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OK FlagAccording to a report on Gamasutra.com, Oklahoma House Bill HB3004, the so-called “Videogames as Porn” bill has been signed into law by the state Governor, Brad Henry. The law would take effect on November 1, 2006, but gamers can expect that the ESA will make a First Amendment challenge to the law soon. The law seeks to regulate violent videogames by amending Oklahoma’s previous pornographic materials law to include “inappropriate violence.” The bill sets the following criteria for determining the standard. First, the violence must be judged to be “patently offensive” to the prevailing standards of the community, and second, the game lacks “literary, scientific, medical, artistic, or political value” based on the following:

  1. is glamorized or gratuitous,
  2. is graphic violence used to shock or stimulate,
  3. is graphic violence that is not contextually relevant to the material,
  4. is so pervasive that it serves as the thread holding the plot of the material together,
  5. trivializes the serious nature of realistic violence,
  6. does not demonstrate the consequences or effects of realistic violence,
  7. uses brutal weapons designed to inflict the maximum amount of pain and damage,
  8. endorses or glorifies torture or excessive weaponry, or
  9. depicts lead characters who resort to violence freely;

Clearly, under these standards, a large percentage of video games could be found to be violating the new law. The ESA will probably attack the law for being vague, as with many of the previously enacted bills. Still, banning violent videogames seems to be the one thing that various state legislatures can agree on, and there are many more bills being enacted.


Read More | Oklahoma Bill HB3004

Gallery: Oklahoma Bill HB3004 Signed Into Law


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Description National Public Radio has started a podcast on video games, called “Press Start.” The hosts of this new podcast-only program are Robert Holt, Ralph Cooper, and Kyle Orland, who will cover the complete gamut of video game culture, detailing what’s new and discussing what games they’re playing. “Press Start” is a part of alt.NPR, unique contemporary content that NPR creates especially for podcast delivery. Alt.NPR podcast topics are “not tied to specific subjects, production styles, frequency, or length.” As such, these programs provide a perfect way to chronicle new media and “youth” culture topics. “Press Start” will run about 15 minutes per show and will be available for download every other Friday at 12:30am ET. A subscription is available directly via iTunes, My Yahoo!, or generic RSS.


Read More | NPR.org

Gallery: NPR Starts Video Games Podcast


Earthbound NESGameSetWatch reports on an insane find that a collector found at a recent garage sale in New York. Apparently, a former employee of Nintendo was selling off a large lot of Nintendo and Super Nintendo games and prototypes that he had accumulated during his years at Nintendo of America. Some of the lot include some of the Starfox competition cartridges used for the Nintendo national tours back in their heyday, and prototypes of the NES version of Earthbound, and apparently, the only copy of the original Nintendo Campus Challenge NES cartridge known to exist. Some of the lot have made their way to Ebay, including a prototype of Zelda 3 for the Super Nintendo, with a “Buy It Now” price of $2000, so those gamers looking to round out their collection of every SNES cartridge ever made now have their chance.


Read More | GameSetWatch

Gallery: Rare Nintendo Prototypes Found At Garage Sale


MMOG Screenshot The online worlds of multiplayer games are spawning a new sideline.  It seems that players who start flirting with each other while participating for hours on end in these virtual reality environments are meeting offline and continuing the relationships, leading to a “marriage” of like minds—that of gamers in love.

Take the case of Mark Brown, who says he searched for Ms. Right in all the usual places, but instead met her online while playing “City of Heroes,” a massively multiplayer online game. MMOG players tend to imbue their online characters with remnants of their offline personalities, so it’s possible to “meet” a character while playing online and hit it off with both the virtual entity and the real person controlling it. Avid gamers who have met their virtual mates sometimes stage in-game weddings, and these virtual nuptials often precede the offline equivalent.

It brings new meaning to the phrase “the family that plays together stays together.”


