Update: Comment repsonses follow the article.

If I were to ever find a document containing Sony's official procedure for making announcements I think I'd find something relatively similar to the title of this article written on it. To any ravenous Sony fanboys that are already primed to leave a negative comment without even having read the rest of the article, go over to my collection page for a second. Go ahead, I'll wait right here. Did you see the Playstation 3 and PSP games in there? Yeah, I own both, so don't go flaming me for being an Xbot or...whatever asinine term you use for Nintendo fans.

It goes without saying that everyone looking forward to the PS3 was taken aback when Kaz Hirai dropped the "599 US dollars" bomb on us back at E3 2006 (cue Lex Luthor). Six hundred dollars was an absolutely absurd price and even though a lot of us (myself included) paid it at launch we did it begrudgingly. Analysts and everyone else kept calling for a price cut on the PS3. They all said that $600 was too high and that in order to compete and create a larger install-base Sony would have to cut the price at some point. Naturally everyone was excited when Sony announced that the price of the 60 GB PS3 was dropping from $600 to $500. That was still $100 more than the high-end Xbox 360 but hey, $100 is $100. As was expected, interest in the machine increased and a huge sales spike followed. Sony had seemingly done something right. Then we all find out that what we thought was a price cut was really a liquidation sale. Sony made the announcement that production had ceased on the 60 GB and that when they were gone they would be replaced by a new 80 GB that cost...599 US dollars. Did I mention that the hardware emulation had been replaced with extremely sub-par software emulation?

Like its giant obelisk console counterpart, the PSP hasn't been the easiest sell either. In both the United States and Japan the system was consistently outsold by the DS Lite, typically by a wide margin. Sony figured that, hey, if Nintendo can release a remodeled system, so can they. Thus at E3 2007 the world was introduced to the PSP-2000, colloquially known as the PSP Slim. The announcement was great for Sony as they unveiled a system that offered numerous improvements, the best two being improved battery life and shorter load times (the two things most decried on the original PSP). Well, the load time improvement remains, at least for newer titles. However, the battery life improvement wasn't as advertised. Sony explained that the PSP-2000 would indeed have longer battery life...if you were using the PSP-1000's battery...huh? Even if you weren't like me and didn't trade in the original PSP toward the new PSP thus leaving yourself without a PSP-1000 battery, the PSP-1000 battery was too big for the PSP-2000. So, if you actually had an original PSP battery to use it would stick out and make your system lop-sided. You'd also have to order a special battery cover from Sony in order to cover it. Lastly, this is probably just me being upset over not paying attention, but Sony also announced a video out feature that would allow PSP owners to play PSP games on their TV. However, you have to have a progressive-scan TV for this to work. This means that SD television owners (the majority of TV owners) cannot make use of this feature but hey, at least we can watch UMD movies on our TVs. Yeah, as if most people own any.

I don't think this next one counts as announcing good news and then messing it up so much as it counts as Sony throwing salt in gamers' wounds. Lair was a game that almost everyone who owned a PS3 was looking forward to. It was an aerial dragon combat game from the makers of Rogue Squadron and it looked amazing. Now, I've never played Lair but general consensus claims that the game's controls are more or less broken. However, that's not the point. Despite not announcing anything good, Sony proceeded to step 2 anyway and sent out a reviewer's guide for Lair. Yes, it wasn't that Lair was a bad game, it was just that every professional reviewer in the industry, you know, people who play games for a living, wasn't playing the game correctly. Wow.

Though I could personally care less, most gamers were upset by the fact that the PS3 controllers would lack any kind of force feedback. Sony told a couple of different lies as to why this was. They told us that the tilt-sensor wouldn't operate properly with rumble weights and they told us rumble was a last-gen feature that wasn't important anymore. However, we all knew that they just didn't want to pay up to Immersion. Well, Sony eventually did pay their settlement to Immersion and the rumble-capable PS3 controller rumors started flying. Sure enough, one of Sony's big announcements at the Tokyo Game Show was the DualShock 3, the Sixaxis with rumble weights they had previously told us was impossible. Now I'm sure you must be thinking, "What's the black lining on that silver cloud?" Well, North America and Europe aren't getting these controllers until Spring 2008, whereas Japan gets them next month. There's no logical reason why Sony would be doing this. Accessories are not games; they do not have region codes and they do not need to be localized. You could import a Japanese DualShock 3 from Japan next month and it would work with your non-Japanese PS3 (unless Sony devises some stupid way to region lock accessories). I understand that these things have to be manufactured and shipped, but if they have enough of them to launch the controller in Japan next month it shouldn't take them six months to get a launch supply for North America and Europe manufactured.

After the whole liquidation sale debacle, gamers everywhere have been waiting for a real price drop for the PS3. Recently, rumors have been circulating that Sony would be announcing a 40 GB PS3 and, at least in Europe, they have. The system, as stated, only has a 40 GB hard drive, it only has two USB ports instead of four, and it no longer has the card readers. That's not so bad right? It also has no PS2 backward compatibility. Yes, you read that correctly. I don't mean that it just doesn't have the Emotion Engine, I mean it has nothing. You put a PS2 disc into that system and it will have no idea what it is. Sony's hilarious reason for this? They claim that few people really use it and that it isn't a feature most people look for when buying a PS3. Ha, ha, and indeed ha. Do they even have any idea what gamers think of their system? Did they not hear the ire of European gamers when they launched the PS3 with its shoddy software backward compatibility? Did they not notice how many people were scrambling to get a 60 GB when it was announced that the 80 GB wouldn't have the Emotion Engine? Sony knows that the PS2 had the greatest and largest library the last generation but they claim that they don't need to rely on that library anymore because the PS3 is going to have a whopping 65 game available by this holiday season. Wow, 65 whole games? So how many of those are licensed titles, available on other systems, or just bad? Never mind the fact that PS2 games are still being made. Granted, Sony doesn't have the Wii advantage here. A lot of people skipped the Gamecube so the Wii being able to play the whole Gamecube library was a selling point. Odds are anyone interested in the PS3 is probably one of the 100 million PS2 owners out there. Still, there's nothing quite like buying a brand new, super powerful system and having to leave it's predecessor hooked up so you can play its superior game library, right?

Looking at their track record I don't think it's any surprise to anyone that Sony is in last right now. They started with two high priced systems, announced pseudo-price drops and have released way too many iterations of a console that's less than a year old. On top of that, it seems that everytime they announce something that makes gamers feel better about them they jab us with a cattle prod as soon as we turn around. At least we still have Final Fantasy and Metal Gear, right?

Comment Response 1: staley6565: So you read all of the "walls of text" and couldn't find a point anywhere, huh? Did you try reading the title and the first paragraph? I'm going to assume you didn't less you wouldn't be complaining about my lack of a point. My point is simply that Sony's PR has been terrible this generation (which, if you notice in the comments, other readers were able to infer that). Everytime they announce something that sounds like good news they immediately follow it up with something bad or something that takes away from that news. As for my "simple history of things", those are what most people like to call support. You know, making a claim and backing it up with examples and facts instead of just spouting of baseless nonsense?

Secondly, you claim that lack of backward compatibility is not a big deal if you already own a PS2. Have you considered things like clutter or lack of inputs? For example, my TV has three inputs in the back, and one is taken up by my DVD player. That leaves me with two open inputs and given that I have 7 systems that need them, I have switch boxes connected into them. Fortunately, when I got my PS3 I was able to simply replace my PS2 with it. Had I not been able to do this all of my slots would have been full and if I ever had the need to install something else it would have come down to swapping cords. A minor annoyance, but an annoyance avoided by my backward compatible PS3. That's not even taking into consideration the amount of electrical outlets I need. Secondly, there's the issue of shelf space. Using myself as an example again, I have six spaces for my seven systems. As it is my Dreamcast has to rest on top of my Xbox so everything fits (though with your ideas on money you'd probably just recommend that I buy a bigger house, more on that in a second). Then you proceed to put words in my mouth, claiming that if Sony didn't release the absurd number of SKUs that they do that I'd be complaining about them forcing us to buy things. Let me start off by saying that I've never complained about Sony forcing anything on me. I didn't complain about it in this article and I've never complained about it elsewhere. In fact, and I'm not alone here, I hate the multiple SKU system so many seem to be embracing. I'm sure most remember back when systems came out and they only came out in one version. If you went to a store and asked for that system you got a system that was the same as every other one.

Not to mention the fact that software emulation would not bring up the price of manufacturing the hardware. Also, just last year Sony was calling bacwkards compatability a core value that was vital to their brand.

