Food, friends, family and football… what a great holiday.

We’ll be taking some time off here at GP to celebrate Thanksgiving and participate in the annual rite of seeing who can achieve the most disjointed belly.

For those celebrating, have a happy and safe Thanksgiving! To everyone else, whether you like turkey or not, enjoy your weekend! To all, thanks for your continued readership and support.

MSNBC’s Citizen Gamer column offers some advice on how to best survive the holiday. Hint: it involves videogames.


|Image via ICanHasCheezburger|

Capcom has responded to criticism of its Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles by religious leaders with a double-barrel return blast of its own.

Bishop Bryant of Jarrow, Archdeacon Brian Smith and Rt Rev John Goddard accused the game of promoting the occult and violence reports MCVUK. Goddard said about the game, “If we dabble in this area we open ourselves to influences and put ourselves at risk. I would regard any encouragement for children to be drawn into this behaviour with extreme horror.”

Capcom’s Leo Tan fired back, saying, “Most games (and movies) like Resident Evil show characters fighting evil not supporting it. Unfortunately the clergy is showing a lack of understanding of the video games industry and is too quick to splash the holy water and lump video games players into stereotypical boxes.”

He continued:

This is scaremongering and typical religious hysteria. You cannot blame society’s ills on video games. It’s just absurd.

The title, developed for the Wii, is due out in Europe on November 27. It was released in the U.S. last week.


Thanks Andrew!

Retailer Game, Activision and Xbox Live have teamed up for a UK-based charity drive based around Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

Activision will donate £1 to the War Child charity for every UK gamer playing MW2 on Xbox Live on December 5th and 6th. Additionally, Xbox Live Gold Memberships will be free that weekend in an effort to boost participation in Games for Good.

War Child benefits children affected by war.

Following President Obama’s recent push to increase the use of videogames as a teaching tool comes results of a study that gives high marks to one such implementation.

Researchers at the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s Watson School of Education conducted a 26-week study into the aspects of using a first-person adventure game that reinforces math skills. Tabula Digita’s DimensionM series of games were the basis of the study, with 250 middle school students and 10 middle school teachers participating.

The results were overwhelmingly positive: 90 percent indicated that some or most of the activities were fun; approximately 67 percent felt the activities were just right in their level of complexity, and about 89 percent believed DimensionM allowed them to demonstrate some or most of their mathematics skills and knowledge.

Lead researcher Albert Ritzhaupt, also an Assistant Professor in the Watson School of Education, stated:

During our post-research focus group, teachers were asked if they thought the relationship had changed between them and their students as a result of integrating the educational game. All teachers, 100 percent, answered that the relationship had changed, indicating that many felt that the students now saw them in a different way.

One unnamed teacher added, “Students find gaming exciting and the mere fact that I was offering it in my classroom made a connection. It made me ‘more cool’ to them.”

For the third year in a row, a comedy troupe is playing a marathon session of the world’s worst videogame to benefit charity.

LoadingReadyRun is playing Desert Bus, an all too realistic bus driving simulator from an old Penn & Teller unreleased videogame compilation, for 120 hours straight to benefit Penny Arcade’s Child’s Play charity. So far, the event, which is being streamed live, has raised over $84,000, already eclipsing 2008’s $70,423 figure.

Desert Bus has players pilot a bus from Tucson, Arizona to Las Vegas in real time at a maximum speed of 45 MPH. The trip takes a full eight hours and the game cannot be paused. Additionally, any incidents or accidents result in the bus being towed back to Tucson and the trip starting over from the beginning. Penn & Teller commissioned the game as a response to the mid-1990s political furor over violent games.

This year’s charity event partners include Rock Band creators Harmonix, Antec, Braid developer Hothead Games and The Escapist, which is hosting a portal for the charity drive on its website.

The event is revenue driven, and in theory endless. As long as donations are increased 7% each hour, the drive will continue.

After six years at the helm, Ireland's chief media classifier John Kelleher has stepped down from his post.

As Director of the Irish Film Classification Office (IFCO), the 65-year old Kelleher banned only one videogame out of the 8,000 submitted during his reign, Manhunt 2. The IFCO typically does not rate videogames however, only doing so if they are deemed prohibitable, otherwise rating chores are handled by Pan American Game Information (PEGI).

Speaking to the Irish Times, Kelleher said that his biggest achievement was changing the name of his office from the Irish Film Censor’s Office to its current designation as the Irish Film Classification Office. The change was made to better reflect the actual work of the office.

