The Select and Start News Report: 04.23.07
Posted by Vincent Chiucchi on 04.23.2007
What Dr.Phil has in common with the vice president, why Vince Young's career is over, and why you need to stop paying taxes
Welcome to The Select and Start News Report. Usually this is supposed to be mostly about games, but with all the crap that's been going on over the past week it almost feels like a political news report.
Big News
SOMETHING YOU THOUGHT YOU'D NEVER SEE: DR.PHIL AND RUSH LIMBAUGH IN GAMING NEWS [credit: Kotaku, Evil Avatar]
So we all know that Voldemort (I stole that name from Will Helm) is off blaming games for the Virgina Tech Massacre and is basically outright lying about everything (so much so that MSNBC is bashing him for it), but of all people to have something similar to say, it's DR.PHIL?!
Here's what Dr.Phil had to say on Larry King Live: ...the problem is we are programming these people as a society. You cannot tell me - common sense tells you that if these kids are playing video games, where they're on a mass killing spree in a video game, it's glamorized on the big screen, it's become part of the fiber of our society. You take that and mix it with a psychopath, a sociopath or someone suffering from mental illness and add in a dose of rage, the suggestibility is too high.
It's obvious why Dr.Phil is doing this; to make himself look like a hero like the DICK that he is. Why do I say this? Because I've seen him done it before.
Dr.Phil had the creator of Bum Fights on his show to defend why he'd produce such a controversial series. As the video is playing about how the guy justifies it, Dr.Phil suddenly stops the video and kicks the guy off the show, saying he's not going to publicize these videos. So my question is if Dr.Phil didn't want to talk to this guy about these videos, WHY DID HE INVITE HIM ON THE SHOW IN THE FIRST PLACE?! One word ladies and gentleman: EXPLOITATION! Click here to see the dick that Dr.Phil is (and go to the 2:00 minute mark to here the best line ever).
While Dr.Phil is off being a dick again, Rush Limbaugh also had some comments about video games in relation to the VT Massacre. Now seing that Rush Limbaugh is one of the biggest conservative Republicans in this country (not a pun about his weight), I expected him to sound exactly like Voldemort. But as it turns out, Limbaugh DOESN'T blame games for the VT Massacre and warns people about listening to "Drive-bys" pushing their own agenda.
This is part of the transcript from when he responds to a caller saying Seung-Hui was likely a compulsive gamer: Let's say you're right. Not every video gamer goes out and murders 33 people on the college campus though. There's more to this than that. We can find all kinds of societal problems and ills, but the fact of the matter is that whatever you would look at as a bad influence -- video games as you mentioned -- it may desensitize people, but it doesn't turn everybody into mass murderers.
If you start blaming the video games, you may as well demand video game control because it's the same thing when you start trying to blame guns for this. You have here a sick individual, an evil individual who committed a random act. But if you want to start blaming the video games, this guy was this or that, weeeeell, then you've gotta maybe talk about banning them because that's the same tack that's taken with guns. You got one guy who used a gun that's it. You're falling prey to the same way the Drive-Bys propagandize, and that's, "Well, we need gun control! We gotta get guns out of the hands of people."
So you gotta be real careful here not to paint with broad brushes on these things. You gotta be very careful not to plug this into your own individual political prism, because then you become no different than what the Drive-Bys are doing. If you just wait, eventually we'll find out more than we want to know about this guy, and you're going to have to listen to what's reported about this guy with keen ears, and you're going to have to read with sharp eyes out there, because the Drive-Bys are going to report about this guy in ways that will advance their political agenda because that's what this story is to them.
THANK YOU RUSH LIMBAUGH!
AND THEN...On Thursday, it was revealed through GayGamer.net that according to the search warrant of Cho Seung Hui's dorm, there was NO VIDEO GAMES found. A roommate of Seung-Hui's also stated that he never saw Seung-Hui ever play video games, especially the one getting blamed recently, Counter-Strike.
So there you have it ladies and gentlemen: Voldemort is proven wrong, and Dr.Phil proves that he's nothing more then a dick.