Read More | Wall Street Journal (Registration required)

Gallery: When Life Imitates VR: Finding Love in Online Gaming


Hot CoffeeAdult-oriented video games are an emerging market and this week the true up-and-comers in the arena were to be found at the first “Sex in Video Games Conference.” Of course, sex as an element in video games in nothing new, but this market segment is focusing on the sex being a major point of the game. Hot topics included “what it will take to get the growing number of adult-oriented games off the ground.” In a post “Hot Coffee” era, pundits were keen to establish norms for the adult-oriented video game segment of the industry. Several attendants at the event seemed to think the networking potential was a benefit, and used the conference to nail down deals with like-minded game publishers and developers.


Read More | ZDNet

Gallery: The First Sex in Video Games Conference


Shoplifter Mark Empire RecordsLast night a Myrtle Beach man stole 60 games from a local Blockbuster in one trip.  Store employees spotted the individual stuffing PSP games into his pants around 8:30 PM.  The games are valued at $1,800 or roughly $30 bucks each.  The theft came as a shock to members of the gaming community, many of whom currently believe the PSP has very few titles worth stealing.  Blockbuster has also issued a warning to stores in the area to be on the lookout for any customer who wears baggy pants and waddles as they exit the store.  Someone please send us the security cam footage of this one!


Read More | The Sun News

Gallery: Man Steals 60 PSP Games From Blockbuster


Nintendo World Store

Gamers in New York City will be able to get the Nintendo DS Lite on Saturday, June 10, at Midnight at the Nintendo World Store. The line up starts at 9 PM, and as midnight strikes, Nintendo fans will be able to purchase the DS Lite. Of course, with numerous stores breaking the street date, this loses a little bit of its exclusivity. However, those in line will get free pizza, and the first 100 people in line will get a free DS Lite case. And, gamers will get to meet Mario and fans dressed up as their favorite Nintendo characters. Of course, that guy that looks like Tingle might not actually be wearing a costume.

Full press release follows.

Click to continue reading Midnight Madness At Nintendo World Store

Gallery: Midnight Madness At Nintendo World Store


Do you often find your trash talk lacking? Do you feel like you can’t get a word in edgewise on Xbox Live?  Are you sick of being berated by masters of smack? Your hook-up has finally arrived.  Check out Fireborn’s “How to talk Smack on Xbox Live”.  Enjoy the educational video and remember, on Xbox Live its not how you play, but what you say!


Read More | YouTube

Gallery: How To Talk Trash on Xbox Live


New Super Mario Bros. New Super Mario Bros. is tearing up the US and Japanese sales charts. The sequel for the DS added another 334,000 sales this week in Japan to push it over the million sales mark, and Nintendo DS titles occupied seven of the top ten sales spots in Japan. The additional sales is also driving adoption of the DS in Japan, leading all console sales with 135,614 units sold. The next highest on the chart is the PSP, at 24,595 units, marking an over 5:1 sales ratio. On the US side, New Super Mario Bros. debuted at number one, pushing Kingdom Heart 2 for the PS2, Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion for the Xbox 360 down in the standings. While in the US, Xbox 360 titles lead the pack, the PS2 is selling strong, with 232,000 units sold versus 221,000 Xbox 360 consoles in the same month.


Read More | Gamasutra
Read More | The Magic Box

Gallery: New Super Mario Bros. Tearing Up US, Japanese Charts


Game ReviewsInvestors looking to capitalize on the popularity of the video game industry might do well to closely watch sites like Metacritic.com, a reviewers’ portal. When users who review games on such websites offer overwhelming praise for a newly released title, it’s a good bet the issuing company’s stock will bump upwards, as was recently the case with Take-Two Interactive and its release of “Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.” The phenomenon has also been observed in reverse. A slate of poor reviews for a newly released game may forecast a downward tumble in the publisher’s stock price. While these market fluctuations are generally short-lived, investors who closely watch “the boards” for an early word may be able to use the information to advantage. Stock analysts seem wary of assigning too much influence to the relationship between reviewers’ game ratings and game maker share price, but one analyst, Evan Wilson, admitted to reading the major game review websites religiously at any rate.


Read More | Marketwatch.com

Gallery: Positive Game Reviews Equal Stock Moves?


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