Kelleher stated:

I don’t believe in film censoring for adults, I believe in film classification for minors. I hope that people realised that I was trying to ensure that adults could look after themselves, that it was the welfare of children which was paramount.

Current IFCO Deputy Director Ger Connolly will take over for Kelleher on an interim basis.

For a man who spent more than 13 years making video game advocacy his life, Doug Lowenstein now rarely gives them a second thought.

Gamasutra caught up with Lowenstein for an interesting interview, tied to the fact that he will be recognized at D.I.C.E. in Febraury by the Academy for Interactive Arts and Sciences with a Lifetime Achievement Award, recognizing his years with the Entertainment Software Association (founded in 1994 as the Interactive Digital Software Association).

A former journalist that loved to argue First Amendment issues, Lowenstein said the video game needs to continue to be vigilant in standing up for itself on those grounds:

"I personally feel that any industry that is dependent on creative expression -- which at the core, are what games are all about -- should allow for unfettered opportunity to pursue whatever artistic vision one may have. This industry and any sort of entertainment industry must defend this to the fullest extent possible. If there's any erosion of that, it's a classic slippery slope. The First Amendment needs to stand tall. The industry can never get lazy about defending those rights."

Lowenstein admits that he doesn't keep up with the industry that much any more, but he said it seems that it is starting to get a foothold of acceptance as a form of expression:

"It seems … that there is more acceptance and tolerance, if you will, across the political spectrum for the game community in terms of the content it creates. It doesn't appear that there's the same level of effort to regulate games and game sales. It doesn't appear that politicians are routinely announcing games and game violence and its allegedly corrosive effect on young people and other users."

It doesn't appear that the gadflies and the critics of the industry have the same traction that they did three years ago. It doesn't seem that the media is as obsessed with the industry in terms of the negative bias that it brought to theses issues."

Despite the fact that the industry does not seem to be taking as many slings and arrows it once did, Lowenstein said that associations such as the ESA can't afford to be complacent:

"Even when you're not in the midst of some intense controversy that goes to the core of what the industry is, the absence of that doesn't make the association any less relevant. When people start thinking that, that's a very dangerous and myopic point of view."

Overall, a pretty good interview from a guy that used to eat, sleep and breathe video games for a living.

World of Warcraft maker Activision Blizzard is the latest target of a lawsuit by serial suer (or professional plaintiff) Erik Estavillo.

Filed this morning in the Civil Division of the Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara, the civil complaint charges Activision Blizzard with “deceitful” business practices, as it “continues to maintain a harmful virtual environment to many of its customers by forcing them to follow the game’s sneaky and deceitful practices.”

Among Estavillo’s claims is that WOW is designed for a gamer “to walk or run at a calculated slow pace, resulting in the player taking longer to get where he or she needs to go in the game.” This slow pace, says the plaintiff, leads to a longer time needed to finish game play or quests, in turn leading to more subscription revenue for Activision Blizzard.

Estavillo also complains that faster transportation is not available until a player levels up accordingly, or purchases an expansion pack.

The plaintiff then likens his health problems (OCD, Agoraphobia, Panic Disorder, major depression and Crohn’s Disease) to the afflictions that ailed the late EverQuest gamer Shawn Woolley, who took his own life on Thanksgiving morning in 2001.  Estavillo stated that he “doesn’t want to end up like Shawn did as he [Estavillo] relies on videogames heavily for the little ongoing happiness he can achieve in this life.”

Estavillo subpoenaed Depeche Mode founder Martin Lee Gore and actress Winona Ryder to provide testimony on his behalf regarding the subject of alienation.

Gore was subpoenaed because “he himself has been known to be sad, lonely, and alienated as can be seen in the songs he writes,” and Ryder because of her and Estavillo’s common interest in the J.D. Salinger book The Catcher in the Rye. Ryder would be able to, “explain the significance of alienation in Catcher in the Rye and will also testify to how alienation in the book can tie to alienation in real live/video games such as World of Warcraft.”

Estavillo is seeking punitive damages of $1.0 million and a court order that WOW implement changes that address the issues of his complaint.

Other lawsuits filed by Estavillo include one against Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA), following a banning from the PlayStation Network, and a recent suit that targeted Microsoft and Nintendo—the former over an Xbox 360 red ring of death and the latter over a firmware update that disabled his Homebrew Channel.

China is again cracking down on "low-brow" game operators.

The country's Ministry of Culture apparently has sent out another letter to game operators to stop providing "low-brow cultural content" and start offering games that are in line with the country's "core socialist value system," according to an article on Kotaku.