You end on a note that is just ignorant, claiming that $600 is not a lot of money in "the real working world." Wow. I'm not sure going to college and working part time in a grocery store counts as this "real working world" that you refer to, but I'll use myself as an example once again. I make roughly $150 a week working the hours that I can. Every week I deposit half of that toward my tuition and take out 25 for gas money. Then I pay $100 for my car insurance bill at the end of every month. This means that every month I make around 150-200 dollars that I don't have to spend on bills (so that's 3 months for me to earn "not a lot of money"), and I don't have anywhere near the amount of bills people in the real world have. Yeah, maybe you have a high paying job that allows you to drop $600 on a luxury and not even bat an eye, but saying that $600 isn't a lot of money just makes you sound like a pompous fool.

Comment Response 2: Charlie2688: Holy crap man.You do realize people are going to read the comments you post right? Grammar and mechanics are your friends. Using the right words might help too (hint: accent is not synonymous with accept). You start out by saying that I'm acting like Sony has wronged me personally...yeah, whatever. Then you tell me that articles like mine are the reason that people have a negative attitude toward the PS3 and can't explain why. What do you think all that text up there is? Oh look, it's me explaining why Sony has such a negative image right now. I'm also curious as to when exactly I bashed the PS3. As far as I can tell I was pointing out flaws in Sony's marketing department the whole time.

You then claim that everyone has forgiven Microsoft's problems. This is something you do throughout your entire comment. You're trying to attack me and yet you lump me in with every Sony hating fanboy out there. Anyway, it's called being relevant and being inspired to write something. The height of the 360's Red Ring issue was over the summer when the warranty program went into effect. Why would I write about something that saw the height of its news coverage months ago? Sony just announced their new, non-backward compatible PS3 yesterday and that news inspired me to write this. Trust me, everyone hasn't forgiven Microsoft. Hell, there are people out there who haven't even played Halo 3 yet because they're waiting for their consoles to be repaired.

You tell me to look at some of the brilliant comments (a category which your comment does not fall under) here on GameSpot about backward compatibility. So people screamed when Sony focused on backward compatibility and people screamed when they stopped focusing on it? Here's a crazy thought, do you think that maybe those were different people screaming both times? Obviously if you have no interest in the PS3's library you're not going to buy one just to play your old PS2 games. However, if you're like me and are interested in the PS3 but also have over 100 PS1 and PS2 games with limited system space then backward compatibility is obviously important to you. Plus, the backward compatibility issue is another example of Sony directly contradicting themselves as they are so apt to do.

You follow that up by telling me to accept (or accent, as you put it) the fact that I'll never be happy with what Sony does. Again, lumping me in with the Sony haters. If you notice I actually own a PS3 (something, based on your collection page, you can't say I might add) and yeah, I have some problems with it but not because of Sony's PR tactics. Why would I have a problem with the console because of Sony's business practices? You go on to follow step 2 of Sony's announcement procedure and completely contradict yourself. You accuse me of forgiving Microsoft for all their flaws and then go on to say that Sony's negative image isn't their fault its the fault of all the people complaining about the PS3. Why do you think people are complaining about the PS3?! Oh wait, it's because it's cool to hate Sony, right? It has nothing to do with any of the mistakes they've made so far this generation? Also, the reason you don't hear people complain about the 360 as much is because the Red Ring of Death is the only major thing people tend to complain about and Microsoft has taken steps to correct it. They spent 1.7 billion dollars to give every 360 owner a three year warranty and they just started releasing new systems that have all of the cooling components they should have had since day one. Sony even has Microsoft beat in this department! They have a better built and more powerful system than Microsoft does. The only reason they attract negative press is because they keep lying to us and contradicting themselves.

Lastly you speak of Lair and I'm not sure you read that paragraph right. You say people like to knock it without having even played it and that wasn't even what I was talking about. I talked about the ridiculous assertion that Sony made claiming that reviewers had all reviewed the game wrong. Here's a math tip for you. You claim that if so many people played Lair at a friend's house that it would be number one in sales. Other than the obvious fact that it wasn't, if all those people played it at a friend's house that means they didn't buy it.

You conclude your rebuttal by saying that blogs like mine will never help change Sony's negative image. You know what will? If Sony stops pulling crap like I've described above.

Bloody hell.

UPDATE: Whoa, over 100 comments? Instead of adding comments to my own article I'm going to post my responses to select comments after the main article.

You have got to be kidding me.

Apparently even Jack Thompson wants in on the Halo 3 marketing blitz.

Honestly, after his attack against BioShock, an attack on Halo 3 probably shouldn't have surprised me, but it did. Fortunately for me, GamePolitics posted the official complaint Thompson issued to the Florida Bar, so let's get right into it.

Before even getting into the document, I think the most amusing thing is just how far off the deep end this man has gone. As I'm sure everyone remembers, this is the exact same thing that Jack tried to do with Bully. What did that get him? An official complaint filed with the Florida Bar and a psychiatric evaluation, to say nothing of the fact that the game came out anyway. Does he really expect the exact same complaint to work with a different game?

The first ridiculous thing is the date of the complaint. It was filed today, Friday, September 21, 2007. For those keeping track, Halo 3 is set to launch this coming Tuesday and all copies of the game are already in the hands of retailers. Is he expecting to be granted a hearing and successfully convince the court to block sale of the game in three days?

It gets better from there. He lists the complaint as being from "John B. Thompson on behalf of the state of Florida." Wow, this complaint really has merit. He's got everyone in the state of Florida behind him! Being a bit presumptuous Jack?

Next comes the legal jargon. Apparently Jack's problem is the future sale of Halo 3 to individuals under the age of 17. So what, he's Nostradamus now too? Even more amazing is that he cites the law he's invoking against Halo 3 and for the life of me I can't see where it mentions video games anywhere.

"...tend[s] to annoy the community, injure the health of the citizens in general, or corrupt the public morals...any house or place of prostitution, assignation, lewdness or any place or building where games of chance (i.e. gambling) are engaged in violation of law or any place where any law of the state is violated, shall be deemed guilty of maintaining a nuisance..."

Oh yeah, illegal gambling and prostitution. I can totally see a video game connection there.

The following section is easily the most amusing. In a section called "THE FACTS", Jack outlines all of the reasons that Halo 3 should be banned as a nuisance and swears, "so help [him] God" that they're all true. Well Jack, you're going to be needing a a lot of the big guy's help.

Thompson starts his list in grand fashion by being wrong from the get go, claiming that Microsoft and Best Buy (they're the only retail outlet selling the game apparently) are preparing to sell Halo 3 on October 25, 2007. Hm, maybe that's why he issued this today, he thinks he still has a month to block the game.

Jack's next line has got to be my favorite. "Halo 3 is a video game that allows the virtual reality player to rehearse violent acts resulting in the death of one's virtual victims", or for the less pretentious among us, "You kill people in this game." Wow, way to describe 99% of all video games. I love how he describes the gameplay as the rehearsal of violent acts that result in death. Yeah, I find whenever I'm faced with the task of killing hordes of invading aliens a video game is the best way to prepare.

Immediately following this he jumps right to the insanity we all know him for. He cites the DC Beltway Shootings and claims that Lee Boyd Malvo used Halo to train himself to fire a sniper rifle. In addition, Malvo's partner, John Muhammad, knew how effective Halo was at training killers as the army in which he served used the gam...er, "murder simulator" to train snipers to kill. First of all Jack, Halo had nothing to do with those attacks. Malvo was also found to have a scrap of paper referencing The Matrix in his pocket, that doesn't mean he shot those people in the name of Zion. Yeah, Malvo may have played Halo, a lot of us have, but that doesn't mean we all know how to fire sniper rifles. Also, if Muhammad truly was trained to snipe using Halo then that must have been one sorry excuse for an army. Personally, I have no idea how to operate a sniper rifle but I can guarantee you it isn't "Push the right analog stick and then press the right trigger." He tries to bring credibility to this claim by saying that the Halo connection was reported on NBC news. Yeah, and Jack reported the video game connection to the VTech shootings on the news before the killer was even identified. That doesn't change the fact that there was no connection.

Jack then proceeds to try and prove his claim using questionable studies, speculation, and outright nonsense. He then claims that the ESRB's existence is the industry acknowledging that violent games are harmful. Whatever you say Jack.

Lastly, he claims that last time he was chasing after Best Buy's ambulance they agreed to ID anyone when selling a Mature rated video game. In what he calls a "sting", Jack sent his own 15-year-old son to Best Buy to buy a copy of BioShock (I assume the concept of irony is lost on him), which he was able to do. Based on the fact that one person was able to buy an M rated game without being IDed Jack was successfully able to conclude that Best Buy is never going to ask for ID from anyone when selling an M rated game. Ever.

