I wake up this to all this fat princess business and I see the 1 group I get nothing by joy from is standing up fighting against a non issue. Feminist. HOW I LOVE THEM!!! I love you all!!! Fighting the long battle that has long been won yet you need to find other issues to continue to validate your worth in the world. So sexy, ALL OF YOU!

So the nice women/men at FG have the the unfortunate problem of letting a game get to them, not to mention put themselves in the same camp as Jack Thompson. That's right you feminist. You are now no different than him..

See the "Might Ponygirl" had this to say about Fat Princess in terms of suggesting how to change the game:

"So how about layering, Karamari-style, a bunch of random shit on top of the chest, like shrubbery, rocks, bison, etc, that would also weight it down. That could be cute, and silly, and not reinforce nasty stereotypes about women and the obese."

Here's the problem with that statement. If you believe that then you run into this conundrum: Video Games Create X People. In this case, sexist men.

Yet in her post, The intersection of murder, video games, and media, she drives home the message that that link between video games & violence is non existent.

Lets not forget this gem, So much for those stereotypes…, as well where where she openly praises a study that "...takes a very different tack from others of its ilk, suggesting that playing violent video games as a means of anger release is not necessarily unhealthy." So ultimately agreeing with the idea that video games don't necessarily make violent people.

So my question is, which is it Ponygirl? Seems that your "feminist" side is at odds with your "gamer" side. if you truly believe that:

"If you like games that portray women as nothing more than bubble-headed fucktoys, you are a sexist, just like someone who thinks that lawn jockeys are funny is a racist."

Then by that logic makes you a murderer if you have ever played GTA.

Now don't get me wrong, video games do influence behavior on some level but it's the job of the parent to explain to difference of the 2 to the child. But putting this much weight on Fat Princess is just as nutty as Jack Thompson's argument of GTA being a murder simulator.

A friend of mine has been trying to get me to quit WoW for over a year. His 1st
reasoning was that WoW was just too easy & kiddie. Next it was that Dark Age of Camelot
was better for PVP and more adult. Now he is trying to woo me away with Age of Conan
and the same ol argument about how much less kiddie. Meanwhile I never considered WoW
a kiddie game, actually I never considered any game kiddie really.

I was under the impression games were supposed to be fun; at any age. This
includes, sports, video games, board games, tag, man-hunt, etc.. What I do find interesting
is how video gamers specifically use what video game you play as some sort of "Maturity
Check". This validation of someone maturity level is just DUMB. Why am I more mature for
playing Gears of War than enjoying Toejam & Earl. If the game is fun that's all that matters
right? Well it doesn't to gamers apparently.

Since the launch of World of Warcraft I've heard from so many different sources,
usually people who haven't played WoW, arguing that very point; WoW is too kiddie, easy
and just plain lame. Yet for some reason close to 12 million players think otherwise. Now
popularity can't really be a good litmus test because Backstreet Boys were HUGE. In that
aspect video games different because a great story & graphics can be ruined by shitty
controls, so at some level it's the sum of all it's parts that player has to enjoy. I'm fairly
certain a teenage girl who most likely wouldn't like BSB if 1 guy was singing off key, ALL
THE TIME. It's something that hits that chord with them and that is all that matters really.

Nintendo has been a victim of this for at least 15 years. I'm basing this on the whole
MK debacle back in 1993 where gamers felt the Genesis version of Mortal Kombat was
better than the SNES version just because it showed blood. By proxy it made Nintendo look
like the "Disney" of gaming an image they have been shaking off ever since. Granted the
Wii doesn't really help much but regardless it shouldn't matter if the game is
good.



Sad thing is that it's easy to get caught up in the argument, especially as you get
older. I'm 32 years old and I know I get pissed if someone talks to me as if I was some
snot nose kid. As you grow and accomplish certain goals in your life and there is a sense of
self worth that comes with it. Like a child learning to walk then run then ride a bike. You
feel change and the experience affect on how you handle situations. I know that I handle
things much more diplomatically now than I did when I was in my 20s. Now if someone
questions it, yeah it fucking bothers me. I made my bones in life and to have someone
question my maturity would bother me. Except it doesn't bother me with video games and
maybe it's elitism but I honestly believe that I'm above that shit.

If you like video games, board games, etc you are most likely being perceived as
doing something childish and that's ok. At least till all these old fucks who are in charge die.
In the meantime stop fighting for fucking scraps over some sort of status of being "adult"
through games. It's not meant to be used for validation but for entertaining, nothing more.
I'm sure preaching to the Choir but anytime you find yourself defending your maturity level
about a game, sport, console, movie or book for being too kiddie, take a step back and
realize how dumb your argument really is. Just enjoy the fucking game. Flame on..

*Goes Back to playing Pokemon for NDS 8/10*

Being that the internet is filled with keyboard cowboys and megabit muscle men I figured I'd
post something that has peaked my interest lately and open myself up to some good 'ol
flaming. Now the term "casual" doesn't mean shit since playing a game is a past time and blah
blah blah blah you know the deal. Anyway I kind of wanted to gauge everyone's thoughts with
this pointless post and see how many would be interested in seeing reviews for some of the
better (if there is) flash based games and/or "casual" web based games out there. Thoughts?

PS
If someone already has this going on please feel free to inform me. Love you honey toes...

