_GET A GRIP: Nintendo’s Wii is flying off shelves, and the new console’s wireless remote - or "Wiimote" - is apparently flying everywhere else. More Wii owners are going online to post photos of damage caused when they lost their grip on the slender controller, which is swung, like a golf club or a tennis racket, when playing. The Wiimote has a strap you’re supposed to wrap around your wrist, but the controller and the strap are connected by a slender thread that could easily break. Then again, a lot of players probably aren’t even bothering to put on the strap.

"Some people are getting a lot more excited than we’d expected," Nintendo President Satoru Iwata said. "We need to better communicate to people how to deal with Wii as a new form of entertainment."

Nintendo is looking into the problem, but spokesman Yasuhiro Minagawa said the company hasn’t decided whether to change the strap.

_DON’T GO AWAY MAD: Given the widespread shortages of the Wii and Sony’s PlayStation 3, it appears a lot of would-be buyers are settling for a consolation prize. Overall video-game sales (hardware and software) jumped 34 percent last month as compared with November 2005, with sales of home consoles nearly doubling. Leading the way were Nintendo’s portable DS, with 918,000 sold, and the six-year-old PlayStation 2, with 664,000 sold. Microsoft’s Xbox 360 outsold the PS3 and the Wii, although not by much in the latter case.

Microsoft still has a few months before the rival machines become widely available - can the 360 build enough momentum before then to win the next-generation console war?

_WHY CAN’T WE BE FRIENDS? `Tis the season to be ... well, at least civil toward people you usually don’t get along with. So let’s raise a glass of eggnog to Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Joe Lieberman, longtime watchdogs of the video-game industry, who have come out in support of an effort to raise parental awareness of game ratings. The Entertainment Software Rating Board has created four public-service announcements explaining the ratings, and is sending them to more than 800 broadcast and cable stations.

"Just like movies and TV shows, video games are created for a diverse audience of all ages, and some are simply not intended for children," ESRB president Patricia Vance said. Lieberman added, "Ultimately, this is about parents exercising some responsibility."

Neither senator appears in any of the ads; instead, they feature Best Buy and GameStop executives promising not to sell games with M (for "mature") ratings to kids.

_OSCAR WHO? What event could possibly attract Tenacious D, 50 Cent, game designer Cliffy B and the cheerleader from "Heroes" to the same room? Why, it’s the fourth annual Spike TV Video Game Awards, which are airing this week on the testosterone-heavy cable channel. The big winner was Bethesda Softworks’ "The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion," which snagged five trophies, including game of the year and most addictive. Microsoft’s "Gears of War," the apparent fan favorite, took four prizes, including studio of the year for Cliffy B’s Epic Games. Only one category - critics’ choice - allowed entries published after Nov. 7, which would include any PS3 or Wii games; the winner there was Nintendo’s "The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess."

_CREATING BUZZ: Canceled science-fiction shows never really die, and the latest to leap into a new dimension is "Firefly," the short-lived space opera from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" creator Joss Whedon. The Multiverse Network has acquired the rights to adapt "Firefly" into a massively multiplayer online game. Is a failed TV series - even a really good one - the best foundation for such an enterprise? Multiverse co-founder Corey Bridges thinks so, calling it "an incredibly rich and exciting universe. It’s going to make a very compelling and unique online experience filled with adventure, humor and mystery." It’s got to be better than "Star Wars Galaxies."