He then goes on to complain about how Microsoft is aggressively advertising the game to "teen boys" to ensure that it becomes "the best-selling video game of all time". I didn't know Microsoft was trying to beat Super Mario Bros. sales record. He goes on but honestly I'm getting sick just reading this dreck.

Seriously, Jack, man, get a hobby or something (one that isn't trying to censor any video game you deem worthy of censorship). This is yet another instance in which Jack shows us all that he isn't out for the good of the people. No, he's out for his own gain. How do I know this? Jack consistently only targets popular violent games, not just violent games. Grand Theft Auto, Manhunt, BioShock, Halo, all huge names that are well known in the public eye but they're hardly the only violent games. What about Persona 3, where you have to shoot yourself in the head (though not with a real gun) to unleash your power? What about Sega's Yakuza series, where they drop more f-bombs than anyone ought to and where your means of disposing of your foes is through bloody and brutal hand to hand combat?

Seriously though, he's after Halo of all games. I've always referred to Halo as an M rated game that doesn try to live up to its rating. By that I mean that Halo's goal isn't to be ultraviolent and gory and thus achieve an M. No, Halo's only M rated offense is that when shot or otherwise dispatched, enemies bleed for the sake of realism. It's not even that violent. If you get a headshot with a sniper rifle does your Covenant foe's head explode into chunks of skull and brains? No, there's just a splatter of blood and he falls over dead. What about when you kill someone with a grenade? Do they get blown into bloody pieces that fly every which way? Once again no. They simply bleed, go rag-doll and fly through the air before hitting the ground. To top it all off, throughout the entire single player campaign you are never "rehearsing violent acts against" other humans. The enemies in all three of the games have been non-human aliens. Even though it has never been proven that violent games turn kids into killers, at least with Grand Theft Auto and its ilk you can argue that the game simulates reality at least a little. Halo has you take control of a genetically and cybernetically enhanced soldier fighting aliens. Even when you're in multiplayer you're fighting aliens or other cyborg soldiers. To top it all off, you're never going to find a real gun that operates using analog sticks.

So in closing, go ahead and file your complaint Jack. No one will care, the world will keep on spinning, and Halo fans everywhere, including fans from the state you submitted this complaint "on behalf of", Florida, will still be playing the game this Tuesday when it's officially released.

Comment Response 1: Ah yes, I knew I was going to get at least one supporter of Doug Lowensetin's Jack Thompson Theory. For those of you unfamiliar with Doug's remarks, he claimed that the only reason Jack has any credibility is because we gamers won't shut up about him. He argued that any time Jack attacks the industry we should basically stick our fingers in our ears and go "La la la, we can't hear you." Obviously, be it as I'm talking about him, I disagree with Lowenstein and his supporters. I think Jamaius said it best down in the comments. He said that though Jack has minimal influence his power could easily snowball if he were to gather a large group of supporters. You know what would make that really easy for him? If we just ignored him and said nothing about his endless assault on our hobby of choice. I know that his "facts" from his Halo 3 complaint are ridiculous, you guys know it and most gamers know it. You know who probably doesn't know? The large majority of middle America, that's who. History has shown that it's typically left up to gamers to defend ourselves when the industry comes under attack. So what happens if we stop speaking up? Jack keeps spewing out these ludicrous attacks of his and every "Won't somebody think of the children?" soccer mom in the country rallies behind him and we just sit there and say nothing? Honestly, I think if that's our plan of action we may as well just come out and agree with whatever he says if we're not going to bother to refute it. EDIT: OK, I didn't say it at first but MuscleCarMan alluded to it in the comments so I'll insert my original argument for why "Ignore it and it will go away" doesn't work. The majority of Europe and America both thought that if they ignored Hitler and the Nazis they'd eventually go away too. I'm sure you all know how well that worked.

Honestly though, do people just expect Jack to fade into a cloud of vapor if we stop talking about him? He's been doing these kind of things his entire "career." He's attacked the music industry, the porn industry, and now the video game industry. Though many people think he's just doing it for attention, he really isn't. He's come out before and said, and I quote that "God put [him] on this earth to fight violent video games." The man thinks he's on a bloody mission from GOD to stop violent video games. Regardless of what that psychiatric evaluation said there's obviously something wrong with the man. If we go silent he'll simply think to himself that he's beaten us.

Lastly, I don't understand how gamers are giving him any shred of credibility. Yeah, we may talk about him a lot, but it's not like when we do we're all hiding behind our controllers and saying "Man, I wish that Thompson guy would shut up. People are going to find out the truth and take our murder simulators away." Far from it. Any time we mention Jack Thompson we're either questioning his sanity, baffled as to how he ever became a lawyer, or writing overly long blog entries that debunk his legal complaints piece by piece. That's acknowledging him as a threat? Sounds more like acknowledging him as a joke.

Comment Response 2: Binarynova brings up a good point and I would have to agree that gamers bashing Thompson and threatening him in forums (by the way, to those if you in the "I want to kill Jack Thompson" crowd, I shouldn't have to point out the foolishness of threatening to kill someone when they claim that video games make people violent) help to portray the negative gamer stereotypes. However, this was not what Lowenstein was referring to. Lowenstein claimed that no one should give any press at all to the man, and that would include my article here, the GamePolitics article that inspired it, and any others like them.

Comment Reponse 3: Wow, these just keep coming. Anyway, there's two comments I want to mention.

First, sdcazares1980, you say you see what I'm saying but I'm not really sure that you do and I also think you don't have all your facts straight. I think my Hitler metaphor sent the wrong message. I am in no way comparing Jack Thompson to Adolf Hitler The Hitler reference was merely an extreme metaphor saying that ignoring something and hoping it will go away isn't a good solution to a problem. You go on to say that Thompson has been discredited numerous times and held in contempt of court as well. Not everyone knows that and even if they do it isn't a guarantee that people won't listen to him. Also, how do you think he keeps getting discredited (hint: this article and the one it references might be good places to look)? I think the point of the article got lost somewhere as well. This article's purpose, as its title would lead you to believe, is to discuss Jack Thompson and his complaint with Halo 3, not the whole game industry and its attackers. Speaking of which, you mention Hilary Clinton and Joe Lieberman. Do you know that earlier this year both of them voiced their support for the ESRB and have made no major attacks on the industry since? You also reference Arnold and I have to say he doesn't worry me at the moment. Why? His law was already thrown out and he is currently in the process of wasting Californian taxpayers' money trying to appeal it. Ultimately the law will be thrown out again and the people of California will have to cover the cost just like every other time some misguided politician has tried to challenge the Constitution. One thing you said really worries me though. You claim that R-rated movies can't be sold to kids and that you don't see why there shouldn't be a law making the sale of M rated video games to kids illegal and that's where you're wrong. There is NO law restricting the sale of R-rated moves to children. Movies are rated the same way games are rated, by a committee selected by the industry that reviews the content. It is then left up to theaters and retailers to enforce the ratings. It would be a complete double standard to have such a law exist for video games. I'm all for such a law if they're going to make it illegal to sell R-rated movies and Parental Advisory CDs to kids too, but that isn't going to happen.

Second, RaohTheKenoh, I'd have to agree. Thompson does make one or two good points every now and again but they're always so enshrouded in stark-raving lunacy that they're impossible to take seriously. Yeah, children probably shoudln't play M-rated games or watch R-rated movies but that isn't for Thompson or anyone else but the parents to decide. I personally wouldn't let a child play Grand Theft Auto but once again, that's not my call. That's what the ESRB is for, to inform parents and help them make the decision on their own. If a parent allows their child to watch an R-rated movie then they'd probably allow the child to play an M-rated game as well. Thompson and many others want the government to step in and life the responsibility of parenting from the shoulders of parents.

As far as carding goes, the industry has been steadily improving in that regard. Sure, not 100% of retailers do it, but there are many theaters and retailers that don't card for movies 100% of the time either. Once again, it's a double standard levied against games. I have a little story about carding. I was up at the mall with my friends one night and they wanted to buy cigarettes (we were all 18 at the time). Though they were both 18, my friends could have easily been younger and one of them didn't even look 18. They walked up to the counter and my younger looking friend hands money to my other friend at the counter and he buys the cigarettes without so much as a single request for ID. Later on, we went over to the Best Buy nearby and I bought a copy of The Warriors for the Xbox and I got carded. Not requesting ID is not a video game specific problem and you have to ask yourself which is more dangerous: not carding for a game or not carding for cancer inducing cigarettes?

