News

Jack Thompson, scourge of the first amendment and enemy of personal responsibility, might finally be facing some legal repercussions for his questionable behavior in legal matters involving violent video games.

Thompson, who has made a legal career out of blaming violent behaviour on video games such as Grand Theft Auto, has recently been involved in several lawsuits against the companies that produce these games. He is also known for his hyper-sensitivity regarding any coverage of his involvement in these matters, threatening parties that criticize him with lawsuits, threatening ethics complaints when judges don't rule in his favor, and even calling the police to file harassment charges against websites.

Finally, someone is fighting back. The Florida Bar Association, of which Thompson is a member and which he has previously sued, has filed a forty-page complaint alleging numerous violations of professional conduct and protocol. The complaint recounts many of the hilarious episodes in Jack's legal sagas, such as the time his temporary license to practice law in Alabama was suspended for misconduct, making inflammatory and unfounded statements about opposing lawyers and the judges that presided over his cases, and of threatening ethics charges because he wasn't getting his way in a civil case.

Thompson, of course, has already counter-filed with motions to force mediation and stay any disciplinary proceedings the bar association may bring against him.

Personally, I'm rooting for Jack. After all, if he gets disbarred, the comedy would come to an end!

Source: GamePolitics.com

If a Final Fantasy Tactics remake wasn't enough to make you want a Sony PSP, maybe a Castlevania compilation will do the trick.

Konami is planning a special remake of Castlevania: Rondo of Blood, originally for the Japanese counterpart of the Turbo-Grafx16, and never before released for English-speaking audiences. The remake will feature updated 3D graphics but retain the original's 2D gameplay.

Unlike the Castlevania Chronicles release for the PlayStation, the original version of the game isn't in the spotlight, but it can be unlocked through completion of the remake. And if that's not enough, Konami is including a second unlockable game: the best Castlevania game ever, Symphony of the Night. This will be the same version of SotN that was made available for the X-Box Live download service, which had a few graphical improvements and other slight adjustments from the original release.

Source: GameSpot

After endless months of hubbub surrounding the various next-gen (this-gen?) console launches, complete with fanboys of all flavors proclaiming their console the winner and predicting at least one complete loser, the numbers are finally in. Which console really did the best in its launch period--and which did the worst?

With similar year-end launch windows for each of the three consoles, it seems fair to compare their sales from launch until year-end. In 2005, the X-Box 360 sold 607,000 consoles. By the end of 2006, Sony had sold 687,300 PlayStation 3s for a narrow launch-window victory. But, wait! In the slightly smaller 2006 window Nintendo gave the Wii launch, it sold 1.1 million consoles, vastly outstripping either of its competitors.

Of course, no one likes to be declared the loser in any kind of race, and Sony and Microsoft have been swift to point out a few caveats before taking these numbers at face value. While the Wii was in short supply throughout the holiday season, Nintendo managed to overcome the supply hurdles that kept Microsoft and Sony in the dust. With an infinite supply of each of the three consoles, it's hard to say which brand would have come out the winner. Also, Microsoft's 360 was the top console seller of this holiday season, claiming a 51% market share in North America.

So what do these numbers really mean? I'm inclined to agree with the analysts. It's too close to call. There aren't any clear losers as of yet, and I think it's going to take at least another year to see if Sony ever solves its production problems or if the Wii fans knocked unconscious by wayward Wiimmotes ever recover from their comatose states. So, shut up, fanboys. Or at least start basing your predictions on the market a year from now.

Source: GameSpot

Barely a month after launch, two of Wii's promised features will see the light of day. Internet-connected users turned on their Wii today to receive a message from Nintendo informing them that the weather channel was just a short system update away. Furthermore, the Wii web browser will debut on Friday.

The weather channel allows the users to select a city from which to receive a daily forecast, including temperature and wind speed. This might sound pretty boring, but the neat part comes when you can zoom out to view the entire globe, spin it around, and check the weather in all kinds of bizarre places. For the record, it's a measly 1 degree Fahrenheit in Antartica today, but at least it's not snowing.

Friday's content may be a bit more interesting as Nintendo release's the beta version of the Opera browser. Initially, users will be able to download this update for free; it will remain free until June of next year.

Finally, the last promised Wii channel, the News Channel, will arrive at the end of this coming January.

Source: GameSpot

Never one to take the market's resounding no at face value, Sony is making another stab at selling PSP owners portable movies. Sometime next year, a video download service similar to Apple's iTunes will allow PSP owners to download movies specifically for use with their PSP.

Few details have been released, but it is known that movies must be first downloaded to the user's computer, then transferred to a memory stick to play on the PSP. There is no word of which, if any, studios will be participants (presumably, Sony has at least someone lined up), but Hollywood can rest assured that this move will not exacerbate copyright infringement. Sony, always hard at work to implement draconian and even damaging copy protecting measures, will ensure that only one copy of the movie can exist per paid download.

Since PSP owners can already transfer DVDs they own to their computer and from their to their PSP, I don't see how this is much different from the failed UMD strategy. This time, users won't even have a convenient case with a pretty picture in which to store their purchase, and with DVDs frequently available for very low prices, I can't imagine an incentive to buy a virtual copy that can only be watched on my PSP instead of the real thing that I can watch anywhere.

Source: GameSpot

You probably didn't need a news post to realize this, but the two simply don't mix.

Should online gamers start keeping better track of their game-world assets? They might have to if World of Warcraft loot morphs into taxable income. The government hasn't made a move in this direction yet, but economic analysts claim that it's a matter of when, not if.

Thanks to the real-money market that has grown up around online games like Ultima Online and Second Life, there's real money to be made by farming game products to sell to other players for cold, hard cash.

Unfortunately, any new tax legislation would not merely tax the people making a real-life living--if it's potentially worth money in the real world, then it's taxable, regardless of whether or not the player ever chooses to take the fruits of his labor out of the fantasy and put it on the market.

Source: GameSpot

In other news, a suspected PlayStation 3 thief was shot to death in his apartment by officers who may have mistaken a game controller in his hand for a gun. The teenager, who is believed to have been behind the robbery of two PlayStation 3 consoles as their owner unloaded them at a campus apartment, did not come to the door promptly enough as officers kicked it in. Also killed was his dog, a German shepherd.

You'd think police officers everywhere would be cautious before unloading into a suspect on the off-chance that he might be armed after the big stink in New York City over the unarmed groom-to-be who was shot by police...and that's only the most recent in a long line of itchy trigger fingers. But a game controller looking like a gun? I guess we have to assume that he was playing his hot PS3, because, otherwise, the trailing cord should have been a dead giveaway.

Source: IOL (among other news outlets)

Of course, even bureaucracy has its moments. The state of Michigan has recently been ordered to pay the court fees accrued by the Entertainment Software Association in its legal battle over the state's restrictions on selling games to minors. Michigan's law is only one of several in recent years to be declared unconstitutional by various state courts; the laws generally impose punishments or special restrictions prohibiting the sale of adult-rated games to children.

Wait, my bad. That was the courts having a moment of clarity--the government bureaucracy is still responsible for this huge waste of taxpayers' dollars over a free speech issue in the first place.

Source: GameSpot