Neil Thompson, Microsoft's regional director of Xbox in the UK, has emphasized the need for the videogame industry to impress upon parents that consoles and videogames have grown far beyond what they were in the past.

 Following the government decision to uphold PEGI as the sole and official ratings board in UK, the BBFC has sent their well-wishes, albeit still with that restrained barb. BBFC Director David Cooke insisted that the BBFC would have been the better choice. Meanwhile, top industry heads are giving their praises for the government's pick. Read all about it after the jump.

We have confirmation, folks! Sky TV really is coming to the Xbox 360 to give us the first ever console-based live TV service. The rumored partnership is real, and it will be "groundbreaking".

Sony has the PSP, Nintendo has the DS. For years, Microsoft has left the two slug it out on the handheld gaming market - perhaps until now. Well-placed sources within the publisher have told TeamXbox.com that Microsoft is in the final stages of a "digital entertainment handheld."

Remember those news bits about the Wii and DS being used as educational tools in classrooms around the world? What about those educational games like Brain Training and the like? Those sound like great ways to make the non-gaming masses more open to video games, right? Well, Microsoft's Neil Thompson thinks otherwise.

Microsoft recently announced that the UK would also be getting the fabled Pro model upgrade for the Xbox 360. The press release they sent out states that, one August 15 rolls around, folks in the UK can pick up a 60 GB Xbox 360 model for £ 199.99.

Online site MCV UK recently had a chat with Microsoft Senior Regional Director for Northern Europe Neil Thompson regarding their company's marketing plans for this coming holiday season.

With the release of Halo 3 and other high-profile titles coming up, the Xbox 360 is in a good position to run away with the lion's share of the market this Christmas. Thompson shared that Microsoft will be spending tens of millions of dollars in marketing alone just to entice costumers to pick its console and software products over the competition. The official said:

It's the most expensive time of year to spend money. It is pivotal, we have heavyweight activity and you will see Xbox 360 very clearly above the line. We're working very hard with retailers to ensure we do a great job in-store and out of store. It will be a big 360 Christmas out there this year.

Neil Thompson then shared that despite having an early lead over Sony and Nintendo, Microsoft can't be too confident and that they have to keep on finding ways to widen their consumer base. Aside from keeping the core gamers happy, the senior director said as well that they have to create content for the mass audience.

"We definitely want to work with people beyond the gaming arena. There's definitely a space between gaming and movies that there is a lot of energy around. It's just finding the balance between bringing the joys of gaming and the emotion and connections from the audience you get with a film," commented Thompson.

Microsoft UK's senior regional director of the entertainment and devices division Neil Thompson, known for criticising competitors in the video game industry, did just so recently, telling MCV UK that the Wii won't last long because of expandability limitations. He also believes the Xbox 360 defines "what a next generation console should look like and how people should think about it."

Thompson did admit that Microsoft wasn't innovative enough last generation, but thinks the industry giant has been the "innovative force" this time. Nintendo, as he sees it, is doing very well and managed to expand the market, but "there is a limit in terms of what you can do with Wii."

He gave Ninty credit for looking at what consumers want and offering them something unique, something Microsoft learned and manifested by releasing two SKUs. Even while skeptic about the Wii's future, he continued:

They looked at something which isn't being offered and that's probably kept them in the business, where many people perhaps thought they couldn't last beyond the last generation because the technology has been evolved.

We all know how Microsoft tried hard to capture the heart - and pockets - of Japanese gamers, and how their efforts fell short of achieving that goal. However, Neil Thompson of Microsoft's Entertainment and Devices division says that they're not giving up, and that they're learning from what they have experienced so far.

While Thompson admits that they did not do so well in the Japanese market, he took a more positive stance in saying that they presented good titles in this year's Tokyo Game Show, and that Ninja Gaiden 2 was well-received.

He also said that they're getting more support from Japanese publishers and the Japanese market than before. This may be in line with Japan Xbox head Takashi Sensui's promise to release more RPGs to please the local palate of the Japanese gamers.

The experience also benefitted the Xbox team and Microsoft. Said Thompson:

Although we won't use the same strategies in those other markets, it is helping us understand how to be different as a company. It's the challenge of the next decade, in my humble opinion, for large organisations - how do you deliver that unique service, while living in a corporate world that's trying to build efficiency, because everything's getting more expensive and more difficult.

It's going to be an interesting path ahead for Microsoft, and us gamers and fans should watch and witness how the software and gaming giant will attempt to rule the scene.

An earlier report saw UK retailer Argos breaking the street date (i.e. official release date) of Halo 3. And after realizing their mistake, Argos is taking measures to prevent it from happening again, saying they won't be selling Halo 3 until the 26th (that's the UK's official release).

But, whether Microsoft will be banning people who Finish the Fight earlier than everyone else or not, here's what we do know now: they won't be punishing Argos for the accidental pre-release of Bungie Studios' hot title.

Neil Thompson, regional director for UK, told GamesIndustry that Argos' mistake was an honest one and not malicious to begin with. Yes, he's disappointed because this has raised a lot of arguments for all parties concerned, but he states that it's really pretty hard to micromanage every single detail in your supply chain and mistakes like these are bound to happen.

I don't think there was any malice on the part of Argos at all, it was just an honest mistake. Argos reacted incredibly quickly to the mistake, they issued us with a detailed summation of why the mistake happened - mistakes like that, we have to be somewhat flexible.

On a related note, Thompson uses the opportunity to state how the accidental early release of Halo 3 has affected the market. Upon talking about how some retailers would (willingly and consciously) take advantage of releasing games early for their own benefits, he manages to sneak in a personal comment on how Halo 3 justifies the anticipation for it.

Everyone will talk about the money, and stuff like that, because that's a headline-grabbing idea - that gaming is potentially going to be the biggest entertainment event that hits this country this year.  // If you over-hype something that doesn't deliver on the promise, then you run the risk of a backlash and that can work against you. I honestly don't believe that's the case with Halo 3.