From the story:

The ministry's memo said violent games "have adversely influenced consumers and especially the physical and mental health of minors." It also ordered game companies to knock off the killin', both of humans and nonhumans. In particular they want them to refrain from "low-brow cultural content that is having a negative effect on the healthy development of the industry."

GP: Apparently it wasn't enough to ban a World of Warcraft expansion and hundreds of other online games, or to halt foreign investment in online gaming. Look for a Chairman Mao game, coming soon.

While it might not mean the end of the traditional air raid siren, New York State is currently testing a plan that uses networked videogame machines to send emergency alerts and warnings to the state’s population.

The alert system is just one component of New York State’s Empire 2.0 initiative, which is designed to make the state’s government more “transparent, participatory and collaborative,” reports Information Week.

New York State Deputy Chief Information Officer Rico Singleton thinks the plan to alert the populace via videogame consoles is a natural, “considering the amount of time our youth spend on video games.“

Other Empire 2.0 measures include monitoring Facebook in a bid to spot and stop potential suicidal behavior, using Second Life to train 700,000 Homeland Security first responders and publishing Senate bills online where members of the public can comment on and mark up proposed legislation.

Joystiq’s latest Law of the Game column takes a look at the intertwinement of professional plaintiffs and class action suits.

The article was written in response to a pair of recent news stories: a possible class action suit against Microsoft over Xbox Live bannings and Erik Estavillo, the banned Resistance: Fall of Man player, whose latest lawsuit targets Microsoft and Nintendo.

Author Mark Methenitis denotes a professional plaintiff as someone whose livelihood depends on suing people. He adds that plaintiffs who are gamers are more prone to demonstrate similar standing, versus attaching their suit to a statute, making them a perfect entry point to class action litigation.

Of course, class action lawsuits “tend to be larger and thereby more profitable, especially to a law firm on a contingency fee basis.”

Methenitis thinks it “unlikely” that we will see fewer lawsuits as time progresses, but tells us not to worry too much about game industry companies that are targeted, as they “have substantial legal teams to deal with these kinds of suits.”

He finishes:

What should concern consumers would be a series of victories against gaming companies. If plaintiffs are successful, then there are two potentially larger problems facing the industry: are companies becoming more dishonest and predatory, and should we be concerned about the continued viability of those studios with substantial legal settlements against them?

Datel, who expressed disappointment over a recent Xbox 360 firmware upgrade that eliminated the ability to use its third-party memory cards with Microsoft’s console, has responded with a lawsuit.

The complaint, filed in the Northern District of California U.S. District Court, alleges that the October 2009 Xbox 360 update, and subsequent lock out of Datel products, was designed to “to exclude competition from the Xbox 360 aftermarket for controllers, and to force consumers to buy Microsoft's own controllers.”

Datel claims that Microsoft informed them that the lockout of Datel products was an “unintentional effect” of the software update, but notes that Microsoft told G4TV that, “Unauthorized MUs are not tested for compatibility or certified for safety and compliance standards and thus could damage -customer's Xbox 360 consoles.”

Datel also says that Microsoft has changed the 360’s authorization protocols and Security Integrated Circuit process to prevent all Datel accessories, even a currently unreleased 360 wireless controller, from working with the console, stating:

In fact, it is Microsoft's anticompetitive conduct, including tying and predatory design, such as the erection of technological barriers to third party accessories and the disabling of otherwise functional third party accessories, not consumer loyalty or esteem, that primarily drives Microsoft's accessories attach rate.

The lawsuit asks that Microsoft be adjudged to have violated federal anti-trust laws and that the Redmond, Washington company “be preliminarily and permanently enjoined and restrained from disabling or erecting technological barriers to Datel accessories and add-ons for the Xbox 360. Datel is also seeking damages and to have its attorney fees paid.

The full complaint can be viewed here (PDF).


|Via Seattle PI|

A Spanish judge has tossed out a criminal complaint filed by Nintendo against a seller of memory cards that allowed users to crack their Nintendo DS handhelds.

Movilquick Group was the target of the complaint, and a seller of devices (pictured) designed to “allow the use of multimedia and homebrew files,” on a DS, though the company noted that it is “against piracy” and does not support the use of commercial software in conjunction with their devices.

The judge ruled that while purchasers could use the devices for piracy, they could also use them to further advance the operational capability of their DS (translation follows): “Ultimately what occurs is a manipulation of hardware to extend its utility, allowing users to use with both legitimate and illegitimate purposes, but not only illegitimate.”