Thompson's complaint is also ridiculous in the fact that he isn't simply requesting that all shoppers be carded. He is trying to have a video game declared a public nuisance. That's insanity. You agree with me that learning to snipe from Halo is ridiculous, but go on to say that I can't deny that violent games have an effect on the human mind, and I can't. As you said, violent games cause a small increase in aggression levels in players and studies have confirmed this. What these studies have also confirmed is that this increase is temporary. So yeah, video games give you a slightly heightened agression level for a short time after playing. You know what else does that? Any other violent media or even sports for that matter. Do you think that people don't get aggressive playing American Football? I can guarantee you no one is going to try and get Football declared a public nuisance. You claim that we have to be more vigilant about ratings in order to claim Thompson has no grounds and I disagree. If the world wants to hold gaming to some picture perfect standard then all other forms of media should be held to the same standard.

The last thing you said worries me and is essentially the essence of censorship. You claim that most of us are alright with violent media but for some people (perhaps mentaly unstable) that the constant violence could send them over the edge. This is true, but it doesn't have to be a game. If someone is mentally unstable it could be any kind of violent media. A violent movie, a song with violent lyrics, a violent comic book, any of these images could make these people snap. Denying all of the stable people access to these things because a select few people could be negatively affected is ludicrous. In the words of Mark Twain:

"Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it."

I don't buy into the whole "interactive vs passive" nonsense either. As I stated, you agree that holding a controller has no correlation to real world violence. So why is it that pressing a button and watching a guy get shot is so much worse than just watching the guy get shot? If you were watching a movie and you had to press a button on your remote every time someone was going to get shot would that turn it into some horrible murder simulator? No, you'd still just be pushing a button.

Lastly, I got a call a few hours ago from GameStop about their Halo 3 midnight launch. Anyone want to guess what a certain piece of information from that message was?

"GameStop will begin selling Halo 3 to shoppers 17 years of age or older at Midnight on Tuesday."

Yes, for the two or so of you that actually read this thing I'm finally back after almost a year. I'm not going to bother doing catch up entries this time. The relevance of the topics I would have talked about has long since passed and I don't really feel like typing up my opinion on all the games I've played in the past year.

So, before the TGS rush I'm going to do something many have done before: Post my personal review of Mountain Dew Game Fuel.

Yes, there it is in all its glowing orange, speed line, and scan line glory. Personally I bought a 20 oz., a 2 liter, and a 12 pack just because I wanted the containers and I'm a huge dork like that.

When I first heard about the soda I was actually excited for it. Those who know me know I love Mountain Dew Code Red and drink far more than I probably should. Code Red is cherry flavored so when Mountain Dew announced a cherry/citrus flavored Halo 3 branded soda my interest was piqued. However, my reaction would ultimately end up being the same as it was to every non-Code Red flavor of Mountain Dew.

The first thing I noticed was that the soda smelled of sour bubblegum. That wasn't a good sign. Ignoring the smell I took a sip anyway and that turned out not to be the best of ideas. The taste is similar to Code Red. Just imagine taking Code Red and adding some artificial citrus flavor, more effervescence and way too much sugar. The soda was sour too. For anyone that tried Pitch Black II last Halloween it tasted kind of like that. For those that didn't, imagine taking the crystals from a bunch of Sour Patch Kids and mixing them with over sweetened, over carbonated orange soda. The most peculiar thing was that the soda managed to get gradually worse, the taste declining with each successive sip. By the end your mouth is filled with this ridiculously sweet and sour flavor that's just unpleasant.

So yeah, not the best soda I've ever consumed. Though I suppose if I ever have the need to best a non-English speaking Halo 3 player on Live I can just grab a bottle. That's the message I got from the commercial anyway.

If I had to pick the one thing about console launches that angers me most it wouldn't be the lack of units or ridiculous pre-order and bundle policies. No, it would be console scalping and those who are proud of ripping people off.

Scalping, by definition, is the act of purchasing a product with the full intent of reselling it for a greater value (in the case of game consoles a much greater value). This is most frequently seen with sporting events and the scalping of tickets. Individuals who are looking to make a profit off of the desperation (or perhaps stupidity) of others with no qualms about ripping people off will buy up tickets and then resell them to patrons at inflated prices. Unfortunately there are no laws prohibiting such actions and these would-be rip-off artists go unchecked.

eBay is the preferred place of business for those scalping things other than tickets. Tickle Me Elmo was probably this first big case, with the toy going for values up to $1500. That's one-thousand, five-hundred dollars for a bunch of cloth wrapped around a voice-box that normally retailed for $30. The most prominent example of scalping I can think of was the Xbox 360 launch last year. Like Sony this year, Microsoft had a few manufacturing blunders and thus numbers were limited. As a result, many purchased a system and immediately put it up on eBay in order to rake in the profits. Granted, it's your own fault if you shell out over a thousand dollars for something that you could get much cheaper with a little patience. However, the way the scalpers carry themselves makes it hard to side with them.

The most aggravating thing is that most scalpers are proud of what they do. They're proud of the fact that some desperate middle-class parent just spent 400% retail on a system. There's a user here on GameSpot who I've seen a couple time who has the phrase "Proud seller of 4 Xbox 360's on eBay for a profit of" whatever the amount was in his signature. Now most of these individuals will tell you that it's just capitalism and supply and demand. Yeah, they wish.

Obviously no one is forcing these people to pay an arm and a leg for the systems...or are they? If Tickle Me Elmo proved anything it's that there are parents out there that are willing to use any means necessary to ensure their child has the hot Christmas item waiting under the tree. The scalpers recognize this and decide to make a profit off of it. The most common rebuttal I've seen from scalpers is the "supply and demand" argument. Yeah, scalpers are catering to a demand, but it's a demand they created. John Q. Gamer could have just gone to GameStop and grabbed the system himself, leaving the scalper with no demand to feed off of. Of course that just won't do so the scalper buys that system, thus taking one unit out of the supply and adding to the demand. So in essence, it's a giant scam that scalpers like to pass off as a legitimate supply and demand scenario.

The problem is obviously that people are willing to pay these ridiculous amounts. I understand that many parents want the whole Christmas Morning thing to be happy and devoid of crying and disappointment (and potential loss of belief in a certain someone) but the line has to be drawn somewhere right? Maybe it's just because I don't have kids but I can't see how paying $1500 for a freaking $30 plushie can be in any way justified, nor can I see paying $2500 for a $600 console (though that Tickle Me Elmo price really blows my mind). Promise the kids a system as soon as you can and tell them to enjoy the utilities and food in the meantime.

Though it'll never happen it'd be the ultimate (and awesome) justice if in the end all the scalpers were left with nothing to show for their efforts but a $600 debt and a system they never wanted. Ah well, I can dream.

Yeah, pretty much every gaming blog on the Internet has an entry about this already but I just couldn't resist.

So as everyone knows Epic's Gears of War recently shipped for the 360 to rave reviews. Now, apparently an employee at the EA studio developing Army of Two (EA Montreal) was baffled by this. He said that yes, the game is amazing but it does absolutely nothing in the way of innovation and thus wondered how it got such high scores.

HA! Wow. Any other company probably could have gotten away with that but EA? EA is the least innovative company in all of gaming (see Madden or any title developed under the EA Sports label) and yet there it was, a member of EA calling out another developer for lack of innovation. It's such a perfect example of that pot calling the kettle black we ought to just adopt it as a gamer's synonym for the phrase. Next time you have a pot and kettle situation just say "Talk about EA criticizing lack of innovation."

One of the innovations in Army of Two is that, like in reality, you are required to drink water to sustain your life. That's not too bad right? Well, the game takes it a step further and requires you to urinate. Yeah, I'm sure Gears is much worse for the fact that you don't have to stop fighting Locusts so that Marcus can relieve himself. Granted, Army of Two actually sounds cool and is definitely a departure for EA (an original IP? Whoa) but for their sake it had better be one of the most innovative shooters ever or this comment's going to come back to bite them come the game's release.

Nintendo held its Space World 2006 event on Friday and as promised there was a new trailer for one of the Wii's most anticipated titles, Smash Bros. Brawl. First off I have to say I was disappointed with the end. Nintendo said that the trailer would contain a new character. I was hoping to see a never before seen character (I was actually hoping to see Sonic) but apparently by new Nintendo merely meant a character that hadn't yet appeared in Brawl and the end of the trailer revealed the return of Fox. Ignoring the fact that almost everyone already knew Fox was coming back the trailer revealed that he's sporting his awful design from Star Fox Command. I'm personally worried about Nintendo making such a big deal out of the appearance of Fox. Most are under the impression that everyone from Melee will be making a return save for Mr. Game and Watch, Young Link, and the Ice Climbers, characters whom the team had alrady announced removing. However, the "announcement" of Fox kind of makes it seem like maybe they're rewriting the roster. Personally I'm hoping that they just finished programming Fox and that they're just going to announce the returning characters in the trailers as they finish with them.

