The Select and Start News Report: 02.18.08
Posted by Vincent Chiucchi on 02.18.2008
This week's news report features the dying corpse of journalistic integrity, the death of HD-DVD, the death of Marvel Online, and more
Welcome to the Select and Start News Report. I've recently found out that Kyle Hyde from Hotel Dusk: Room 215 is going to appear as a sticker in Smash Bros Brawl, and I think it's awesome. His legacy lives on!
Big News
SAME OLD SHIT: SCHOOL SHOOTING, JACK THOMPSON, DEATH OF JOURNALISM... [credit: Destructoid, GamePolitics, Kotaku, Joystiq]
It's that time of the year again! A school shooting has taken place in the state of Illinois, where 5 people including the shooter are now dead. So of course, in comes the usual suspects. Everyone's favorite soon-to-be-ex-lawyer is of course blaming video games, and everyone's favorite unfair-and-unbalanced news network is promoting him as a school shooting expert as he outright lies about everything, and of course the newspaper owned by the people of the unfair-and-unbalanced news network immediately writes the headline "COLLEGE KILLER CRAZY FOR VIOLENT VID GAME" while only making small references to the fact that the kid was mentally unstable. Meanwhile, Rep. Robert Pritchard (R) is also blaming video games and says we shouldn't blame guns. It's the same old shit that won't ever change because America is ruled by a nation of conservatives who don't fucking get it.
So instead of saying what I'm pretty sure I've said before, I'm going to talk about something that's even more violent then video games that somehow doesn't get blamed enough for school shootings.
That's right, the book that we all must follow in order to lead a good life or burn in hell. Industry vet Bruce Everiss did an opinion article on how The Bible has just as bad content as M-rated video games. Through website Bible Gateway, Everiss points out that The King James version has "harlot" in it 48 times, "sodomite" 5 times, "fornicator" 5 times, "smite" 133 times, "kill" 208 times and "maim" 7 times. And yet somehow, this book somehow escapes blame for young people killing each other, especially since The Passion of the Christ, a movie christians have tried to make us see, is even more violent then Grand Theft Auto.
In fact, this has inspired to start a new weekly segment I'm going to call "The Bible is worse then Grand Theft Auto", where every week I'll share a very violent or sexist passage with the help of The Skeptic's Annotated Bible until The Bible is blamed just as much for school shootings as GTA and other such games. This week's passage comes from Proverbs 29:
29:19 A servant will not be corrected by words: for though he understand he will not answer.
Translation: Beat your servants/slaves. Thanks Bible, I'll be sure to beat my servants often!
This week we've learned of many companies now jumping on the Blu-Ray bandwagon. Best Buy will still have both but will be encouraging customers to go with Blu-Ray. NetFlix will be phasing out HD-DVD by the end of the year. The biggest blow however comes from Wal-Mart, who are going exclusively with Blu-Ray by June. Rumors are now going around that Toshiba will be dropping the HD-DVD format. Though nobody at Toshiba has yet to confirm this, an announcement about the future of HD-DVD could be coming out in the near future.
Well, there you have it. Sony finally wins a format war, and now the Blu-Ray feature in the Playstation 3 has finally been justified. With major supporters for Blu-Ray and the release of AAA titles like Metal Gear Solid 4 coming out this year, this could be a great year for the PS3.
THE MILLION MARK [credit: GameDaily, GameSpot, Gamasutra]
Three things hits the one million mark this week. First, Super Smash Bros Brawl has reached a little over one million in sales in Japan during the first 11 days of it's release, making it the fastest Wii title to hit that mark. Second, the PS3 has hit the one million mark in the UK. It took the PS3 about a month or so sooner then it took the PS2 to hit that mark. Third, the Devil May Cry 4 demo on Xbox Live has had one million downloads, making it one of the fastest downloads to raech that mark in Xbox Live history. Good times to be had by all.
SOMEWHERE OUT THERE, LEX LUTHER IS LAUGHING HIS ASS OFF [credit: GameSpot, GameDaily, Gamasutra]
A few weeks ago we found out that EA has lost the Marvel license, thus canceling the upcoming Marvel fighting game that the closed EA Chicago was working on. Now another game in the Marvel universe has been canceled. Marvel Universe Online, the MMORPG created by Microsoft and Cryptic Studios, has discontinued development. Microsoft's Shane Kim says the decision to cancel it was an amicable one. Factors for the cancelation included whether or not to use a monthly based subscription and that the MMO genre is highly competitive.
You may now return to playing City of Heroes, already in progress.
[credit: Gamasutra, Destructoid]
Our first lawsuit related news item is about Ubisoft winning a $13.2 million suit with MGA Entertainment over the Bratz license. Apparently when the Bratz dolls started to get more popular, MGA tried to discontinue their licensing deal with Ubisoft in order to force a new one. When that failed, MGA sued Ubisoft, so Ubisoft counter-sued for breach of contract and invalid termination of the license. After about five years, Ubisoft won their lawsuit against MGA. Good for you Ubisoft.
