Video & Online Games

Posted by Jonathan Coley

We've all heard the bad rap on video games: they desensitize kids to violence and, in some instances, can even spur kids on to violence.

Of course, any thinking person can immediately see a number of holes in this argument. Not all video games are violent; the vast majority of video game players are good people and never commit violence; not all video game players are kids.

Just putting an end to this way of thinking has been a goal of many video game "advocates" for some time. But, in a welcome change of pace, the USA Today published an editorial praising video games in its June 20th, 2008, edition.

The editorial, entitled "Virtuous video games," discussed games such as Wii Fit, which promotes healthy living, and the United Nations' free video game Food Force, which educates people on the difficulties in responding to natural disasters.

The editorial also pointed out how "reading novels" were "once condemned as morally wrong and particularly harmful to young ladies." I immediately thought of another example: as discussed in the new book The Fifty-Cent Plague, the government launched a virtual war on comic books during the 1950's, leading many comic book professionals to leave the industry. Nowadays, condemnations of reading novels or comic books would hardly be taken seriously.

Yes, the public may finally be coming around and seeing the good side of video games. But the work isn't finished yet: video game developers should continue to make video games promoting positive social change in addition to merely entertaining us. We'll all be better off for it.

Posted by Jonathan Coley

Last week, Activision officially unveiled Guitar Hero World Tour, AKA "Guitar Hero IV," for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Nintendo Wii. The latest "Hero" is scheduled for release this fall, only a few short months after Guitar Hero: Aerosmith, and features a redesigned guitar, a microphone, and a drum set for a whopping $190!

Confession number one: I'll probably play the new Guitar Hero. Scratch that, I'll definitely play it -- it's my job.

Confession number two: I'll probably enjoy the new Guitar Hero. The game series brings together two of my loves -- video games and music -- and with its online and multiplayer modes, Guitar Hero is one of my favorite time wasters.

But let me just put into print what every video gamer has had on their minds for a while now with confession number three: I'm beginning to get tired of Guitar Hero.

Simply put, Guitar Hero and the larger music-and-rhythm genre are to video games what game shows and reality shows have been to television the past few years. Guitar Hero was a blast at first. And for many of us, it still is. But Activision and other companies are starting to milk the genre a bit too much, and it's going to make us all want to never play a music game again.

One glimpse at this year's release calendar tells you all you need to know about the state of the music-and-rhythm genre and, maybe, the video games industry in general: Guitar Hero On Tour (DS), Guitar Hero Aerosmith (multiplatform), Battle of the Bands (Wii), Rock Band (wii), Samba de Amigo (Wii), Guitar Hero World Tour (multiplatform), and the list will (probably) go on.

So Activision, the best present you can give us this holiday season is not another Guitar Hero -- it's a break.

Posted by Jonathan Coley

I've been writing about video games for quite a while (ten years this May), and I've been playing video games even longer. Over these past years, video games have grown from being a mere niche hobby to a cultural phenomenon, and more and more successful games are popping up on the market.

Yet, even the video games industry is not without growing pangs, and one of those growing pangs is certainly the lack of original games and the subsequent demise of numerous small video games developers.

Take the top ten selling games of February, for instance. Five of the ten titles were sequels to existing series -- such as Call of Duty 4, Devil May Cry 4, and Guitar Hero III - while the others were either games from existing franchises or spin-offs of current franchises.

That's why I was very pleased recently to hear about Nintendo's plans for WiiWare and Microsoft's plans for Xbox Live Community Games.

WiiWare, launching today in Japan and in May in North America, allows small and large developers alike to come out with original, small-scale titles that can be downloaded off Nintendo's online service. Xbox Live Community Games, launching later this year, will allow almost anyone to put new games online for download.

Yes, many of the games released through the programs may be of a lower quality. But both Nintendo's WiiWare and Microsoft's Xbox Live Community Games will allow small developers who don't have a big budget to get their foot in the door of the games industry, as well as allow gamers to find cheaper and more original games -- and that's a good thing.

Look for previews of upcoming WiiWare and Community Arcade games in the coming weeks. In the meantime, read more about Nintendo's WiiWare program and about Microsoft's Xbox Live Community Games service.

Posted by Robert Janelle

One-hit wonders from the 1980's The Romantics have filed a strange lawsuit against Guitar Hero maker Activision over a cover of "What I Like About You" included with Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80's.

The lawsuit is strange since Activision did secure permission to record a cover for their button-mashing phenomenon that is Guitar Hero.

At issue, according to a Canadian Press report, is that the cover version is so similar to the original that Activision has "infringed on the group's rights to it's own likeness."

Now, I don't play guitar Guitar Hero at all, since I much prefer playing a real guitar and I can say it's a little hard to get E major, A major and D major in that order to sound different from the original. Probably the reason the song is such a favourite among bar bands. .

It'll be interesting to see where this goes, especially since the band has filed an injunction to get the game pulled from shelves.

Posted by Robert Janelle

This is quite possibly the coolest site I have encountered lately: C64S.com

Basically, the site hosts a Java-based Commodore 64 emulator and tonne of old C64 games essentially turning your web browser into an emulator.

It's easy to waste hours on this site due to the plethora of Commodore 64 games available to play. The big ones are all here: Bubble Bobble (with the original music), Paper Boy, Ghosts and Goblins and more.

Along with the blockbuster titles though, there's plenty of other lesser known games to explore, like some weird text adventure called Dennis Through the Drinking Glass.

Now that the gushing is out of the way, I do need to add, the site is far from perfect. The emulator has a few annoying glitches, so long game play probably isn't going to happen here. Not yet, at least.