Roster worries aside the trailer was awesome. The trailer from E3 was much more cinematic and put much more emphasis on special moves. This new trailer showed pretty much 90% gameplay. We got to see a preview of a bunch of new levels, all of which looked amazing, including a Mario Kart level in the vein of Melee's Mute City and a destructible level based on Kid Icarus. The trailer also showed a great deal of combo based attacks which not only revealed just how Snake is going to fight (Rocket Launcher!) but also eased worries that the game was going to be simplified. The hype for this game just continues to build and I really hope it hits in early 2007. Hopefully the entire Melee cast returns (with the clone move-sets (C. Falcon and Ganondorf, Marth and Roy) fixed), along with some other new Nintendo characters and hopefully Sonic (though Sonic and Rockman would be beyond awesome). Man, I'm glad this game isn't a launch title or not having a Wii pre-order would be even more maddening.

Almost forgot to write this one. So yeah, a few weeks ago a new trailer for Dead or Alive Extreme 2 hit Xbox Live and wow...I think if I had to summarize the trailer I could do it with the phrase "too bloody bouncy."

Seriously, Dead or Alive has always been famous for its large-breasted females and their bouncy tendencies but this trailer is just nuts. Right from the get go we see Hitomi dancing around on the beach and her chest is just going nuts. Team Ninja was very proud of the fact that breasts could now bounce individually but that just makes it look even crazier as not only is the bounce exaggerated but now the breasts flail around. It's like someone turned up the Zero-G when programming the breast physics. Right after the Hitomi scene we see Kokoro slowly getting out a pool. This slow, subtle motion cause her chest to spaz out. These hyperkinetic breast spasms are commonplace throughout the trailer.

I have to wonder if the programmers have ever seen real women on a beach. If these girls were naked maybe the bounce would be more believable but these girls are all wear very small and very tight bikinis. Garments of this type tend to hold things in place but these girls clothes may as well be painted onto their skin. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a girl in a bikini with her boobs bouncing out of sync and in opposite directions?

Lastly, my main gripe with the game resurfaces, gameplay is once again not the focus. This new trailer is 8 minutes long, 8 minutes. The entire duration of the movie shows absolutely no gameplay. The trailer is nothing but 8 minutes of the girls dancing around. The game continues to walk the line between game and porn with such scenes as Lei-Fang dancing on a stripper pole and plenty of implied lesbianism. The worst part is that it seems like all of the graphical enhancement has gone into the breasts. For the most part the game looks just like Dead or Alive 4 (though apparently there's some great water effects). The fabric looks to move a little better (though it moves kind of unrealistically in the vein of the breasts) but the hair hasn't been addressed at all. The girls' hair still moves in strips and the frequent clipping is still present. Hyperkinetic breasts and tentacle hair capable of passing through the human body? Sexy.

The part that really confuses me though is why Team Ninja would release a trailer like this. It's obvious that the point of this game is to ogle the DOA girls. If your goal was to do as such why would you bother buying the game when you already have 8 minutes of the girls dancing around?

It's kind of funny that Itagaki assigned someone else to handle Ninja Gaiden Sigma so he could focus on DOAX2. I agree with Game Informer, choosing DOAX2 over Ninja Gaiden really says something about you as a person. Something you probably don't want said about you.

Being a collector has really been a pain in the wallet with all of the Collector's Editions hitting recently.

I have to say I'm a big supporter of full-English, region-free, Asian versions of games. Play-Asia has a number of next-gen games that will work on any system and have full-English support and they cost at least $20 less because they're the Asian versions. This was especially helpful for the Assassin's Creed collector's edition. The Assassin's Creed CE comes with the game and a 12-inch statue of Altair. A 12-inch statue of Altair would be beyond awesome but I wasn't about to pay $40 for a statue. Fortunately, Play-Asia was taking pre-orders for the game at $75.00 shipped. Now if only Ubisoft hadn't delayed the game (and added insult to injury by releasing GRAW2 in its place).

After that came the Final Fantasy XII Collector's Edition. A stylish metal case and a disc of extra material, the standard features. Though I was surprised that the game disc was different. Usually it's just the case they change but FFXII had a different case, manual, and game disc.

As if next-gen games weren't expensive enough they have to keep releasing Collector's Editions for them. Gears of War hits this week with an awesome looking tin and an art book from the game. Next week Smackdown VS. Raw 2007 hits and GameStop is offering a special edition that includes a Championship History DVD, WWE trivia book, and collector's tin.

Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin is great because all the awesome stuff it comes with is a pre-order bonus! You get a Castlevania timeline poster, a soundtrack CD, an hardcover art book, a DS game case, and a DS extendable stylus all just for pre-ordering. It's amazing that depsite being free the 25th Anniversary pre-order bonus provides much cooler stuff than what Colletor's Editions typically charge for.

Then, of course, Bungie announces the mother of all Collector's Editions in the form of Halo 3: Legendary Edition. The set includes the regular Collector's Edition (the game itself and a behind the scenes bonus disc, like Halo 2) as well as a third disc containing spin-off material like Red Vs. Blue and a fourth disc featuring all the cutscenes from Halo, Halo 2, and Halo 3 in chronological order and in HD. The best part is that all of those discs come inside of a replica of Master Chief's helmet! The game doesn't even have any semblance of a release date and I've already got my Legendary Edition pre-ordered. Wow, with the PS3, Wii, and all these Collector's Editions it's a really expensive time to be a collector.

There have been a couple more fun demos on Live recently. Though I have to say Microsoft's tactics haven't exactly been nice as of late. Silver was supposed to be the membership for people that wanted the content but didn't want to pay for online play but now Microsoft is trying to force people into buying Gold by only releasing content for Gold members. With Sony and Nintendo's systems about to launch with free online systems it doesn't seem like a great time for Microsoft to start trying to rip people off with live.

Anyway, the first demo I tried was Rainbow Six Vegas. With all the video games I play I had never actually played a Tom Clancy game before the 360. GRAW came out back in March and released to critical and commercial success. I never understood what all the fuss was about, thinking the game was mediocre at best. I downloaded the demo and I couldn't get into it. The action was wicked slow and I don't know if it's just because I don't have an HDTV but I didn't think the visuals were impressive either. On top of that the AI went brain-dead on me a few times. In one instance I had one of my guys randomly run out into the street and get sniped by a terrorist on a rooftop. Another time I was in a combat situation and couldn't find one of my guys. I found him back around a corner emptying clips into a telephone pole at point-blank range. The last instance was actually with the enemy AI. I was standing around the corner from a terrorist who just kept firing his gun at the wall across from him as he was seemingly too dumb to come around the corner. So yeah, I wasn't impressed with GRAW. Adding insult to injury, Ubisoft announced GRAW2 for March and pushed back the game I was actually looking forward to, Assassin's Creed.

But anyway, Rainbow Six. Vegas couldn't have been any more different from GRAW. I thought it was awesome. There were still some issues with the squad AI but it really only consisted of my having to give an order a few times (nothing as ridiculous as what I saw in GRAW). The action is intense and the cover system is excellent (if the cover in Gears of War is anything like this than it should be awesome). The variety of actions such as taking cover and rappelling as well as the variety of gadgets at your disposal make the game all the more fun. I've never been into the Tom Clancy games before but I may just have to pick up Rainbow Six Vegas.

The other game demo I downloaded was the demo for Eragon. I've yet to read the book but I knew Stormfront (Lord of the Rings, Demon Stone) was developing the game and I'm a big fan of their hack-n-slash action games so I gave it a shot. My biggest complaint would be that the game does not look like a 360 title at all. The animation is probably a little more smooth than it would be on the current gen but everything in the game looks like it came off of the original Xbox. The gameplay feels just like the Lord of the Rings games or Demon Stone, which for me is a good thing. The addition of arrows and magic added some needed variety to the action as well. All in all I had fun with it. I'd never pay $60 for it but I don't think it'd be a bad way to kill an afternoon if I find it in a bargain bin someday.

Masterpiece. That is the word that instantly comes to mind when I think of how to describe Okami. The game is the perfect blend of art and great gameplay.

The first thing everybody notices about Okami is the unique art style. Interestingly enough I found out that the original plan was to use a hyper-realistic style but the PS2 wasn't powerful enough for it so Clover opted for the better looking Japanese painting style. The game is absolutely beautiful in motion. If Japanese wood block painters made animations Okami is what they would look like. The look of the game is very Japanese and is amazing to see. The music is equally Japanese. The music is a blend of your typical Zelda-esque type of fare and traditional Japanese music and complements the game perfectly.

