Monthly Archives: May 2009

Culture, Electronic Arts, Games, Gaming, Piracy, The Sims 3

Playing The Sims 3

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The Sims 3 cover Actually, I’m not playing The Sims 3 myself – it isn’t really on my list just now – but apparently a whole bunch of you are, having downloaded the bootleg copy online, from wherever. That in itself isn’t so surprising, considering that apparently it’s being downloaded even more than Spore was if the stats are credible.

What’s interesting, is that every single one of you that’s mentioned to me that you’re playing the bootleg have already preordered the game and are just waiting for it to come in. Now that’s an interesting, if slightly unscientific statistic.

Games, Gaming, Jack Thompson, Law, Opinion, People, Places, Spam (UCE), Utah

Jack threatens criminal charges and cake against whole Utah Legislature

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From the readership figures, a lot of you can’t get enough of lifetime-disbarred Florida attorney, Jack Thompson. So, here’s an update.

Thompson doesn’t like the suggestions (“threats”) that the Utah Senate President and State Attorney General are investigating the possibilities of prosecuting Thompson as a spammer, and in a measured response has threatened to have the entire Utah Legislature added to a criminal complaint that he has filed with the FBI.

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David Matranga, Fail, Games, Gaming, Opinion, Rant, Stephen Russell, Video Games, Zero Wing

Five things I really hate about video games

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Yes, I’ve played a whole lot of games (that list isn’t even complete). There are a few things that keep coming up over and over and over about games that really bug me, even though I can be very forgiving about a game’s flaws so long as I’m getting some fun out of it. Here then, are a list of five things that I really hate about video games.

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Atlus, Beta, Games, Gaming, Gatheryn, Mindfuse, MMOG, Neosteam, Steampunk, Video Games

Gatheryn steampunk MMORPG taking beta applications

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Gatheryn

If Atlus’ NeoSteam isn’t steampunky enough for you, you might be interested to know that Gatheryn, the upcoming casual steampunk MMORPG from Mindfuse is signing up beta-testers. During the beta-test period, you’ll be expected to keep your lips zipped about the game itself, while various systems are added and tuned, of course.

Signing up isn’t a guarantee that you’ll get in on the beta, but failing to sign up is a guarantee that you won’t.

Culture, Games, Gaming, Law, Supreme Court, Video Games, Violence

California wants Supreme Court to hear case on failed violent gaming bill

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The state of California has now spent rather more than half a million US dollars on its violent video games. The bill would make the renting or sale to minors of video games unlawful, if ‘the state’ determines those games to be ‘violent’. Note that that violent rating seems to be entirely independent of the existing ESRB ratings system.

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Games, Gaming, Jack Thompson, Law, People, Video Games, Violence

RU SB152?

Remember the failed Utah bill created by Florida ex-attorney Jack Thompson? It was designed to make the sale of mature-rated video games to minors (by retailers if they also advertised that they did not do so) a deceptive trade-practice.

As it panned out, the bill was denied by the governor on constitutional grounds. Thompson raised the ire of the Utah legislature, and has been having another go-around with the bill in Louisiana as SB152.

It hasn’t fared so well there, either.

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Culture, Gaming, Roleplaying, Second Life, Virtual Environments/Virtual Worlds, virtual worlds

Glorious, beautiful text

12 Comments

The art of roleplaying has been one of the several key drivers in virtual environments over the last 20 years. Indeed, there have been environments packed with features supporting roleplaying, scriptable objects, and user-generated content for a long time.

Mostly those environments were text, but that shouldn’t really be held against them. Many roleplayers coming from these environments find them technologically superior to Second Life in many respects, and the textual aspects of them cannot be ignored — with good reason.

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Eidos, Game Sequels, Games, Gaming, Maundering, Opinion, System Shock 2, Thief 1: The Dark Project/Gold, Thief 2: The Metal Age, Thief 3: Deadly Shadows, Thief 4, Video Games

Game 2: Return of the Game

When there’s something I really enjoy, be it a book or a movie or a game — things I particularly liked — and I hear that there’s going to be a sequel, my immediate reaction is largely one of disappointment.

Sure, I’m intrigued, but suspicious … and with good reason. Nowhere does the immediate bitter taste of disappointment come so strongly than with games.

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