A California gamer whose lawsuit against Sony Computer Entertainment America was tossed out of court last month has filed an appeal.

Resistance: Fall of Man player Erik Estavillo originally filed a complaint against SCEA on July 6th of this year, alleging that Sony suppressed his free speech rights by banning him from the PlayStation Network. Estavillo further claimed that disabling his account amounted to a theft of his PSN pre-paid points and that SCEA was unable to stop users under 17 years of age from playing.

A judge dismissed Estavillo’s lawsuit on September 22, 2009, ruling that there was no plausible First Amendment claim for relief.

The appeal was filed on October 19 in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

Update: Estavillo also filed (on October 14th) a civil lawsuit against SCEA in Superior Court of California, County of Santa Clara seeking $180,000.

Estavillo tells GP he is representing himself in these cases and, in light of his PSN ban, is playing the Wii (Metroid Trilogy) and Xbox 360 (Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe). Estavillo said that he loves playing as The Joker in the latter title and may be “a bit obsessed” with the character, adding, “I plan to wear a purple suit during my court trials. No joke!”

Following a PlayStation 3 system software update that rendered his console unusable, and a $150 fee from the manufacturer to fix it, a Florida man has filed a class action suit against Sony Computer Entertainment America.

John Kennedy v. SCEA was filed on October 3, 2009 in the San Francisco Division of the Northern District Court of California. The plaintiff alleges that he purchased a PS3 unit on January 8, 2009 before installing the fatal update (Firmware 3.0) in September of 2009.  The suit notes that while “as a general rule, Sony ‘encourages’ PS3 owners to install the latest version of system software, Sony required users to install the Firmware 3.0 update.”

Kennedy added that a Sony forum featured “many” complaints about console failures due to the Firmware, enough that Sony responded with a “Firmware 3.00 Q&A” FAQ.  Also stated is the fact that Sony released a 3.01 version of the update a little over two weeks after the release of 3.0 in order to “improve system stability,” but which, according to the complaint, “not only failed to address problems introduces by Firmware 3.0, it caused new problems,” including the malfunctioning of the PS3’s Blu-Ray drive.

Courthouse News, via Gamasutra, has the full complaint in PDF form.

The case of a gamer who sued Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) over being banned from the PlayStation Network has been tossed out of court.

After being banned for “multiple violations” on PSN, the Resistance: Fall of Man player Erik Estavillo had sued SCEA for violating his First Amendment rights (for the PSN ban) and for money he had invested into the PSN Wallet Fund. He sought $55,000 and an injunction that would limit SCEA from banning any players in any form on the network.

Northern District of California District Judge Ronald M Whyte ruled that there was no plausible First Amendment claim for relief stated and dismissed the case.

The Technology & Marketing Law Blog (via Gamasutra) zeroed in on one specific comment of Whyte’s, that “Sony's Network is not similar to a company town.” Blogger Eric Goldman wrote:

…this opinion emphatically rejects a meme that has become pretty popular among virtual world exceptionalists. Some exceptionalists have favored the company town analogy because it enable virtual world customers to reduce an operator's ability to run its business capriciously.

A PDF version of the Order Granting Defendant's Motion To Dismiss is also available on the aforementioned blog.

PlayStation 3 manufacturer Sony gamed the product registration system of the Federal Communications Commission, according to PS3 News.

Yesterday, of course, Sony announced that it was dropping the price of the PlayStation 3 to $299 and introducing a slimmed-down, 120GB version on September 1st. Digging through FCC records, PS3 News discovered filings for a 200GB PS3 registered to Sand Dollar Enterprises of San Mateo, California:

Now, Sand Dollar Enterprise, Inc is represented by SCEA's General Council, Riley Russell.

This house is actually a private residence, but whomever lives here filed the documents with the FCC, most likely on the behalf of Sony, as they would be much harder to find with a different FCC ID (XCE) than that of Sony (AK8).