R.I.P. VINCE YOUNG'S 2007 SEASON [credit: DEN]
You'd think these NFL players would know better by now, but apparently not. Vince Young, the 2006 Rookie of the Year, is going to be the cover boy for Madden '08.
"It is truly an honor for me to be on the cover of Madden NFL 08, every NFL player dreams of being on the cover," said Young. "After being named Rookie of the Year and going to the Pro Bowl my first season – this is a perfect way to start my second season in the NFL."
Every NFL player dreams of being on the cover? Oh Vince Young...so young, so naive...it's almost adorable.
NOW YOU CAN HEAR ANNOYING "PLAY FREEBIRD!" CHANTS ONLINE [credit: Gamasutra, GameDaily, GamePro]
Last week we had the rumors of what was happening to Guitar Hero III floating around, and this week we've got official confirmation from RedOctane. GH3 will appear on PS2, Xbox 360, PS3, and the Wii (using a guitar peripheral). A Guitar Hero game is also in the works for the Nintendo DS. Plus with Rock Band going to use online multiplayer, GH3 will be doing the same with both co-op and competitive play.
That's awesome, but I'm really surprised about a Nintendo DS version being announced. I mean one of the main reasons Guitar Hero was so great was because of that guitar controller, so having it on the DS just doesn't feel the same. Then again they did do a mobile phone version of the game (which was probably even more surprising), so who knows.
LOUISIANA LOSES TO THE LAW WHILE NEW YORK IS TRYING TO MAKE ONE [credit: Gamasutra, GameSpot]
The U.S. District Court of Louisiana ordered the state to pay the ESA an estimated $91,000 in legal fees they incurred when fighting the overturned HB 1381 anti-violent game law. The law would fine and jail anyone selling a game to minors that a judge would deem inappropriate and have removed from store shelves.
Let that be a lesson everyone: NEVER pay your taxes. New Yorkers will soon learn this lesson because NY senators Andrew Lanza and Martin Golden are introducing legislation to keep kids from being exposed to inappropriate games. Oh yes, because if there's one problem that New York is really in desparate need of solving, it's preventing our kids from playing games like Grand Theft Auto IV. Did you know that here in NYC, cops only get paid $25,000 a year to put up with all the ridiculous bullshit this city puts them through? I'm surprised they haven't gone on strike yet.
Anyways, the legislation calles for three measures. The first measure is to establish a council the monitor the effectiveness of the ESRB in keeping adult games out of children's hands since, you know, that isn't really the parents or the retailers jobs. The second measure would make labels mandatory on all games sold in the state, and those who sell unrated games (if ANY of them actually exist) would be fined and penalized. The third measure would be something called the "Parent Teacher Anti-Violence Awareness Program", which is...well, self-explanatory.
So the first measure is stupid, the second one seems pointless, and the third one seems well intented. Overall, this legislation sucks.
Tidbit News
-I hate to give Voldemort any more publicity then he already has from the VT Massacre, so I'm making this one brief: he's somewhat settling with the lawsuits that he and Take-Two have been going through. [credit: GameDaily, Gamespot, Gamasutra]
-If you weren't able to attend this year's "I Am 8-Bit" (a show where all the artworks are video game related), check out I-Mockery's article on the exhibit. I really like the one where Mario looks like he's from Hotel Dusk: Room 215. [credit: I-Mockery]
-Sega released four new Virtual Console games, and one of them is something fans have been dying to play: Streets of Rage 2. I've never played this game myself, but with all the praise I see people giving it, I just might get it along with Star Fox 64 sometime. [credit: Kotaku, Gamespot]
-In other "Xbox 360 fucks up" news, Microsoft has stated that they are promising a serious inquiry into the issue of Xbox 360s scratching up discs. [credit: 1UP]
-Gears of War still rules Xbox Live. That is all. [credit: Gamasutra]
-Dr.Phil is still a dick. [credit: Dr.Phil]
-Adding fuel to the 80GB PS3 fire, Sony spokesman Satoshi Fukuoka that "For users who vigorously store (games and other entertainment content) in the PS3, 20-giga is probably going to be too small, and even 60-giga may not be big enough eventually." So does that mean we'll get our price drop on the 60GB version now? [credit: GameDaily]
-No, wait, they just stated once again they are not cutting the price of the PS3. [credit: CVG]
-It's official ladies and gentlemen: Final Fantasy XIII will NOT be exclusive to the Playstation 3. At this rate the PS3 is going to have the same kind of third party support as the Gamecube. [credit: ps3center.net]
OH WAIT... After originally posting this I received some feedback stating that the entire FF13 PROJECT is not exclusive to the PS3. FF AgitoXIII is an exclusive for mobile phones, and the other two (FF13 and FFvs13) are still exclusive for the PS3 so far. A big thank you to John Burin for pointing that out. Sorry for the mistake everyone!
