MS Changes Name of Column....

We're all incredibly relieved. I just hope there isn't a big holystoning party going on over there. No need for collateral BS.

Now that this is resolved, I welcome the guy. We can use any help we can get in getting these wallflower parents to start paying attention to their kids and what they're doing. If he can help lower the proportion of little punks getting away with bloody frelling murder on Live I'd be really really happy.

Welcome to the Windmill Tilting Party, Xbox Dad. We've got a spot for you right here.

MS Trying to Steal Gamerdad Name

Last Friday-ish, up on Gamerscore Blog, they highlighted a new column over on Xbox.com. It's called Gamer dad. This was extremely unwelcome news to us. You see, that name has been in use by us for over three years at Gamerdad.

It's not like they didn't know they were stealing the name. As you'll note right there in the top of the entry they pointed out the existence of the Gamerdad site. This is blatent copyright infringement.

To them this is just a sort of cute gimmick to go with their lame attempt to belatedly advertise the parental controls on the 360. To Andrew that's his livelihood, and having it tangled up with the Xbox brand would kill it.

I hope it's not malicious. I hope they're just being the same clueless people blundering through a big forest they have always been. But they're in for a fight.

I Fold...

They're having a poker tournament down at a local comic store. Some comic luminaries are going to be there, and the whole event is going to culminate with a poker tournament to benefitChild's Play. This is a worthy cause and I very much support it. One of the prizes is something I want very badly. The only problem is, I really can't play.

Texas Hold'em is the name of the game. I've tried to learn to play this multiple times. I suck at all poker, pretty much. I don't understand what my issue is.

I can play Pinochle with no problem and it has a bunch of arcane card passing crap. Cribbage has both the concept of "the crib" and it even requires accessories. But for some reason all this blind business and buttons and betting just don't make any sense to me at all.

I'd be better off with a Calvinball tournament. If you insist cards be involved, how about a brisk set of Mao? Or if we could pull off a large-scale game of Egyptian Rat I'd be set.

But no. Poker it is. The Penny Arcade comics here and here are such a prescient vision of what would happen if I tossed my hat in that I think I'll sit this hand out. Maybe there's a donation thing and I can just hand them the money at the door rather than doing it in dribs and drabs as I flounder helplessly around on the felt.

A New Kind of Idiot in Town...

With the recent resurgence of everyone's favorite Florida Lawyer, an odd sort of freak has crawled out from between the keys on the keyboards and oozed their way onto many game-related message boards and websites. They create an identity posing as Mr. Thompson and post inane nonsense supposedly in his character.

I have a few words to say to these individuals, and so I'm going to a take a point of character from Mr. Thompson and send out an open letter.

Open Letter to Posters currently posing as Jack Thompson:

There are people in this world who are working very hard to make sure this man doesn't manage to legislate his idiotic view of the gaming industry into place through the courts.

Crap like this little pose of yours does NOT help this.

It's flamebait. Too many people don't figure out you are a posing r-tard until after they've shot their mouth off. It causes people to act even more like the usual asshats at a time when non-gamers are paying more attention to the actions and speech of gamers.

You, and your ilk on many other gaming message boards, need to find another way to get your jollies. Because right now all you're doing is helping him.

Brownback's Folly
In case you hadn't heard the government's latest attempt to figure out what to do with the soi disant "problem of videogames" is a real doozy. It all starts out so innocently as a requirement for the ESRB to actually play the games they rate (which I support), but is structured in a way that would force the system to fail and then mandate the government take over when that happens. It also discusses a "universal" system for rating entertainment also managed by the goverment.

He's trying to get average parents to do this rating - not gamers. That's going to be difficult. Obviously this guy's never played a current generation videogame. Expecting the average soccer-mom to get through Ninja Gaiden is just not feasible. And there are over 10,000 games released every year. Where's he gonna hire that many parents? Also, after a couple games, they're no longer, uh, virgins. Before too long, find a parent who doesn't game is going to be something like trying to find an unbiased juror for Michael Jackson.

They claim they're trying to prevent another Hot Coffee. Too bad this wouldn't have done that. Hot Coffee required a crack built by a third party and therefore wouldn't have been part of the game submitted for review. The ESRB has some problems, but this one wasn't their fault. It might have prevented another Oblivion rating problem, but they caught themselves and took that one on the chin already.

Oh, and he wants the ESRB supervised by the Government Accountability Office (GAO). And I assume once we go to the overall system he wants them looked at, too. Except none of the entities in question are part of the goverment. The MPAA for movies, the ESRB for games, and I don't know the name of the TV ratings body are all funded by the industries they represent. The government doesn't pay a red scent and all the government's attempts to get into this business have been blocked by the courts (14 times and counting so far).

He's not trying to get parents better information or even "save the children", guys. He's trying to set up government censorship for videogames and eventually all other entertainment media.

There's no amount of re-arranging the deck chairs that's going to keep this Titanic piece of idiocy afloat. Would someone please read the First Amendment to this guy and save the government and the rest of us a lot of money and time?