361769
submission
MaryAlan writes:
Wal-Mart is now selling an electronic LCD game in the kid's section that resembles a Wiimote so closely that even Wal-Mart employees can't tell them apart in a picture. But the games — made by ToyQuest out of L.A. — are complete and utter crap, to the point of being unplayable. Their only redeeming feature is that they look like the Nintendo Wii, which means Wal-Mart is relying on brand confusion to sell any of these things to unsuspecting customers. Click here to take a look at side-by-side pictures with a true Wiimote, down to the fake speaker on the front. It'd be laughable if it were not nearly so obvious, and didn't imply that Wal-Mart thinks people are idiots to be ripped off.
25732
submission
MaryAlan writes:
The National Summit on Video Games, Youth, and Public Policy was this weekend, and almost no one from the game media showed up. In fact, the game industry seems to pretty much be ignoring the whole event. There's an article up on GamesFirst, which attended the summit, that criticizes the mainstream game press pretty hard for not attending. Apparently only one game journalist showed up. From the article: "The video game media owes it to our readers to come to events like this and listen, come here and think, and come here and base our editorials on the reality of what's being said instead of an interpretation of the talking points that are published afterwards. Too many of the people discussing these issues in forums do so based on the works of the game media, and too few in the gaming media are spending the time to make it justified." So what's the deal? Is no one showing up because gamers don't care, or is the game media letting us down and missing the battle?
2037
submission
MaryAlan writes:
Sweet! Penny-Arcade has announced that they're getting into the gaming biz of making games, partnering with unknown Hothead games to create titles based on the characters of the comic. There aren't any details, yet, but it's cool news going into PAX. The games will be released in episodes several times a year, and will play on Windows, OS X, and Linux, with an eye on consoles somewhere down the road. Does that mean flash animation (which would seem to fit the style of the comic) and some new Xbox Live Arcade games? Who knows. Wait and see.
1887
submission
MaryAlan writes:
I don't know if anyone has noticed this, but About.com's Aaron Stanton is in the middle of a back and forth firefight with Dr. Thompson, a Harvard researcher who recently testified before the U.S. Congress about violent video games. She published a study that listed Pac-Man as being 62% violent. Stanton attacked in an article criticizing her research. Then, Joystiq.com contacted Dr. Thompson and got an interview and a response, published her rebuttal, in which she defends the Pac-Man rating and the study.
So today, Stanton attempted to tear the study apart, detailing why it's flawed even though Thompson claims otherwise. On one hand we have an established Harvard Phd, who has testified before the U.S. congress, against a game journalist with a bachelors degree in Psychology. Hmmm...