This means that some time in the future (for probably a premium, maybe $349 or so), a new PS3 Slim may come out featuring a 250GB HDD. There is not much of a difference, but expect it to be bundled with a game or so, right in time for Christmas!

A PlayStation 3 gamer has filed suit in U.S. District Court in California, alleging that SCEA suppressed his free speech rights and caused him pain and suffering by banning his account on the PlayStation Network.

In a complaint filed on July 6th, Erik Estavillo of San Jose writes that he his disabled by a variety of disorders; among these are agoraphobia, a fear of crowds:

The pain and suffering was caused by the defendant, Sony, banning the plaintiff's account on the PlayStation 3 Network, in which the plaintiff relies on to socialize with other people, since it's the only way the plaintiff can truly socialize since he also suffers from Agoraphobia...

Estavillo's issues with SCEA apparently stem from his play of the PS3 hit Resistance: Fall of Man:

The ban is supposedly due to the behavior of the plaintiff when he plays the video game "Resistance: Fall of Man," which Sony owns and employs moderators for its online play. These moderators kick and ban players that they feel are deserving; though their biases to a player seem to be what determines the kick or ban...

 

The plaintiff was exercising his First Amendment Rights to Freedom of Speech in the game's public forum when he was banned from, not only [Resistance], but also banned from playing all other games online via the PlayStation Network...

Estavillo also claims that the PSN ban amounts to a theft of his pre-paid points:

The plaintiff...cannot access [his] money when a moderator from Resistance and Sony gives a player a arbitrary wide-range ban... which in essence, is stealing money from the player...

Estavillo also argues that the EULA for online play of Resistance is ineffective in blocking players under the game's recommended age of 17, although it's unclear how this fits into his claim.

In his request to the court, Estavillo, who appears to be unrepresented, asks that SCEA be enjoined from banning players. He also seeks $55,000 in punitive damages.

To date, SCEA has not filed a response with the Court. GamePolitics has requested comment on the lawsuit from SCEA.

DOCUMENT DUMP: Grab a copy of Estavillo vs. SCEA here...

The PlayStation 3 may be struggling in major consumer markets, but Middle Eastern gamers apparently love Sony's Blu-Ray equipped console.

Emirates Business 24/7 reports that the Middle East enjoys the highest level of PS3 sales among developing countries. SCEE exec Jim Ryan commented:

The PS3... has a strong market in the Middle East. The sales have been disproportionately strong in the Middle East and Africa... and parts of Asia, especially in the May-June-July period.

At least 20,000 to 25,000 PS3s have been sold in developing countries this year and 80 per cent of that was in the Middle East... In other emerging countries such as Iran and Africa it's entry-level machines like the PS2 which... are moving fast.

The high summer temperatures, combined with the economic downturn, have encouraged [Middle Eastern] users to stay at home, which is another major driver of sales.

Despite the PS3's relative success, gamers in the Middle Eastern market shouldn't expect much in the way of culturally familiar games on the system, Ryan said:

Without too much of Arabic content in games, sales figures are positive. Unless gaming companies see big returns from the localisation or Arabisation of content there will be no investment made on that front.

Emirates Business 24/7 reports that the total Middle Eastern gaming market for systems and software is $750,000 million, with at least a third of that amount controlled by Sony.

Developers of Sony's upcoming God of War III are concerned that the game's graphic violence may prompt a ban on sales of the game in the Australian market, reports Digital Life.

Australian censors have historically been tough on games featuring extreme violence. That's largely due to the lack of an R18+ rating Down Under. With Australia's highest rating currently at MA15+, any game not suitable for a 15-year-old is refused classification.

GoW III art director Sean Cunningham commented on the design team's worries over the game's Australian rating:

There is (concern). We try to push the boundaries a little bit. (But) we’ve had meetings and discussions and internally we all have a good gauge on what’s 'too far'.

