The willingness to develop or publish AO games is another issue altogether. For business reasons, including reputation concerns, stores and game developers may choose to eschew AO games. That's the nature of private ownership; they sale or make or not what they want. Although a combination of these factors has indeed resulted in very few AO games being made/distributed in the US, it is still a world better than legally binding policies that either seek to categorize expression or prohibits certain categories from being made/distributed. In the former case, individual freedom is preserved, at least to a much greater extent than the later. From a creative point of view, the result is the same. Sadly I don't know how to change that. From a legal/social point of view, there is a world of difference.

I believe technically all videos on YouTube and elsewhere derived from games or movies without permission are against the EULA of the publishers. On the other hand, I seriously doubt that Sites like YouTube will be affected because the IP holder like EA or MS or Sony simply won't care about that type of violation. Most of that user content actually raises brand-awareness and is good for business. The spirit of the bill, though I don't support it, is actually valid. Any website that participate in the illegal distribution of copyrighted material is complicit in the crime. Search engines, ISP, domain registrar are to an illegal file downloading site as the city news paper (runs ads), the local taxi company (operates as a destination), and the county commerce department (has a valid business registration) are to a known dealer of stolen cars. The legal difference is much more nuances, of course, but the argument that we wouldn't possibly allow the later to operate, why should we allow the former, has merit.

I am against the bill because I do not believe in prevention, only punishment. A person should have the right to commit a crime if he wants to, we as a society then take the necessary action as legally agreed. I believe Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld made a statement, when asked about the looting in Baghdad after its "liberation," that free people are free to make mistakes. I am fine with punishing people for copyright infringement, but to block the possibility of it, by taking away the knowledge. That's bad mojo. It's like that movie Serenity, where the government introduced a drug that prevents aggression. We don't have that drug, but if we did have a way to "cure" all people of violent tendencies, should we do that too? To prevent a known genetic defect from perpetuating in the population, should we practice eugenics? They are all beneficial to society. In this as in all cases, I do not want to live in a society that forces people to do the "right thing."

Delightful read. Brendan, you've eloquently expressed the frustration that I (and many others like me) feel about the direction the gaming industry is heading. Sadly, I think this is less an indication that the new marketing schemes are faulty and more a sign that we are getting old. I am just wondering, for any young gamers who has never known a time before micro-transaction, f2p, DLC, do you have a problem with these business models? Such a market research would be telling. This article has got me thinking. Although I avoid micro-transaction-based f2p games in general, it may very well be the ultimately evolution of gaming as a business. It permits perfect price discrimination (the product is slightly different but the marginal cost of additional maps or cash items are negligible) not just on the individual level, but on an individual temporal level. Two best friends can play a game together with one spending no money and another spending over \$500 in 2 years. I know because I was that non-playing friend. This is a stroke of genius that would make even John Nash proud. Everyone who has a problem against this, like me, should do what we can to support any wrench in the system. I myself support Guild Wars as my stand against the tide. Otherwise, we may well see in the near future a perfectly price-discriminating game market because there won't be any alternative.

Wow, this guy is such a professional artist. No wonder the Heavy Rain soundtrack is awesome. Game is entertainment. Movie is entertainment. I hope to see more of this fusion in the future, with talents like NC.

I don't think one needs to force divine inspiration into games. Truly our faith, regardless of type or degree, strongly affects everything we do. Game makers are no exception. If they do not explore their faith in the game's content, they show it through the way they make games. I would think the main obstacle to consciously exploring faith in games is marketability. This is something touched on by the article. Many people are very serious about their faith. This is good except too many of them are also serious about other people's faith. A game maker shares his faith in his game, and it's guaranteed that some people will find his portrayal of faith misleading, or worse, blasphemous. The more orthodox the portrayal, the stronger the backlash from other religions and denominations. Sadly, it's safer to just not make faith the centerpiece of a game; you are accepted into a much broader market (especially West vs. Middle East vs. East) this way. Personally, I welcome any game that explores faith, Christian or otherwise. To me faith is subjective. I would be very interested to experience someone else's faith through his game. I will avoid overly evangelical games the same way that I avoid overly evangelical people. If anyone grossly misrepresents established religions in his game, he will just end up looking foolish. So I don't see any harm of faith in games. Unfortunately, not everyone is this easy going. Marketability.

Spoken like a true businessman, but very insightful observations on the business of gaming. It's perfectly fine that devs and pubs put more efforts into fewer key games; they are just giving gamers what they want. However, while they are raking in the dough from the AAA games, I hope they invest some of that profit in risky but conceptually innovative games. Be philanthropic to the indie scene; that's where I've noticed most of the recent gameplay innovations. Some of them may even become AAA IPs. I agree with Danu_06 that too many games nowadays mistake advances in science and engineering with innovation in gaming. I for one am getting a little tired of hearing about Frostbite 2. At best, these are innovations in technology, not game design. Games like Limbo, Heavy Rain, LBP and Portal take gamers in new, exciting, and sometimes weird directions, and I love them for that. I am also a big fan of the Kinect and the Move and the Wii. I disagree with JD that next generation consoles represent innovation in gaming. I consider the online capability of the 7th gen an innovation of sort, but I didn't see the PS3 or the Xbox360 bringing about particularly innovative games that could not have been achieved on the PS2 or Xbox, in fact, other than improvements in presentation (graphics, etc.), most games on the 7th gen consoles are essentially the same as their 6th gen counterparts, the Wii being the sole exception.

ARGs shouldn't be thought of as an offshoot or, worse, a promotional tool of traditional games. They are in a league of their own. Action gamers are not called such for their love of puzzles either online or in the great outdoors. People who got hooked on I love Bees but thought playing Halo 2 on a screen a thorough bore testify to the triumph of ILB as a new form of entertainment instead of its failure as Halo's ARG. I hope more artists create fresh ARGs, using inspiration from traditional games if they choose. There may come a day with technology permits the level of interactivity in real life to match the intensity of action that exist in most popular games. That would be swell. Unfortunately, it is not today.

The rationale behind this article is a bit confusing to me. No doubt the Alternate Reality Games described here are an exciting new form of interactive entertainment. But have they truly demonstrated any significant impact on traditional games? I've never even heard of I Love Bees (maybe because I am not a Halo fan to start). Most of the games with an associated ARG cited by the article are either already a part of a popular franchise with almost guaranteed success (Halo, Resistance) or never became widely popular (GUN, Velvet Assassin, Darkspore). I do not see any evidence that ARG has had meaningful impact on the success of traditional games. Connecting favorite games with something in another medium can trace its roots to the earliest days of gaming in the form of, as some have already said, peripherals. ARG takes that connection to a new level of realism and interactivity. No doubt the Pit was an exciting novelty during CoD XP. However, trying to reach a mass audience with any level of interactivity beyond simple puzzle solving is a daunting task. For many popular games it's simply not possible. Some ARG that associated with such games, such as I Love Bees and Halo 2, simply became two entirely different experiences that appealed to generally different audiences. How many people who embraced the ARGs actually embraced the actual game? How many fans of the game actually played or even cared about the ARGs?

@vadagar1 I wouldn't want to dispute your claim to, hmm, non-ignorance (?). Please simply tell those of us who don't know better the distinction that sets DOTA apart from both pvp and pve gaming.