Of course, style can only carry a game so far. Fortunately Okami is a blast to play. The biggest mechanic is obviously the Celestial Brush, which is a fantastic mechanic. The brush and all of the techniques allow for a multitude of puzzle solving and platforming opportunities throughout the game, adding to the variety. The Celestial Brush also adds a whole new dimension to the combat. The combat plays out like you would expect it to. Enemies appear and you use one of three types of weapon to combat them. You can equip either a reflector, rosary beads, or a sword as your main method of attack and then you can equip another weapon as a sub-weapon to provide a secondary effect. The combat is fun on its own but the Celestial Brush adds so many options. The brush allows you to cut enemies clean in half, fire ink bullets, create bombs, cause trees to sprout in front of your enemies, and more.

Overall, Okami is one of the greatest games this generation has seen. It's a shame that Clover is gone but going out on a game like Okami is an awesome way to go.

Wow, I'm really amazed at how negative the general consensus for this game has been. It seems like GameSpot are the only ones who really appreciated it.

Yeah, the game isn't perfect. The RE4 style of camera and movement seems really odd for a brawler. The game probably would have benefited from a pulled back camera and non-pivotal movement but these aspects are easy enough to deal with. The close up camera forces you to keep an eye on where your enemies go and if you need to move backward really fast there's the back-flip and the flip 180 degrees button.

Those issues aside the game is awesome. I think it's the truest realization of a brawler I've ever seen in 3D. The game has you playing as a guy who's an awesome fighter and sets you up with a bare bones plot, you run around environments beating up random looking thugs, you break open barrels and boxes to find food that restores your health and there's even a bonus stage where you have to beat up a car. That's pretty much everything about the classic 2D brawlers right there and then the game ties it all together with hilarity, quirk, challenge and a great fighting engine.

I still don't understand the widespread negativity toward the game. Yeah, the game isn't a masterpiece like Clover's other recent effort Okami, but I think it's a blast and it successfully captures the feel of a brawler in 3D, and that's a feat in and of itself.

Wow. I was completely caught off guard by the new Gears of War commercial. Gears always looked to me like your typical testosterone-driven Western game what with the super bulky soldiers and copious amounts of blood and explosions. I would have expected a commercial full of blood, explosions, and destruction all set to a roaring heavy metal sound and then they released that...wow.

We see that Marcus Fenix is actually human as he kneels, saddened, in the rain. Gary Jules's cover of Mad World plays as Marcus studies the ruin around him, the "Destroyed Beauty" theme of the game. Suddenly the Locust close in and we cut to Marcus running through the rain. The ad ends with Marcus stumbling into a den of Locust and everything fades to black as he engages a colossal beast.

I have to say I was skeptical about Gears. Yeah, it looks really, really good but I wasn't totally sold on the "stop-and-pop" gameplay. I was going to buy it anyway (as I'm sure most 360 owners are) but this spot was the first time I got really hyped for the game. The game engine makes for a beautiful scene and the somber music provides a very melancholic atmosphere, making the whole thing very artistic. I'm a bit worried though. Most people in the online gaming communities appreciated the ad but I can just picture your average John Q. Madden-fan seeing it and proclaiming "Man, I thought that game was gonna be cool, what's with the gay emo-music?" Grah.

Regardless, I have my Collector's edition pre-ordered (though Veteran's day may delay its arrival until after Emergence Day) and I'm excited for it. I played the Rainbow Six demo on Live recently and if Gears cover and shoot gameplay is anything like that it should be a blast. Here's hoping.

Like many gamers out there I'm really not too fond of Electronic Arts. Granted I do own a few games of theirs. I love Burnout and Criterion's other work and EA publishes those. Road Rash was good back in the day and Everything or Nothing was the one truly great Bond title EA made (before throwing everything down the toilet again with the terrible Rogue Agent). EA has always been viewed in a negative light. They're the largest publisher and constantly make attempts at monopolizing the industry (such as attempts to buy out Ubisoft) and multiple lawsuits were filed against them when they denied overtime pay to dozens of employees. However, the advent of the Xbox 360 has added a great deal of negativity to EA's image.

First off all is Xbox Live play. I'm sure mostly everyone is familiar with Xbox Live. It's a great service. Microsoft has a series of servers for online play and provides an excellent matchmaking service for easy online gaming. However, EA apparently took issue with using good servers and only agreed to provide online play over Live if they got to host their own games. Those of you who've ever tried to play an EA published game over Live know that EA can't host servers to save their lives. One of my favorite games for the 360 is Burnout Revenge but I barely ever play it online. Every time I try it takes forever to find a match and when I finally find a game I want to join I usually get kicked by the server.

Another great aspect of Live is that it has one universal log-in. You log in with your Gamer Tag and you're all set to play any game on Live without the fear of giving out information and getting spam...unless you play an EA game. EA is the one company that is the exception to this and you are required to sign up with them to play their games. You can keep them from passing your information out but they trick you into letting them. All of the menus have the set-up "A = Yes, B = No" until they get to the e-mail menu where they switch it! So if you've just been clicking B to get through all of EA's crap suddenly you've just signed away your e-mail address to EA and its parnters. Nice, EA.

What EA has come under fire for most recently is its downright appalling use of the Xbox Live Marketplace. The first offense was selling two Madden tutorial videos. Yes, EA expected people to shell out extra money for something that should have been included in the real game. Recently however EA has been offering unlockables. It started off harmlessly enough with Tiger Woods 2007 where EA made all of the unlockable players and max stat upgrades available for a price. OK, I guess if you're one of those instant gratification types you can just shell out more money to have EA complete the game for you. Wow, how awesome, you don't even have to play the games you buy now. Things started to smell fowl when the Godfather's downloadble content hit the Marketplace. The Godfather, as far as I know, is the first game to offer consumables, downloads that serve as one-time use items in the game. Personally I think the idea of buying in-game items that are available for free within the game is absurd but hey, maybe you're too busy to play your games. EA offered unlocks on a bunch of weapons but these were just unlocks, you still had to buy the guns in the game. Don't worry though, EA has that covered too. Once again, if you don't feel like playing the game you've already paid for you can pay more real world money for EA to put Godfather money into your game. Now this all seems really stupid but it doesn't sound too evil does it? Well it wouldn't have been if EA hadn't removed all of the cheat codes from the 360 version. Yes, all of the downloadable content was available in the other versions via cheats but EA expects money for the 360 version's content. In essence, EA is expecting people to pay for cheat codes (one time use cheat codes at that). You know, those things that have existed for free in games since the NES?

EA is already the largest publisher and they're notorious for putting out endless sports game roster updates and half-hearted licensed titles. However, the aforementioned games all sell really well and thus EA stays the course. Hopefully the general public won't bite on this paying instead of playing insanity and EA will stop trying to pull crap like this.

Wow, there's been a lot of developments in the video game censorship battle as of late.

First off we of course had the eternal thorn in gamers' sides Jack Thompson and his crusade against Bully. It's gotten to the point where Jack just comes off as pathetic. He has nothing better to do with his time than file frivolous suits against video games, send nasty e-mails to gamers, and make nasty comments on game forums, coming off crazier and crazier as he goes.

In what Jack laughably called a "historic ruling" he convinced a judge to order that Take-Two bring in a copy of Bully and play it for the Judge. After a few hours the judge deemed that the game had nothing in it warranting a ban. "I wouldn't want my children to play it, but that in no way constitutes a ban." Wow, doing your own parenting? What a novel idea. In typical Thompson fashion, Jack threw a temper tantrum when the judge ruled against him, writing a ridiculous letter in which he compared the judge to a terrorist and ranted on about his being a Christian to the point that other Christians have started distancing themselves from him. The most amusing quote had to be:

“When kids start showing up in ERs with slingshot wounds at the hands of Bully enthusiasts, don’t blame me.”

Wow, just wow Jack. Never mind the fact that slingshots have been around for hundreds of years and kids have used them for decades and that Bully is actually social commentary on the rampant bullying that exists in the real world.

A fact that many are ignorant to is that you do not actually play as a bully in the game, you defend others against the actions of Bullies. Jack proclaims that Bully teaches kids to react with violence as opposed to seeking aid from teachers, parents, etc. and that such a game would make Harris and Klebold (the Columbine Shooters) proud. Speaking from personal experience I can say that Bully is a perfect representation of the real world. In one of the game's commercials we witness Jimmy attempting the Thompson method of telling a teacher. We see the teacher instantly dismiss the bullying claim as "nonsense" leaving Jimmy with the task of protecting his fellow students. My brother had to deal with a situation just like the one above. He was picked on frequently by other students and we tried the Thompson method. We kept informing teachers and guidance counselors and they all proved completely useless. The perpetrators got a finger wag and a "Now don't you do that again" and eventually we just told my brother to punch someone. "If anyone messes with you just punch them in face and they probably won't try it again" (my brother's a huge kid but he's a pacifist for the most part so he usually doesn't fight back). "When the school calls to tell us you've struck another student we'll say "Good, he did the job you idiots couldn't be bothered to." So in the end Bully is a very poignant and accurate commentary on the real life school system. Of course, admitting the video games imitate life and not the other way around would kind of blow a hole in Thompson's argument.