-Even though they announced that they would lay off the Sonic games, Sega has already announced a new Sonic game for the DS coming this fall. Well at least the handheld ones are still good. [credit: Gamasutra]
-In case you didn't buy the Playstation or the GBA versions, Square-Enix is once again remaking Final Fantasy's I and II, this time for the PSP. But no matter how many times you remake it, FF2 will always suck. [credit: Gamespot]
-In other "Rebels without a brain" news, some hacker broke into Valve's Steam services and stole peoples credit card information and threatens to post them on an anti-steam website. Hackers: Ruining it for everybody since 1993. [credit: Joystiq]
The Other Crap
PROGESS GAMING: Jump Ultimate Stars
Must get gems. Buy better komas. Build cheap decks. Defeat people online. Repeat for many hours.
OTHERLY GAME REVIEWS
This one is for all the hardcore puzzle fans out there: Puzzle Freak.
Puzzle Freak is basically simple: You roll a die, go across a gameboard, and solve a puzzle. If you get it done before times runs out, you get to keep going. Otherwise your turn ends. Some of the puzzles in this game...okay, a LOT of the puzzles in this game will definitely challenge your mind to the point where it almost seems impossible to win. But if you're a big fan of puzzle games, then this is something I really recommend.
GAMING CALENDAR
Week of May 7th - Xbox Live Dashboard Updates
May 16th - Halo 3 Beta to be released
INTERNET ARGUMENT
Check out this comic from www.xoverboard.com. It's not game related, but it is funny.
OPRAH WINFREY IS A "SEE YOU NEXT TUESDAY" (non-game related)
While I'm on the subject of Dr.Phil being a dick, I might as well talk about this See You Next Tuesday as well. A couple weeks ago when I found out that Oprah was going to have this forum discussion about the whole Don Imus crap, I decided to TiVo the episode to see how stupid this bitch was going to sound. I remember one time hearing about how she said she didn't know what the word "nigger" was because she isn't one. Since then, I will never give her creditability for anything.
So Monday comes along, and the VT Massacre happens. When I get home to watch the episode of Oprah, the first 7 minutes was cut off as ABC was reporting the breaking news about the massacre. Then once the breaking news was over, it went back to Oprah talking to a forum about the Don Imus situation. It was at that point when I thought to myself "Wow. How fucking trivial does this whole Don Imus crap seem compared to 32 college kids being murdered?"
Here's the worst part though. I decided to re-record that episode of Oprah (a local network reairs it later in the day), and I was about to watch it, Oprah said that they were going to discuss this situation for TWO WHOLE EPISODES. One whole episode was bad enough, but TWO?! That's TWO FUCKING HOURS to talk about something I can sum up in LESS THAN ONE MINUTE! Don Imus racially insulted black women. He gets fired. DONE! But what's really fucked up is that by Tuesday, I thought Oprah wasn't going to air Part 2 of this Don Imus crap and instead talk about the VT Massacre. But nope, they were still discussing about "Where do we go from here?"
I find it really fucking annoying that Don Imus's verbal insult is getting almost the same amount of coverage and political bantering in the news as the VT Massacre when it seems so trivial in comparison. Fuck you Oprah.
