This is clearly a move on Microsoft’s part to please parents who feel like they’ve lost control of their child(ren) to the seemingly addictive Xbox.  I think this is a great idea, and one of the most responsible things Microsoft has done with their Xbox consoles; not only does it give parents the freedom to set limits on their child’s gaming habits, but it also allows them to allocate that time with ease.

In his letter to Bill Gates, Microsoft is only again abused by anti-game activist Jack Thompson’s latest barrage of threats, threats that stem from an over-zealous confusion of moral value and necessity of legal action.  The game that’s pissing Mr. Thompson this time is Halo 3 for the Xbox 360, a game that he calls “hyperviolent.”  Furthermore, he erroneously alleges that the original Halo was the source of inspiration for Lee Boyd Malvo, the DC Beltway sniper, and that Halo allowed Malvo to become “remarkably efficient” in his killing.  However, JT couldn’t leave his letter as a mere judgment of Halo 3’s content, so he decided to threaten Gates with legal action if it didn’t prevent the sale of it to minors.  Here’s Jack Thompson’s letter in full to Microsoft’s Chairman Bill Gates:

Bill Gates
Microsoft Corporation
Redmond, Washington

Re: Halo 3

Dear Mr. Gates:

As you know, the Federal Trade Commission has repeatedly found that games rated “Mature” by the video game industry-captured Entertainment Software Rating Board are routinely sold to kids under the age of 17 despite the age rating. The most recent failure rate of the ratings on “Mature” games, according to the FTC, is 42%. The entire rating system is a fraud, and “broken,” the latter description aptly provided by Senator Hillary Clinton.

As you also know, Lee Boyd Malvo trained on Microsoft’s Halo to further enable him to become the remarkably efficient “DC Beltway Sniper.” That was reported by NBC News at the time and was noted in Malvo’s criminal trial.

You appeared on CBS’ 60 Minutes II and rather revealing and usefully noted that “the cool thing about these games is that they transport you to a world you think is real.” Precisely. Capcom has recently disclosed to investors that your video game industry’s violent games, sold to children, pose a real hazard to the health of the industry. Right on.

The hyperviolent Microsoft Xbox 360 game Halo 3 is scheduled by your company for commercial release in September of this year. The Beta version that was released last week shows us all just how violent the game is and how inappropriate it is for play by anyone under 17, as the “Mature” rating it will surely receive indicates.

Here’s the deal, Mr. Gates: Either Microsoft undertakes dramatic, real steps, through its marketing, wholesale, and retail operations to assure that Halo 3 is not sold, via the Internet and in stores, directly to anyone under 17, or I shall proceed to make sure that Microsoft is held to that standard by appropriate legal means. I have done that before successfully as to Best Buy, and I shall do so again as to Microsoft and all retailers of Halo 3.

Regards, Jack Thompson

I wonder what will come of Mr. Thompson’s latest endeavors.  Will he successfully sue Microsoft for perceived crimes of passivity?  How will he be able to prove Microsoft culpable for the legal violations of retailers who sell its games?  We’ll keep you posted.

Aeropause recently picked up on ITWorld’s story concerning Microsoft’s new media player, the name of which is “analogous to the F-Bomb in Hebrew.”

Hebrew linguists are divided over Zune. Tsila Ratner, the head of Hebrew courses in the Department of Hebrew and Jewish Studies at University College London, says Zune is an unsuitable name for a product. However, Haggit Inbar-Littas, a 30-year veteran Hebrew teacher with the London Jewish Cultural Center, says while the name is “ridiculous” and close to the bad word, it’s unlikely to be mistaken.

Ridiculous indeed.  Like a newer rendition of the Nintendo Wii naming fiasco.

Sony’s PS3 controllers, also called Sixaxis, are wireless, but unfortunately do not feature removable battery packs, which makes them useless after the rechargeable batteries lose their efficiency, common after a finite number of charges. 

A Sony spokesman has denied the rumor, saying “This is a purely speculative story and is largely untrue. The latest generation of Lithium Polymer batteries hardly suffer any memory effect at all, so it’ll be many years before there’s any degradation in terms of battery performance.”

Furthermore, Sony has the courage of its convictions, and is willing to replace any controllers, free of charge, when their battery dies. 