Meanwhile, Capcom is suing KR Productions, the holders of the rights to the Dawn of the Dead films, to "eliminate any doubt" that Dead Rising doesn't infringe on company rights. According to the suit, Capcom entered into discussions with New Line Cinema (acting as a representative of MKR) without resolution, starting in 2006. According to Capcom, in 2007, MKR also filed a Notice of Opposition to block Capcom's trademark registration for Dead Rising. Capcom is seeking a declaratory judgment to protect its rights in the game, and to prove that the scenario of zombies attacking a mall is an "unprotectible theme" under copyright law. The complaint states that Capcom is filing suit in anticipation of action from MKR.
Tidbit News
-Resistance: Fall of Man had controversy over having the Manchester Church in it's game. So what will Insomniac do for the next game? According to CEO Ted Price, We've actually made it a big focus to include more churches and now synagogues and mosques in Resistance 2. [credit: Kotaku]
You know what? That puts me in the mood for another Bible quote. From Genesis 3:
3:16 Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.
Translation: Men rule over Women and Women suffer painful childbirth because that's the way God wanted it. Thank you Bible for making sexism perfectly okay!
-Killer 7 and No More Heroes mastermind Goichi Suda says he has a desire to make an adult-themed Mario game. Yeah, because we all know that worked out SO WELL for Sonic the Hedgehog. [credit: CVG]
-Remember that one part in the World of Warcraft episode of South Park where Butters says he plays "Hello Kitty: Island Adventure" and thinks that's better then wow? Well, apparently someone else did, and now there's a Hello Kitty MMORPG out. Probably still better then Maple Story. [credit: Shiny Shiny, Kotaku]
-Just when you thought there was about two years left in the EA/NFL Monopoly, EA made a new deal with the NFL to extend the contract to 2012. [credit: Gamasutra]
-Blizzard says that Starcraft: Ghost isn't technically canceled, it's just a focus thing for Blizzard right now. Next thing you know they're going to say SC:G will come out "when it's finished". [credit: Joystiq]
-From now until the 23rd, you can get Rock Band for the PS3 or Xbox 360 at Target for $149. [credit: Joystiq]
-Due to "violence that is high in impact", Australia's Office of Film and Literature Classification (OFLC) has banned Dark Sector from being sold in that country. [credit: GameSpot]
Gaming Calendar
February 26th - Dragon Quest Swords: The Masked Queen and the Tower of Mirrors to be released
March 2008 - WiiWare service to be released?
March 4th
-Army of Two to be released
CHANGE: -God of war: Chains of Olympus to be released
March 9th - Super Smash Bros. Brawl to be released
March 11th
-Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates to be released
-Condemned 2 to be released
March 25th - FFVII: Crisis Core to be released
April 4th - Myst Online to be discontinued
NEW: April 22nd - The World Ends With You to be released
April 25th - Grand Theft Auto IV to be released
NEW: May 2008
-Mass Effect gets ported to the PC
-R-Type Command to be released
NEW: June 2008 - Guitar Hero: Aerosmith to be released
And knowing Activision, they will price it at the same amount of a regular Guitar Hero game and it will fail just like Rock the 80's.
Spring 2008:
-Heroes of Might and Magic Kingdoms to be released
NEW: -Death Jr.: Root of Evil to be released
2nd Quarter 2008 - Metal Gear Solid 4 to be released
NEW: June 28-29 - Blizzard's Worldwide Invitational convention to be held
September 2008 - LittleBigPlanet to be released
NEW: September 7th - Spore to be released
Well it's about damn time!
NEW: October 3-5 - E for All 2008 to be held
IDG decides to go from August to October. The dates chosen also happen to overlap the Penny Arcade expo and IDG's own GreenXchange and VerdeXchange events.
October 9-13 - The Tokyo Game Show 2008 to be held
Fall 2008 - Resistance: Fall of Man 2 to be released
Otherly Game Review
Tilt is a balance game where you keep the stick upright using the mouse cursor. As time goes up the stick gets shorter and so it gets harder. The game is simplistically fun, but the music is really annoying and I hate it when I fail because the width of the game isn't big enough. Check it out at Tiger Flash Games.
The Video of the Day
Two new Street Fighter 4 characters get it on in this new SF4 video.
Let me say I'm not bashing you for usage of the Bible, in fact I think it's a great idea and needs to be done more.
However I was wondering if you could add a disclaimer that the verses are taken out of context. That seems to be the case for a lot of Bible Bashers where they look for a specific verse, take it out of context, and then say the Bible is bad.
Please, Don't be that guy.
Posted By: Tack Angel (Guest) on February 18, 2008 at 02:31 AM
Tack Angel GJ.
You missed the entire point.
Posted By: Guest (Guest) on February 18, 2008 at 02:46 AM
He missed the point by about a few hundred meters.
Posted By: Travis (Guest) on February 18, 2008 at 03:18 AM
This page is entirely gay. and the person wrote this is probably gay too! I think I made my point thanks.
Posted By: justin giles (Guest) on February 18, 2008 at 05:57 AM
I think I heard Tack Angel wooooshing
Posted By: Woooosh (Guest) on February 18, 2008 at 12:24 PM
"Aw, people can come up with statistics to prove anything, Kent. 40% of all people know that."
Posted By: G-Walla (Guest) on February 18, 2008 at 03:27 PM