You throw something past [content rating boards] and they might say 'Absolutely not! You could not do that!' and we’re all like: 'Aww, c’mon, that was a great idea!' There have been a couple of those…

Also visually, everyone’s really excited. The disembowelment of the centaur, ripping Helios’s head off, the reaction from the floor has been amazing. Everybody in the studio is very happy....

God of War III is due in 2010. As the first GoW game to appear on the PlayStation 3, the visual quality of its violent scenes will certainly be more intense than those found in the franchise's PS2 games.

Via: Kotaku

Thanks to: Australian GamePolitics reader Ryan for the tip!

Via fidgit we've been clued into Sackboy, done up in patriotic style as the Sacktue of Liberty...

...which reminds us that Hillary Clinton's face appeared on the Statue of Happiness in Grand Theft Auto IV.

So, are there other Statue of Liberty appearances in gaming? Gotta be...

The subject of game consoles in prisons is invariably a controversial one.

Some think that convicts don't deserve what might be considered a luxury. Others believe the relaxation afforded by gaming might make prison a safer place.

But U.K. newspaper The Guardian reports that officials at Britain's Rye Hill prison have removed PlayStations 3s from the inmate population over fears that prisoners will use the system's built-in WiFi capability to communicate with those on the outside. A prison official told The Guardian:

PlayStation 3 consoles are barred on the grounds that they have the capability to send and receive radio signals as an integral part of the equipment.

Some inmates were said to be chatting with friends. No information is provided on how those inmates obtained access to a WiFi signal, which might seem to be at least as important an issue, if not more so.

GamePolitics readers may recall that a similar issue was raised last month by Britain's Serious Organized Crime Agency.

UPDATE: IncGamers contacted the British Ministry of Justice and learned that Internet-capable consoles are already banned. This is not the first time that there has been confusion in the U.K. on this issue.

The debate over whether prison inmates should be allowed video game consoles is one that surfaces periodically.

But the head of Britain's Serious Organised Crime Agency offered a new twist this week when SOCA director-general Bill Hughes claimed that jailed crime lords were controlling their illicit empires via Internet-enabled video game consoles. U.K. newspaper the Times reported Hughes's comments:

If you are locked up, how do you communicate with others? And we have been highlighting the fact it is not always with mobile telephones. There is other technology used — people are using PlayStations to charge their mobile phones and are playing games interactively with others, so are able to communicate with them.

The Prison Service is concerned that prisoners are using interactive games to talk to people outside the prison. Communication is the name of the game and criminals are looking to exploit new technologies. Prisoners have rights and they have access to the internet...

U.K. prison officials, however, expressed outrage over Hughes's remarks, which apparently caught them off-guard. A spokesman for the Prison Service told the Times:

Prisoners have never been allowed access to wireless enabled technology such as that used in some games consoles. Nor would they ever be allowed access to such technology.

A decision was taken some years ago that the then-current generation of games consoles should be barred because the capability to send or receive radio signals is an integral part of the equipment.

Although the Times mentions that SOCA chief Hughes later apologized privately to prison boss Phil Wheatley, the newspaper also reports that SOCA is standing by its original claim.

As GamePolitics has previously reported, U.K. prisons allow inmates with good behavior to use game consoles. Potentially suicidal inmates are also permitted to play.

Via: Kotaku

In what could be viewed as a real-world version of a business tycoon game, the video game foreign trade wars appear to be heating up.

Earlier this month came word that Nintendo was jacking up the price of the Wii in the U.K. due to the weakness of the British pound vis-a-vis the yen.

Last week GamePolitics cited a report that China was using protectionist tactics by blocking entry of the Wrath of the Lich King expansion for World of Warcraft in order to promote home-grown MMORPGs.

Now, via Kotaku, comes word that Sony has stopped shipping PlayStation 3s to South Korea.

Thanks to the depreciation of South Korea's won versus the stronger yen, it seems that Japanese tourists have been picking up PS3s on the cheap and toting them home from Korean trips. A Sony employee told Chosun Online:

We are troubled by 'reverse-importing', which is when products exported into South Korea are flown back into Japan," said a Sony employee.