A question further raised by the judge was whether or not Nintendo is the only company that can provide additional functionality to its devices (translation follows):

…this leads to another question that is if Nintendo has an absolute right as the only manufacturer to create accessories or, other manufacturers can produce and offer accessories for Nintendo consoles provided copies of attachments are not originally created by Nintendo and therefore protected by industrial property rights. That question goes beyond the criminal and should be terminated by the Civil Court…

|Via TechDirt|

South Australian Attorney General Michael Atkinson and Gamers4Croydon political party creator David Doe were both interviewed on Australian radio about that country’s lack of an adult ratings category for videogames.

The two appeared on ABC Radio National’s show National Interest, but unfortunately were not in a position to joust on the subject, as Atkinson’s bit was pre-recorded. Doe appeared in the studio with host Peter Mares.

Atkinson, again, on why he opposes an R18+ rating:

I’m opposed to extreme and cruel violence being dissipated in interactive games. The decision on this game [Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2], to give it an MA15+ classification is a matter for the Commonwealth Classification Board. I‘ll be appealing against that classification. It doesn’t surprise me because the Classification Board in Australia does everything to try to get games in under the radar, and films generally. Just because the system is not being applied properly, does not mean that the principles of the system are wrong.

The host then asked Atkinson, in light of the apparent failings of the Classification Board; wouldn’t it be better to have an R18+ rating? Atkinson’s answer:

No, no… What I want the Classification Board to do is to apply the guidelines properly. I don’t want the extremely violent, sexually depraved and drug use games in Australia at all. We can’t stop these interactive games getting into the home and getting into the hands of children. Interactive games are, I think, a greater risk than films because they are interactive.

Atkinson then referenced Rapelay, saying, “I wouldn’t put it past the Classification Board to make that an R rated game frankly. “

Atkinson accused the host of being a bond company stooge/game industry apologist in favor of an R18+ rating, before claiming that Australians just don’t care about the lack of an adult videogame rating category:

The vast majority of Australians have not turned their mind to the question of an R18+ classification for interactive games. It’s just not an issue out there in the electorate. Most Australians don’t think about it. Like me, many of them enjoy playing games such as the Wii.

Atkinson again indicated he was aware of the Gamers4Croydon party that plans to run a candidate against him in the coming election, though he’s doesn’t give them much of a chance, “I rather doubt that they will get even 1% of the vote, so much for the claim of 90% of Australians favoring what the games industry wants (an R18+ rating).”

David Doe, the Aussie game developer and man behind Gamers4Croydon also appeared on the show. Doe used Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 as a lynchpin in his argument for an adult videogame classification, calling the game “just not suitable for 15 year olds.”

Does this indicate that Atkinson is right and the Classification Board is not doing its job the host queried?

Doe responded:

I think the Classification Board is doing the best it can. There’s obviously a huge commercial interest in the videogame industry, and even though Australia is a small market, they are going to try and provide Australians with the type of content they would like to engage with. I think if we gave them the option of having an R18+ rating, they would classify more games as R18+ because they have that ability and then that way people would be more informed as to the type of content that’s readily available in those types of games.

He added:

If you’re over 18 years old, you should be able to decide for yourself what you think is appropriate.

Doe said of Atkinson, “He has made it clear that he is immune to popular public support, scientific research and reasoned argument.”

The whole show can be downloaded in MP3 format from the National Interest website.
 

Thanks Ryan!

An unnamed (for obvious reasons) UK district judge feigned illness in order to skip work the day following the release of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

An article on the Times Online details the judge’s story as part of an account detailing "secret gamers," i.e. those who can juggle playing games and maintain a successful career… go figure! The 48-year old judge, a married father of two, waited in line for an hour at midnight in order to score a copy of the game on launch day, feeling “like Charlie waiting outside the chocolate factory.” He apparently stayed up late playing the game, necessitating his call in to work the next day. “Will” spends “hundreds of pounds a year” on new games.

The article also details the gaming habits of a 37 year-old advertising executive—who plays Lego Batman with his kids—and a 35 year-old female speech and language therapist, who is deep into playing Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune 2 with her boyfriend.

The story introduces the aspect of videogame addiction, but plays down that part of gaming by quoting a psychologist who in 22 years of experience has “only met 10 people who are genuinely addicted.”

A related article, written by a former member of the video appeals committee, a part of the British Board of Film Classification, details the writer’s brief addiction with Carmageddon, one she stopped because she claimed to feel the urge to run down grandmothers in real life following extended bouts playing the game.

She noted losing interest in the title once in-game granny tire targets were changed to aliens and their blood changed from red to green.