Over the past couple of weeks, several publishers have released their quarterly earnings reports: among them, Electronic Arts, Ubisoft and THQ. Apart from a title slipping its ship date from one quarter to the next, there were few surprises to be found...except for the fact that of the three publishers listed above, two of them declared that the lion's share of their console revenues had been derived from the third-place platform: Playstation 3. Electronic Arts gave its breakdown as 17 percent PS3, 10 percent Xbox 360 and 7 percent Wii. For Ubisoft, it was 21 percent PS3, 9 percent Xbox 360 and 11 percent Wii. (THQ was the exception, with 4.8 percent PS3, 14.6 percent Xbox 360 and 17 percent Wii.) How could this be, given the installed base lead that the first-place Wii and second-place 360 currently possess over the PS3?

For an answer, we turned to Wedbush Morgan analyst and The Who's number one fan Michael Pachter. Here's what he had to say in our email exchange:

To read Pachter's explanation, click on the link below.

1. EGO...trip: You're far too kind, Brainy Gamer, but our ego is still grateful
   
2. EGO...trip: the hardcore gamer's Lex Luthor, Sean Malstrom, gives us a nod
   
3. HMM...how begging by the homeless is similar to marketing casual games
4. BLO...wback: Outspoken designer Jonathan Blow on the limits of narrative
5. RND...The Return of the Trolls: the subjects of the NYT's story respond