Sports simulation games take strides to replicate their real-life counterparts, but Madden NFL game publisher EA would rather not be facing a legal dispute that somewhat echoes the NFL’s labor troubles. [More]
video games
Hackers Seize Control Of Xbox Cop's Site
By 4.4.11
Xbox Live rule enforcement comes with its risks. A Microsoft employee who serves as director of policy and enforcement for Xbox Live suffered an apparent attack from hackers who seized his personal site and Xbox Live account. [More]
Ways In Which Nintendo Needs To Improve The 3DS
By 4.2.11
Nintendo’s 3DS, which provides glasses-free 3D images, came out last weekend, and fan reaction has been a mixture of elation and grumbling. Just about every review knocked the handheld’s battery life, which can max out at just over three hours of constant, full-feature use. [More]
Metacritic Drops Controversial Video Game Developer Ratings
By 4.1.11
Metacritic, a review aggregator that raised eyebrows by affixing ratings to video game developers based on the average of ratings of their work, scrapped the system because it believes rating developers is unfair. [More]
Microsoft Investigates Indie Games Ratings Abuse
By 3.31.11
When most people think of downloadable Xbox 360 games, they think of Xbox Live Arcade, which boasts the work of major publishers. But there’s also an indie games economy, in which “garage developers” compete with one another for attention and royalties. The indie games section doesn’t get much play on the Xbox dashboard, and the odds appear further stacked against some indie games in light of charges that a group of online users manipulated the Xbox.com ratings system to elevate certain games while burying others. [More]
Researcher: Wii Is The Most Power-Hungry Current Game Machine
By 3.30.11
When stacked up alongside the Xbox 360 and PS3, the Wii appears to be small and innocent, but a Carnegie Mellon PhD candidate’s research finds that the diminutive console is something of a power-hungry vampire compared to the current iterations of its competitors. [More]
The First Customer To Buy A 3DS Truly Deserved The Honor
By 3.28.11
Triforce, the determined gentleman who didn’t let NYPD stop him from waiting outside a Best Buy last week to be first in line to buy the Nintendo 3DS, was rewarded for his endurance. [More]
Do Not Try To Turn A Kid Into A Drug Dealer By Promising Him A Video Game
By 3.23.11
A 34-year-old New Hampshire woman who wanted to get her hands on some pain medication allegedly devised a plan that landed her in jail: Ask a 9-year-old boy to swipe his mom’s Percocet, and promise to buy him a video game in return. The boy held up his end of the bargain and noticed something was amiss when he saw the woman take the label off the pill bottle. [More]
EA Makes Video Game Manuals An Endangered Species
By 3.22.11
Following video game publisher Ubisoft’s decision to ditch paper manuals in most games last year, industry giant EA is following suit, revealing they’re phasing out little-used instruction booklets. [More]
Fix Your Own Broken PS3 Via Safe Mode
By 3.18.11
Sony inserted a safe mode into PS3s, allowing determined gamers to take a crack at fixing their broken consoles before making phone calls of shame to the customer service department to schedule repairs. [More]
Sony Can Sift Through Alleged Hacker's PayPal Records
By 3.17.11
In it’s all-out legal quest to stomp an alleged hacker who released a PS3 jailbreak, Sony continues to seem to get whatever information it wants via legal channels. After being allowed to collect the IP addresses of anyone who visited the alleged hacker’s site, Sony has now been given the go-ahead from a federal magistrate to collect the man’s PayPal records. [More]
Madden Video Game Will Come Out Whether Or Not There's An NFL Season
By 3.14.11
Regardless of whether or not NFL owners and players can make nice in time for there to be a football season, all will proceed as normal in video game world. [More]
Gamer: I Was Banned From Playing Dragon Age 2 For Calling Publisher 'Devil' Due To 'Glitch'
By 3.14.11
After a player referred to Electronic Arts as “the devil” in a forum posting, he found himself blocked from playing Dragon Age 2 on PC. Following a 72-hour ban for “profanity,” developer BioWare declared the action was due to an error and restored his access to the game. [More]
EA Decides NBA Jam Is Unworthy Of Roster Updates
By 3.11.11
Xbox 360 and PS3 sports gamers shell out money for annual releases with the usually well-founded hope that the publisher will be kind enough to release free downloadable roster updates when major in-season trades and injuries shake up the makeup of the teams. [More]
Study: Active Video Games Are Good For Kids
By 3.8.11
Two new studies may provide some ammo for kids that want to get more time in front of the Wii or Kinect. According to researchers at Brigham Young University and University of Massachusetts, “exergaming” for 10 minutes can result in a workout as stimulating as walking three miles on a treadmill. [More]
Judge: Sony Can Have IP Address Of Anyone Who Visited Forbidden Site
By 3.7.11
In its ongoing quest to neutralize the alleged hackers who decimated the PS3’s security, Sony won the legal right to track down the IP address of anyone who visited a site on which the PS3 jailbreak was posted. [More]
Nintendo 3DS Will Stream Netflix, Connect Automatically For Free To AT&T WiFi Hot Spots
By 3.3.11
Nintendo’s 3DS handheld, which is due out March 27, will hook up with AT&T and Netflix in a super-hot threesome that will eventually let gamers stream movies while on the go. [More]
Lawsuit: GameStop Collects & Stores Customer Info
By 3.1.11
A class action lawsuit filed in California accuses GameStop of collecting and storing customers’ data, violating state law in the process. [More]