For some casual play, you can't be a massive catalog of classic computer games.

Posted by Robert Janelle

It turns out liberals and conservatives can agree on something: Mario!

This was the finding a poll conducted by Zogby International that looked at whether personal politics affected entertainment choices.

In the round-up, they found people who conservative leanings feel a lot of entertainment doesn't reflect their values and apparently they aren't big on video games either. But when they play, they're all about Madden and Mario.

The latter choice seems a little strange, since Mario is suspected of being a communist.

But I digress.

Liberals, the poll found, enjoy more variety in entertainment and they play more video games. Their favourites, according to Zogby: Mario and The Sims.

Finally, the poll found that political moderates prefer Donkey Kong, Madden and...Mario - yet again.

All this considered, I have to stop and wonder how the poll was conducted. Did they only give respondent's five games to choose from? While Mario is obviously one of the most popular game characters of all time, you'd think there'd be some mention of say Zelda or Halo.

Along with that, there are more than three political persuasions. What about libertarians? Though, I'm guessing they're the ones who are into Grand Theft Auto.

Posted by Robert Janelle

Another beautiful thing about those free web browser games is quick they are to comment on what's going on.

Take Escape Paris for example.

It didn't take long at all for someone to lampoon Paris Hilton's jail sentence in a video game.

This one is done is the now classic "escape from the room" style where you basically click on objects and hope they interact properly to escape from a room.

Maybe it's because this one has you playing as Paris Hilton, but some of the item interactions don't seem to make much sense, but they work. In other words, to get Paris out of the pokey, try EVERYTHING and ANYTHING.

Of course, that seems to be the usual rule for "escape from the room" type games.

Edit: Link actually WORKS now

Posted by Robert Janelle

Last week marked quite the SNAFU for Rockstar Games and their parent company, Take-Two Interactive.

The sequel to Manhunt was banned in several countries, protested and effectively killed when the Entertainment Software Ratings Board slapped an Adult's Only rating on it.

One would think the game would only have taken a financial hit in these circumstances, since major retailers like Wal-Mart won't carry a video game rated Adult's Only.

However, neither Nintendo or Sony will release a game with the dreaded AO rating. Which begs the question to me: Why have an Adult's Only rating if it's essentially a Trojan Horse for censorship? Slap that rating on a game, it's dead. Sure, the film industry has the evil NC-17 rating (Absolutely no one under 17) but those movies can still see the light of day.

Plus, it seems pretty disingenuous that Wal-Mart and their ilk will carry movies with graphic violence like Saw or Hostel, but a game like Manhunt, apparently that's crossing a line.

In the midst of the controversy, GameSpot published a first-hand look they got at the game and described the content. It sounds pretty gruesome, with one sequence required the player to decapitate a guard and hold it up to a window.

The thing is, without playing it, I can picture the scene perfectly since it's such a cliche from both the horror and action movie genres.

One common explanation for the double-standard between video games and movies is the interactive nature of games. When you're watching Saw, it's passive. Playing Manhunt, you're pushing the buttons to make the dude on the screen garret somebody with a wire. There is some possibility that this could have a negative impact on children playing the game.

However, what groups like the Campaign for a Commercial-free Childhood forget is that THIS GAME IS NOT FOR KIDS!

Seriously, do parents allow their kids to watch Tarantino movies? If I had kids, I certainly wouldn't, nor would I allow them play original Manhunt or Grand Theft Auto or anything similar. And adult games are nothing new. In my own video game-centric childhood, my parents forbid me to touch the Leisure Suit Larry series, which centered around one man's attempts to have sex with many women.

Besides, since I doubt any of the protesters have actually played the games, they probably don't realize how much patience Manhunt requires. Most of the game consists of hiding in shadows and waiting then very slowly creeping up behind the enemy. It's anything but fast paced and I can't see it holding any kid's attention span for a long time. Heck, it tested mine and I usually love stealth games.

Before writing this, I sat back and watched the trailer again (after confirming to the video website that I am indeed older than 18) and realized, I actually do want to play this game.

Perhaps Rockstar should take a page from Tarantino's play book and switch the more graphic scenes to black and white. That was apparently all it took to keep the NC-17 rating off Kill Bill.

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Posted by Robert Janelle

This is a rather odd piece of Flash video I stumbled across late at night and felt a strange need to share:

WARNING: The above link contains violence and/or communist content and is therefore not suitable for minors or Republicans.

The People's Mario

So apparently Mario's red outfit wasn't just because it looked good in 8-bit...he's actually a filthy commie.

Thank you Internet, for corrupting my childhood since well...Al Gore invented you.

Posted by Robert Janelle

I frequently write in this space about free web games to play at work, but would the temptation to goof off with video games be as strong if work WAS the video game?

That's what Paul Johnson, CEO of Entellium is trying to do.

According to an article in the New York Times, Entellium is developing customer management software that tries to take advantage of the competitive nature of sales people.

The software, called Rave, shows the employee the "sales stages" they're completing (beating levels) and allows them to build a database of clients using the customer's photo (avatar) along with a list of their likes and dislikes (similar to stats in a role-playing game.)

It's an interesting idea for a motivation hack that could work well for people working mundane jobs.

Imagine a call centre where employees see a status bar on their screen that shows their productivity, especially if it showed them comparison to their co-workers. Competitive nature would most likely kick-in. Then when their status goes up high enough, they "level up" (hopefully with an increase in real-life salary.)

Going to work in order to "beat the next level" may very well the drudge more exciting.

Now if only I could find a way to turn writing into a video game. Though editing would be easy: a crosshair to move around and article and shoot down all the grammatical errors.