Nintendo phasing out Wii Speak peripheral from retailers

We're finding it hard to accept the fact that future generations of Wii gamers won't be able to experience the raw thrill of one roomful of people chatting it up with another roomful of people during an Animal Crossing: City Folk session. Sadly, that's the hard, hard truth one must extract from Nintendo's recently announced decision to phase out the Wii Speak peripheral, which is now only available "at limited retail locations."

Nintendo refused to hammer the final nail into the poor, puck-shaped microphone's coffin, however, telling GameSpot that "additional shipments can be made if consumer demand increases." In that case, we suppose our grandchildren can still have conversations with strangers' living rooms -- but they'll have to organize some kind of movement in order to do so.