid NES game to the Virtual Console for 500 points. Super Metroid fans can expect to see the SNES classic appear this August 20th, priced at 800 points. Coinciding Wii releases with their complementary retro titles seems like an obvious sales stratagem; we wonder what took Nintendo so long to catch on? Anyhow, we can't wait to see what else Nintendo has planned for this Metroid Month.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]