The issue really hit the fan when GayGamer.net revealed that it was possible to engage in same-sex kissing in Bully. Jack added raging homophobe to his repertoire and demanded Bully be re-rated M because of the Mature content. Now, the ESRB knew all about the same-sex kissing when they reviewed the game and they appropriately rated the game T (it's only kissing) and added a sexual content warning on the back. But wait! This is gay kissing! Apparently gay kissing is for adults only where normal kissing is harmless. Oh no, we can't have kids seeing gay kissing in a game. That might make them thing that homosexuality is OK. We can't have that if we want them to all grow up to be obedient little homophobic Bible-thumpers can we? Not that I needed another reason to hate Jack but hey, I guess he's an overachiever.

Unfortunately, GameSpot didn't have the foresight to disable user commentary on the Same-sex Kissing in Bully article and thus the bigots came out from under the fridge. I think my favorite comment was one user who claimed that people who support homosexuality are the bigots because we force our pro-homosexual views on homophobes. Excuse me while I laugh like a madman. He then went on to say that he doesn't approve of gay people but he isn't a homophobe because he doesn't hate them. First off all, what homosexuals do is no one's business and they don't need anyone's freaking approval. I don't approve of so many people being closed-minded, ignorant, Bible-thumpers but that doesn't stop them does it? Secondly, ha. Saying that you disapprove of gays but you aren't a homophobe because you don't hate them is like saying you think blacks are inferior to whites but you're not racist because you don't hate them. There can be discrimination without hate. His defense was some warped definition of the word bigot that included the phrase "strong dislike." Here's the definition of the word courtesy of Dictionary.com:

bigot - One who is strongly partial to one's own group, religion, race, or politics and is intolerant of those who differ.

So whether you hate them or not, you're still intolerant of them and at the end of the day you're no better than any other bigot. My faith in humanity takes another dive.

Some more random tidbits. Hilary Clinton released an ad in which she touts her fight against video games. First off all, I think it's great that Hilary is ignoring the frivolous issues like war, poverty, Medicare, and the like and focusing our tax dollars and Congressional effort on something that really matters. Seriously, is such a claim actually supposed to get people to vote for you? First of all, anyone who sees that ad is going to assume "So what, she has no stance on any important issues so she has to tout her fight against video games?" Secondly, touting that you've been actively trying to destroy the First Amendment isn't the best campaign strategy. And second of all, what has she actually accomplished? Yeah, she and Jack got GTA re-rated AO and pulled from the shelves and she has a bill being looked at by Congress right now. Have any her actions produced results as of yet? Gods, I hope she isn't the Democratic candidate for president in 2008. Having to decide between her and some conservative Republican is about as lose-lose as it gets.

I just found out about this guy, who's apparently crazy as well. He's a conservative Republican senator who is siding with Democratic liberal Hilary (who, amusingly, has donated $10,000 to his opponent) in the fight against video games. In a move that can only be described as sheer hypocrisy, as soon as he finished announcing this he elbows a man in the face. He's against violent video games but apparently all for real life acts of violence like pro-wrestling and elbows to the face. Wow.

The most amusing bit of controversy from recent months goes to some crazy woman who took offense to the Behemoth's upcoming Xbox Live title Castle Crashers. Apparently the woman in the video sees in black and white and wasn't wearing her glasses. She describes the game as a game in which four characters wearing hoods who are all-white (when they are really wearing helmets and are very bright shades of green, blue, red, and yellow) attacking all black characters (characters who were actually all Caucasian). It's people like this that make the anti-game cause look so ridiculous.

I really need to start writing these on time so they'll actually still be relevant when I upload them.

DO NOT WANT!

That was more or less my reaction when I read the news of Clover's closing. I was shocked. There I was immensely enjoying Okami and eagerly anticipating God Hand and all of a sudden BAM! Clover is no more. I was upset at first because at first it seemed like another case of creativity not being profitable and being given the axe. Capcom's referral to Clover as an "experiment" to see if creative games could produced just purported that feeling. "It turns out creative games can be made. OK, shut down Clover and start production on 4 more Rockman games."

Then of course we got the news that the key players at Clover had split after the completion of God Hand and Okami and the studio was really already gone. Mikami and Inaba had both gone off to pursue their own interests and (hopefully) start their own studio. So while the prospect of the two masterminds of Clover starting their own studio is tantalizing indeed, the fact remains that the Clover that was, the Clover that created Viewtiful Joe, Okami, and God Hand, is gone.

Now, I know that Clover's closing had nothing to do with sales but this whole issue reminded me of an article condemning casual gamers over at Bits Bytes Pixels & Sprites, though my annoyance is of a different vein.

Look at Okami. Okami is a beautiful, artistic masterpiece that I know is never going to get the audience it deserves. It seems nowadays that the industry is doing all it can to attract the casual gamer. Now obviously they don't need to target the hardcore gamers. We've been here the whole time and we'll continue to play save some catastrophic event in which the collective quality of gaming spirals down toward Hell. Casual gaming is obviously a desirable piece of the market as it provides the most profit for the industry and spurs growth. The problem I see is that much of that profit is from sub-par efforts and promotes even more sub-par efforts while true gaming gems are ignored by the masses.

Just look at Psychonauts from last year. The game was brilliant. The writing and art direction were superb, it was hilarious, and most importantly, it was a blast to play. Yet all of that wasn't enough to help it pass the 90,000 mark in sales. Yet in the same year the licensing crap-fest known as 50 Cent Bulletproof broke the million copy barrier. I'm not sure how I feel about living in a world where a terrible game starring a terrible musician outsells a work of creative genius like Psychonauts.

It gets worse than just that one example, just look at the sales totals for games ever year. Unless a Halo 2-caliber blockbuster is released it's almost guaranteed that the game that sells the most copies will be EA's Madden franchise. Somehow EA is able to sucker the same millions of people into buying a roster update every year. Gaming media as a whole doesn't really help either. I read the review for Madden 07 in Game Informer a while back and it got an 8.25. In the review the staffer says, and I quote, "I don't think any of the gameplay issues have been resolved from last year." What!? That doesn't make any sense! The game gets an 8.25, a fairly high score, and yet no problems from its predecessor have been addressed. But hey, why should they address the problems, people will buy them anyway. And that brings me to my case against the gaming mainstream.

It's almost inevitable that the top-ten selling games every year will all be sports games and mediocre licensed games with maybe one really good blockbuster in there (again, think Halo 2). This is why I think the gaming mainstream hurts the industry as a whole. The top selling games every year are sports games (roster updates) and licensed games that had little to no effort put into them. Publishers recognize that they can get away with this minimal-effort and creativity, high profit approach and they stick with it. What's worse than lack of creativity being embraced is that creativity is typically rejected by the mainstream. Look at Katamari Damacy, a completely original game that provided hours of fun. No mouth-breathing, Madden-loving, jock-type would ever play that. They'd take one look at it, call it gay and go buy whatever sports game came out that week.

I think Jeff said it best in his latest Points Report. If creativity is ever to truly die gaming will be nothing but Sports Games, World War II FPS games, and crappy licensed titles. However, while some would shun creativity in favor of profit (*cough*EA*cough*) there are thankfully plenty of developers (and console manufacturers, i.e. Nintendo) who are willing to harbor creativity and innovation so hopefully that dark, gaming apocalypse never comes to pass.

So like many PlayStation fans I traveled to my local GameStop this morning in hopes of securing a PS3 pre-order. As my title would suggest I was successful and as an added bonus I'm number one on the list. It wasn't entirely smooth sailing however.

Like everyone else I got the news from GameSpot and my e-mail last night. Talk about short notice. I wasn't about to sacrifice sleep to go camp out in Seabrook (the purpose of the pre-order is to avoid the camping). My plan was to skip my morning classes and get to GameStop as soon as I could. I woke up at 7:30 and left my house by 8, arriving at GameStop at around 8:30. Imagine my surprise when I saw no one standing in front of the store! Unlike the other GameStop visitors around the country I got to sleep and got to be first in line after showing up at 8:30.