When and if this happens, then of course we will be providing a service to exchange these items.

The Sixaxis controller will retail in stores for a modest price of $49.99 on the PS3 launch date: November 17th in the US.

In a mere 25 days, Blizzard managed to ban about 59,000 World of Warcraft accounts.  This topped the 30,000 or so for the May bannings.  From the horse’s mouth:

As part of our efforts to eliminate cheating from World of Warcraft, we recently banned approximately 59,000 World of Warcraft accounts in the month of June, and with that removed well over 22 million gold from the total economy across all realms. While we regret having to take such extreme action, these accounts were participating in activities that directly violated World of Warcraft’s Terms of Use, including the use of third-party programs to farm gold and items. Such behavior not only negatively impacts the economy of a realm, it diminishes the achievements of those who play legitimately. We will continue to aggressively monitor all World of Warcraft realms in order to protect the service and our players from the harmful effects of cheating.

Once again, I maintain that this is excessive, unsubstantiated, and perhaps motivated by corporate greed (i.e., Blizzard wants a less expensive hosting bill).

It is not a chemical dependency, but it’s got everything of an obsessive-compulsive disorder and all of the other stuff that comes with chemical dependency

One of their patients, a 21 year-old from Utrecht, said that he barely left his room during a 5 year gaming stint because he was so fixated with his electronic fantasy world.  Such cases are quite rare indeed, for most people who game do so in moderation.  Quite frankly, I think we should do away with these clinics.  Addiction to video-games is a harmless and voluntary occupation, and individuals should be able to do as they will with their lives.  Let Darwin do his work.

But now, Take Two Interactive has recieved grand jury subpoenas from the “Manhattan attorney’s office, seeking information about a range of its business practices dating back to 2001 and the inclusion of sexually explicit material in one of its games”.  This development has caused Take Two’s stock to tumble “nearly 19 percent, to $10.44, a 52-week low”.  As the public catches whiff of Hot Coffee again, the online petitions are becoming all-the-more conspicuous.  For better or for worse, “Hot Coffee” is a stale brew of the past, re-heated again for a second swig.

Although PayPerPost, a company that acts as a conduit between bloggers and advertisers, offers decent incentives for posts (think $5-$10 a post), it fails to establish rigorous criterion by which posts can fail to achieve a commission. Take, for instance, the post I am making, which will no doubt create more of a “buzz” for PayPerPost. In many ways, this is a step-forward for bloggers. They can browse through their favorite categories, finding topics that they like, and then get paid to write about them–it’s a win-win for both bloggers and companies who want this form of advertisement.

However, by setting the bar at a “40 word minimum,” PayPerPost seems to be inciting the blogging community to do shoddy work.  Quality and quanitity are important aspects of any blog post, and they are often associated in the subconscious of a blogger’s mind.  That being said, if the requirement for a post is that it be at least 40 words, the blogger will write poorly–not out of any malicious intent, but rather because he unconsciously infers from the small requirement of length that the quality should be trifling in nature.  Barring this complaint, I whole-heartedly embrace this new avenue for blogging!

Above is a screenshot of WoW as of this morning, with its notification of a 6-hour downtime for today. That means the masses of eager gamers cannot play for 25% of today, yet they are paying the full subscription fee. Fans, however, are for the large part used to this. It’s a phenomenon that occurs with great regularity; think once-to-thrice weekly. Ultimately, the ethical question is this: how much disservice are we willing to take with our monthly bill for our favorite MMORPG? Blizzard needs to make a non-intrusive method by which we can play WoW night or day, 24/7 if we want, and still have all the subtle benefits of a well-maintained game.

Update: Much to my chagrin, but not to my surprise, Blizzard has delayed the maintenance an additional two hours today.  That makes the amount of game time lost to performance-tweaking maintainance (or whatever they do in the down-time) 8 hours, or 33% of today.

Appearing hither and thither are a trifecta of Half Life 2: Episode 2 screenshots. Half Life 2: Ep 2 is expected to be released in the Fourth Quarter of 2006, but there has already been a release of its trailer. The following three “screenshots” are from DigitalBattle.com, but a closer review of the trailer for Episode 2 will suggest that the alleged screenshots of in-game action are merely just screen-captures of certain moments in the official trailer.  But they are rather pretty: