RPGs: Stop Making Bad First Impressions 
Is Hitman's Next Target Assassin's Creed? 
Why Kotaku Australia Should Never Work With Children... Or Robots 
Three Words I Said To The Man I Defeated In Gears Of War That I'll Never Say Again 
New Doom 3 For Xbox 360 And PlayStation 3 Supports Head-Mounted Displays 
Far Cry 3 And The Stranger In A Strange Land newVideoPlayer( {"type":"video","player":"http://www.youtube.com/v/EwNSzoe28MQ&hl=en&fs=1&fmt=22","customParams":[] ,"width":500,"height":412,"ratio":0.824,"flashData":"","embedName":null,"objectId":null,"noEmbed":false,"source":"youtube"} );
IllFonic, the Denver-based developer of Ghetto Golf, happens to have a medical marijuana dispensary for a next-door neighbour. Last night its alarm went off, the fuzz showed up at the wrong address, and three devs were cuffed at gunpoint.
NBC are reporting that a series of Grand Theft Auto modifications – aimed at replacing the fictional in-game police cars with replicas of real ones – have some American cops a little concerned.
Some background: reckless driving and young deaths on Australian roads are a fairly big problem here. We’ve got lots of long roads, lots of kids with big cars, and a culture of people driving big cars fast. It’s been a problem in Australian society for decades, but since games are around these days, they’re becoming a convenient scapegoat amongst those who should really know better (ie the police). Having armed himself with a German report on the subject, Superintendent Dave Evans of the NSW Police has told the Daily Telegraph: Video games can have a negative impact on young drivers because it increases their complacency and their indulgence in risk-taking behaviour. In games you race, you crash and it is a matter of pressing the buttons and off you go again. In real life it doesn’t work that way, you can be killed.
Police searching for missing Ontario teenager Brandon Crisp say there is a possibility he may have left the country.
Saint’s Row 2 might be a very tongue-in-cheek take on the GTA-style sandbox genre, but the New York’s police unions are taking the game very seriously indeed, calling for it to be pulled from store shelves because it glorifies the sort of things you should really only do in video games. New York’s powerful police unions say that a violent new video game called “Saints Row 2″ is an abomination. In the game, the player controls a gang member who can steal, do drugs and kill as many characters as possible, including police officers.
Dustin Waller, of Cleveland, N.C. (this is where my mother, I shit you not, foxhunts) got a Playstation 3 from his fiancee, who bought it either used or refurbed for $US 350 from an independent games retailer at a mall down the road in Salisbury. Tuesday, Waller gets a visit from the police up the road in the other direction, Statesville, who said the PS3 was stolen goods. They’d tracked him after he unwittingly signed on to PSN using the previous owner’s ID. After the police confiscated the PS3, Waller went back to the store to get a refund. He got a 360 instead, and thinks the cops asked the store to provide it.
It’s pretty standard now to hear people close to law enforcement, be they lawyers or police officers, blame much of the violent crime committed by youth on violent video games. Apparently, gamers and game journalists aren’t the only ones to notice this, as a reporter for the Naples Daily News questioned when one police officer attributed the reason for a violent crime to a game.
Don’t be silly. Of course he doesn’t. He blames videogames! In New Zealand, youth crime overall is on the decline, but violent youth crime is on the way up. Superintendent Bill Harrison, national manager of police youth services, knows what’s behind it: You see these kids – their hands are wringing wet with sweat because their bodies are taking in what’s going on on the screen and they are acting it out.
Cue the regular old arguments, counter-arguments and rolled eyeballs from all interested parties, which is where the story normally gets very uninteresting. But this one’s saved by the New Zealand Herald’s subsequent guide to violent videogames, entitled “A BOX FULL OF NASTIES”.
While San Andreas predictably features, New Zealand’s parents should also be wary their children don’t their hands on NARC. Or Crime Life: Gang Wars. Presumably because the country has been flooded with copies of those best-selling hits.
Video violence beyond a game: top cop [NZHerald, via GamePolitics]