A 24-year-old Kentucky man is under arrest, charged with persuading an 11-year-old Texas girl to send nude photos of herself through her PlayStation 3.

As reported by Houston's ABC-13, police allege that Anthony Scott O'Shea's manipulation of his victim was managed entirely via the console. Sgt Gary Spurger told ABC-13:

He used the PS3 for everything, checked his email, played on the internet, on his PS3 and of course, played his games on PS3, but had no computer...

 

[O'Shea] asked for pictures of her breasts. She said no. He said friends do things for each other. You're on my friends list. If you don't, I'm gonna remove you, at which point she feels nervous and scared and sent the pictures.

Police say that Shea mailed the girl's pictures to others around the country. The suspect's bail is set at $300,000.

For its part, Sony provided investigators with technical assistance in the case.

As GamePolitics reported earlier this week, Sony pulled ads for PlayStation 3 shooter Killzone 2 from bus kiosks in Toronto after an elementary school teacher complained that they might frighten children.

An adjoining regional transit company has now followed suit. As reported by YorkRegion.com, York Region Transit has taken down the Killzone 2 (left) from its bus shelters.

Although YRT received a complaint from the parent of a three-year-old boy, the agency opted not to act until it learned that Sony was voluntarily removing the ads in nearby Toronto.

The parent, John Rennie, reported that the ad upset his son:

Pulling into the parking lot, his son began cry, saying he saw a monster and didn’t want to go to school...

“He really thought what he saw [on the poster] was going to be inside the [school] complex...”

Mr. Rennie was not only upset the poster evoked such an emotional reaction from his young son, but that the violent advertisement for the mature-rated game was placed at a site frequented by youth.

YRT General Manager Don Gordon said that political ads as well as those for alcohol and tobacco products are banned from its bus shelters. A contractual clause also gives the agency the right to remove any ad judged to be in bad taste:

This has happened on a few other occasions. The one that comes to mind was a lingerie ad that was too revealing.

In pulling the Toronto ads, Sony said that it would look into the creation of an ad-free radius near schools, a spokesman said.
 

At this point, British government health campaign Change4Life probably wishes it had gone in a different direction with its most recent ad campaign.

As has been widely reported, the ad, which visually links playing video games with an early death, has generated official complaints to the U.K.'s Advertising Standards Authority by British game development group Tiga and game business website MCV.

Now, reports MCV, Sony Europe is considering the filing of a lawsuit over the ad's unauthorized use of what appears to be a PlayStation controller:

A source close to Sony revealed to MCV that the agency behind the ad, The Gate, had not contacted the platform holder to ask about using a controller that bears a close likeness to PlayStation's pad.

The ad forms part of the Government’s Change4Life Campaign, and was created by agency The Gate in conjunction with the British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research UK and Diabetes UK.

Erik Ayala (left), the 24-year-old Oregon man whose weekend shooting rampage  left two dead and seven wounded, willed his PlayStation 3 to a roommate before embarking his murderous mission.

The Oregonian reports that a suicide note found by police in Ayala's apartment even specified how much his roommate might earn by selling his PS3:

And to my friend, (redacted)

I am especially sorry. I know it's not much consolation but as my friend and roommate you are entitled to everything that I own. Maybe these things can bring in a few bucks.

Good luck in this shitty world...

You know my ps3 is special. Similiar USED ps3's go for AT LEAST $450-$500. Our landlord guy wants a ps3 like mine. Let him know that $400 would be a GOOD deal. If he doesn't want it, format the drive by going to Settings>System>Format Utility. You can say it "comes with the latest firmware software" to help market it on the internet. In case you don't know, it's the special "100% backwards compatible" (60 GB) ps3.

I'm sorry to put all this on you buddy, good luck.

As GamePolitics noted earlier today, Ayala, who remains in critical condition after shooting himself in the head, was reportedly a fan of FPS game Resistance: Fall of Man and Left 4 Dead.

UPDATE: Ayala has died, reports The Oregonian.

UK newspaper The Times reports today that radical corporate upheaval is coming to Sony.

Long-overdue cost-cutting moves will, according to company sources, result in "sacred cow-slaying measures" that will "will abolish or fundamentally alter many of Sony's long-established business practices."

The reorganization will likely be made public following CES in Las Vegas. The massive trade show ends on January 11th.

Could the PlayStation hardware business get the chop?

That's hard to say, but the PS3 has been bleeding money since it launched in November, 2006 and the PSP is struggling as well. One ominous sign: there is talk of a shift that would turn Sony from a manufacturing to a content-driven business model.

PS3 manufacturing costs have generated huge losses for Sony over the past two years. Content would include games, of course, but Sony also has a stake in movies and music. If the company judges its console business as too costly to continue, it could decide to pursue a system-agnostic approach like the one adopted by Sega after it abandoned the Dreamcast in 2001. Ironically, back then it was Sony's PlayStation 2 which steamrolled the well-regared Sega console.

Alternately, the PlayStation business might be salvaged in whole or in part  and manufacturing cuts could be made on the consumer electronics side of Sony's house.

In any case, we should know more next week. In the meantime, PlayStation 3 fanboys may suffer a few sleepless nights as they worry about the future of their system.

A number of common, non-obscene words are being filtered out of text chat on Sony's new PlayStation Home service, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.

Reportedly, "gay," "lesbian" and "bisexual" are among the words, as are "Christ" and "Jew." Even "Hello" is being filtered, presumably because it begins with "Hell."

Gamer Michael Marsh told the Chronicle:

I can understand if they're filtering out profanity, but if feel like it's discrimination. By blocking a word like 'gay,' which is a preferred term by the gay community, you're encouraging it as a bad word.

SCEA spokesman Patrick Seybold, however, reminded gamers that Home is a work in progress:

The key message is it's a beta and it's evolving on a daily basis. We've said early on that user behavior and feedback will shape where we go with Home.

Sony will launch the beta version of PlayStation Home, its long-awaited PS 3 online service, beginning tomorrow.

PS Home would appear to be Sony's long-overdue riposte to Microsoft's popular Xbox Live service, which has been building a strong user base since the days of the original Xbox. Home takes a decidely different approach to its user interface, however. The service will function as a virtual 3D world along the lines of Second Life. Users will have individual avatars as well as personal spaces called "apartments" which can be decorated.

A company press release describes Home as:

...a ground-breaking 3D social gaming community available on PS3 that allows users to interact, communicate and share gaming experiences... Within PlayStation Home, users can create and customize their own unique avatars and explore the virtual community in real time where they can communicate freely through text or voice chat.

 

PlayStation Home users will not only be able to enjoy variety of entertainment content such as mini-games, videos and special events along with their friends, but will also be able to create their own community by using the “Club2” feature to create clubs with other PlayStation Home users who share the same interests. PlayStation Home also allows groups of users to launch directly into their favourite online games together from PlayStation Home.

VentureBeat's Dean Takahashi, who participated in Home's closed beta, writes:

Home is different from Second Life and World of Warcraft. Unlike those fully-built worlds, Home isn’t really a world. It’s more like a series of virtual spaces. If you want to visit your own personal apartment, where no one can visit without your permission, then you teleport there. If you want to go to the central plaza, you teleport there. Same goes for the bowling alley or the bar from the game Uncharted. You’re free to decorate your home as you wish. If you want to listen to music, you can walk up to a jukebox...

In the movie theater, you can go into a room and see what’s playing. You can actually watch that movie with your avatar in a social setting, making comments about it that others in the theater can see. That turns movie-watching into an online social experience. There is a profanity filter, and Home will be compliant with the PS 3’s own parental controls.