So I got my PSP out and started up Gitaroo-Man Live! to make the wait more bearable. At around 8:45 a guy pulled up in an SUV and asked me when the store opened. I replied 10 and he said "And you're already waiting. Ha, good for you." Apparently he had come for his son as he returned later after having pulled his son out of school! The boy and I were the only two waiting until about 9:55 when the third and final person showed up. The store opened up at 10:00 and in we went.

Now the funny thing is the manager got there at 9. She walked up to the store, said "Hey" to me and went inside. I took this as a good sign. She seemingly didn't care that there was a customer waiting outside her store over an hour before it opened. I took this as meaning she knew why I was there (in hindsight I'm glad she didn't tell me anything at this point). Anyway, we went in and she asked us if there was anything she could help us find. That kind of worried me but I said no and we proceeded to the counter. She asked what we needed and I said we were there for the PS3 pre-orders to which she replied "Sorry, I'm not taking those yet." We said they were supposed to open today and she said they weren't even in the system. Then she asked where we had heard that because she had been getting calls about it. We informed her of the e-mail and the GameStop website and proceeded to stand their stunned as she made a phone call to her DM. Turns out she could take pre-orders! I quickly beckoned to #2, who had drifted toward the door. Apparently they just hadn't put the consoles into the system and they had to be entered manually. Yes, my wait was not for naught! It took her a few minutes to get it all worked out and then the question came, "20 gig or 60 gig?" Yes. I put $500 down on a 60 gig and then pre-ordered Resistance and Sonic and she handed me the receipt that would be the Holy Grail of my quest this morning. Humorously enough she then thanked me for letting her know that PS3 pre-orders opened today! How on top of things must those GameStop corporate officials be when a manager has to find out from her customer that she's supposed to be taking pre-orders. Though I think that probably worked in my favor. Seabrook isn't the most heavily populated area and many don't even know there's a GameStop there. In addition people probably called last night and she told them no (as she had been told earlier). As a result they probably didn't bother to show up. So now provided that GameStop gets at least one PlayStation 3 come November I'm guarateed one on launch day. And the Wii pre-orders are supposedly opening on Friday as well!

As if today didn't go well enough, I checked my student portal page for the university when I got home and found out the class I thought I had skipped had actually been cancelled. Awesome.

Anyone who's ever played an MMO (or really just any RPG) is familiar with the process of the level grind. The level grind is a long and sometimes tedious process in which you must constantly battle enemies and earn EXP in order to go up in level. As time went on companies that would "power-level" characters appeared. These groups would accept players' real world money in exchange for playing the game for them. Now, I guess there could be a reason behind it. Some people want to see the high level content but don't have the time to level up on their own. Others just plain don't want to level up on their own and desire the instant gratification of being able to jump right into the end game. Now, I've never understood the whole "pay others to play the game for you" bit. Games are supposed to be fun and I never understood how someone could simultaneously want to play a game and yet pay someone else money to play it for them. I can't wrap my brain around having someone else play your game for you, let alone giving them your hard earned money to play your game.

Now, at least having someone level up your character for you kind of made sense. It severely limited your own playtime but you were able to show-off the leveled-up character on whatever server you played on, though usually other players could tell you "bought" the character due to your lack of experience, and you were able to access the high level content. However, recently a new website has surfaced called LevelMy360.com. If you relinquish your Xbox Live password and your hard-earned money this company will play Xbox games in your name and earn achievements for you, increasing your Gamerscore. The "packages" they offer range from 500 points for $40 all the way to 3,000 points for $300. $300!? You could buy a spare 360 (just move the hard drive) for that kind of money. OK, new rule. If you actually use this site you're not allowed to be a gamer anymore. Seriously, who in their right mind would ever pay someone to do something as inane as increase their Gamerscore? The sad part is that the website claims the service was created due to popular demand implying that there was a large group of people that desired increased Gamerscores without actually having to do the "gamer" part.

Apparently quite a few people are obsessed with raising their Gamerscore. This is confusing as the only purpose the number serves is allowing you to brag that you've unlocked more achievements on your 360. The number does not unlock anything special nor does it grant you any privileges, it merely represents the tasks you've completed in your games. Some people have even gone as far as to import games and play games they didn't even enjoy just for the sake of raising their score. What? Gaming is supposed to be for fun and the achievements serve as a way to monitor your accomplishments in the games you play. Yet there are people who will do anything, even at the expense of fun (you know, the reason most of us play games), for the sake of achievements and for what? To win some Xbox Live pissing contest?

Anyway, this kind of became a rant on the points obsession instead of a rant against the new service. In summary, if you would pay real money to do something as meaningless as increase your Gamerscore you are a fool. If you don't want to devote the time and effort to unlocking achievements on your own you don't deserve them. They're called achievements, achieve them like a real gamer and keep your money like any sensible person would. 

As usual, the anti-game crowd just outright refuses to leave us alone. For starters, there was the recent case in which a 14-year-old boy murdered his father and step mother. The boy's real mother died in a car crash while he was in the car. The boy also suffered constant abuse the the hands of his sorry excuse for a father and was assaulted by his brother as well. The night before the murder his twisted father, who had incest-themed porn on his hard drive, tried to coerce the boy into having sex with his step-mother and then burned him with a hot metal rod when he refused! As a result of this the boy was suffering from both post traumatic stress disorder, depression, and plain old mental instability. But wait! They took a PS2 with a copy of Grand Theft Auto Vice City out of his room! That's why he killed them! So now there's a $600,000,000 lawsuit against Sony, Rockstar Games, Take-Two Interactive, and others over the murder, despite the fact that the game had nothing to do with it. The "GTA Made me do it" angle was even brought to the boy's attorney before the trial and he dismissed it as having nothing to do with it! Apparently that just wasn't enough for these anti-game fanatics. (Read the full story here).

Currently the ESRB's policy for rating games is that developers submit collections of what they believe to be the game's most objectionable content as well as a description of the general content. The ESRB reviews these materials and then rates the game accordingly. There's a bill right now that proposes that ESRB be required to play each game to 100% completion before reviewing them. That is a ludicrous proposition. First, from a gamer standpoint, it's bad for us because that means it takes the ESRB much longer to rate a game and thus it takes longer for the game to get to us. Secondly, all of this game legislation is fall out from the Hot Coffee scandal. The funny thing? A policy that required the ESRB to play through games completely would not have averted either Hot Coffee or the incredibly less severe Topless Oblivion Mod. Why? Those two incidents were brought about as the result of modding and third party devices. Yes, the content was left in the game but was normally not accessible to the player in any way without the use of a downloaded modification or a third party accessory. Yes, the developers probably shouldn't have left the content in the games but it was not they that brought it to light, it was the players. Also, Oblivion is frequently updated via microtransactions. Would it make any sense for the ESRB to have to play through every single new quest in case they had to revise their rating? No, no it wouldn't.

Apparently the ESRB is broken now as well. Just, how exactly? If you ask me it's the parents that are broken. Apparently the general consensus is that the ESRB doesn't do enough advertising to educate parents about the system. What? Sorry, but I don't recall ever seeing any MPAA or RIAA ads explaining to parents what "Rated R" and "Parental Advisory" meant. You have to be pretty inept not to understand the game ratings we currently use. E means Everyone, it's suitable for anybody to play. E10 signifies that a child should be at least 10 to be exposed to the content in the game. T means Teen, meaning you should be 13 to play the game. M means Mature, a game for the 17 and up crowd. There's never been a misunderstanding with movie ratings and yet there's a direct correlation between them and game ratings. Everyone is G, Everyone10 is PG, Teen is PG-13, M is R, and the infamous AO is X. The ESRB doesn't have to spend its time and money to educate parents. Parents need to look at the bloody box and see what the age recommendation in the corner is. It's sickening to think of all of the money being wasted on all of this.

I was kind of hoping the launch of the PS3 wouldn't be some great fiasco like the 360's was but I guess that was just a passing dream.

First of all, Sony pulled a Microsoft and took a huge hit to launch quantities due to manufacturing issues. However, Sony is actually going to launch with more units than Microsoft ultimately did and they've already intensified production in order to have a projected 2 million units shipped by the end of the year.

Sony apparently was also very lacking in the information department. GameStop employees who attended the recent conference in Texas said that Sony really offered very little information and as a result the pre-order situation is still messed up. I called my local GameStop and they said they are definitely not taking pre-orders for it. That may change but I may actually look into an online bundle if I can't pre-order in the brick and mortars. I'm a hardcore gamer and all, but I'm not going to camp outside of a Best Buy for two days to get a console. I could spend that time playing other games as I awaited the arrival of my new system.

Anyway, even with the colossal price, money isn't an issue at this point so all I have to do is manage to actually find the console somewhere and I'll be good to go.