GP: The Home launch is a critical step for Sony and the PS3. Let's hope that they get it right. However, as a PS3 owner who tries to stay optimistic (Sony doesn't make this easy), I am concerned about the PS Home press release (I'm looking at the SCEE version), which devotes several paragraphs to the marketing of virtual crap for avatars. For example:

Thanks to Diesel, avatars can look great from the start with Diesel offering the latest men’s and women’s designer avatar clothing, with items ranging from free of charge to €1.50...

PlayStation®Home gives everyone their own apartment to spend time in and entertain friends - who will now be able relax on exclusive Ligne Roset furniture. At the virtual store, people will be able to choose from a selection of the most popular Ligne Roset designs...

 

A selection of virtual Watchmen merchandise e.g. T-Shirts with the smiley face logo, Doomsday clocks and character statues, will also be available in the New Year...

Meh.

XBL got it right by making an easy-to-use, pleasant gaming environment. Sony really needs to focus on its core gamers with PS Home. Everything else is just a distraction.

My wife already thinks that I waste too much time on video games. Wait until she finds out that I'm wasting energy, too.

A new report from the Natural Resources Defense Council maintains that game consoles can significantly add to consumers' electric bills. In fact, across the United States, consoles consume as much juice in a year as the combined total of residential electricity users in San Diego.

The solution? One piece of the puzzle is not to leave your system on when you're done playing. NRDC Senior Scientist Noah Horowitz commented:

If you leave your Xbox 360 or Sony Play Station 3 on all the time, you can cut your electric bill by as much as $100 a year simply by turning it off when you are finished playing. With so many struggling in today’s economy – it’s important to realize there are simple steps gamers can take to lower their energy costs. And if manufacturers make future systems more energy efficient, they’ll be doing the right thing for consumers’ pockets, for our clean energy future, and for the environment.

Among the big three, the PlayStation 3 is the energy hog of the bunch, consuming 150 watts per hour in active mode. The Xbox 360 isn't far behind, at 119. The Nintendo Wii, on the other hand, is the console of choice for the conservation-minded, drawing just 16 watts in active mode.

The NRDC claims that a combination of more efficient console hardware and educating gamers to use power-saving features currently built into the 360 and later PS3 models would save consumers a billion dollars a year and cut down on the type of pollution that leads to global warming.

Other goodies from the must-read report:

• watching a movie on your PS3 consumers 5 times the power of using a stand-alone Blu-Ray player
• average annual energy cost for a launch model (2006) PS3 user is $160
• the 2007 PS3 is more efficient: annual cost is $134
• For launch (2006) Xbox 360 users, it's $143; drops to $103 for 2007 models (GP: less RROD as well!!)
• it costs $10 per year to operate a Wii
• the game industry and game media should encourage console owners to use auto power-down features built into the 360 and PS3
• the next hardware generation should be more efficient and have auto-power down
• an auto-save feature should preserve game progress when the system auto-powers down
• controllers should have a "sleep" button

Grab the full report here.

Destructoid has the inspirational story of a gamer who goes by KitsuneYume on the PlayStation message board.

KitsuneYume has severe physical handicaps, but doesn't let that deter him from enjoying his PS3:

KitsuneYume worked with broadenedhorizons.com and a gentleman named Mark Felling of GimpGear to create his custom controller, which uses movements of his tounge and sips or puffs of air in straws to control games.  Fingers and toes help round out many of the other controls.

 

Kitsune's goal was to share the news with others that may be handicapped, letting them know that a solution is available. Good on him, and good on the the people that are helping him out, including an unnamed donor that paid for some special switches he needed.

 

In another post he says, "Since 1986 I have lived for gaming and will continue to do so for eternity." KitsuneYume, you are an inspiration to gamers everywhere, living proof that you can't keep a good gamer down. See you online, man.

GP: Simply amazing. Makes me want to mail Kitsune every PS3 game I own.