Last year it was all about Puzzle Quest for me. A little Bejewled knock off that I found myself
playing mindlessly for HOURS. Any chance for playing I would, Bus Ride to work, Shitting,
Bored, hell it even subsituted my bored moments that I would use for masterbating and
turned it into "RUNE COLLECTING TIME!". It was a bomb surprise game for me in 2007.

For those not in the know Track Mania has a Wiki; so google it and you'll be all catight up. I'm
too lazy to break it down to you. Anyway it's a recently been released for free, kinda..
TrackMania Nations Forever is the free on version with the United version being the
ALL-IN-ONE package deal. So since free hasn't hurt anyone, with the exceptions of STDs, I
figured I'd give it ago..

I do like racing games but usually goofy ones like Mario Kart, or any derivative of. And Grand
Turismo type games are usually excellent driving game (simulators if you're a snob) but it just
doesn't hold my attention very long. This game on the other hand has tapped into my OCD so
hard that I can't stop playing it. I could go into a long winded explanation of how good the
graphics are and how well the physics react. Maybe even go on & on how cool the Track Editor
is. Or how about the time I spent almost 2 hours customizing my F1 Racer with just the right
amount of bluish tint i wanted.

In Short, the game is free and Good. Try it and if yo don't like it, come back here and bitch at
me about it. Now lemme try to get some more gold Medals..

The Pink Panther, The Shaggy Dog, Flicka, The Poseidon Adventure, Last Holiday, When a
Stranger Calls, Honeymooners, Fat Albert, and Miami Vice. The List can go on for days of
bad movie remakes and TV to Movie Remakes. It's painfully obvious that Hollywood's pool
is unbelievably shallow, if not empty with ideas. The last straw where I gave up going to
movies was Transformers. Sure it was cool to see a new generation of kids getting
introduced to Optimus (Greatest leader EVER btw) but that whole "thing" I saw on screen
wasn't Transformers, it was something with people and robots fighting for no good reason.



But that isn't what this stupid post is about obviously, it's more of a topic starter for us
nerds. The new issue of EGM has a big bow out issue of 35 games that are being reinvented
for "next-gen consoles". I've already seen a render of Rick, hero from Splatterhouse and it
got me thinking. With the exception of Ninja Gaiden I really can't think of a game that has
taken a 10+ year break and brought back to where it captured me the same way when I
first played it. Usually it's because though the name is the same, the game isn't. Keep in
mind doesn't include the ever lasting constant favorites that never really went away, like
Mario, Mega Man, Final Fantasy, etc.. Those are usually good games that somehow evolve.
Now there seems resurgence of taking old games like Bionic Commando, which was
already re-imagined WELL, and bring "them" back. Now I loved the game and how the
XBLA version is shaping up to look really cool but those seem to be more based on the old
formula. The new version just looks.. Meh..



My question is WHY? Are Dev costs that out of control? Has the industry run out of heroes to
make up? No more stories to tell? The video game industry is usually busy sucking it's own
dick how it's bigger & better than the movie industry but now it's starting to emulate it more
and more. Madden still sells a million and games like Deathrow are overlooked because of
Marketing dollars. This isn't a bad thing because sometimes it's cool have an on going story
so games like a HALO, which I don't see so much as a sequel but rather a continuation of
an already established story. Now it seems games are now being made to have us chase
the last lingering remnants of our childhood. I can't imagine this being good in the long
term but then again, these are not movies. I am amped about seeing them but I have
really low expectations that these will only resemble the games they are re-inventing in
name and that's about it..

I was really sitting indulging on all the GTA IV information I can gather. Multi-player
information, Storyline, graphic engine updates, Screen shots, even that supposed GTA intro
I have downloading as I write this. That was until someone brought something to my
attention that made me feel very ashamed. Now to avoid confusion and potential flame
posts, comments, etc I have to add the following:

[i]This is a personal stance and my goal with is to share why I came to this decision. This is
NOT a fucking movement.[/i]

Hot Coffee....

Remember that shit!? Rockstar got caught with it's proverbial pants down for a mini-
game in GTA: San Andreas, they had INTENTIONALLY left in, inaccessible but in the game
all the same. Now the problem isn't so much that I don't want to have porn on, in and/or
with my video games but rather the spineless backpedaling that Rockstar was doing at that
time.

Initially it seemed like a reasonable misunderstanding based on old fogies who just don't
get the power of the interweb. You know, the one made of a series of tubes? Why wouldn't
it be misunderstood by politicians who are usually out of touch with "kids these days" (I'm
32 T.T). Even the statement Rockstar released seemed reasonable. They were releasing a
new GTA, a lightening rod for the "video games are destroying America" sect. Also being a
PC gamer primarily, I know what the "Mod Community" can & have done to add to a game
as well to an entire industry. (IE: Counter-Strike) So why wouldn't this be a factual
statement. Now keep in mind that Hot Coffee was originally found on the PC version of
GTA:SA

Hacker(s) did it statement:

[i]"So far we have learned that the "hot coffee" modification is the work of a determined
group of hackers who have gone to significant trouble to alter scenes in the official version
of the game," reads the statement. "In violation of the software user agreement, hackers
created the 'hot coffee' modification by disassembling and then combining, recompiling and
altering the game's source code. Since the 'hot coffee' scenes cannot be created without
intentional and significant technical modifications and reverse engineering of the game's
source code, we are currently investigating ways that we can increase the security
protection of the source code and prevent the game from being altered by the 'hot coffee'
modification."[/i] ([url=http://www.gamersgame.com/cgi-bin/ggblog.pl?
ggblog=714051]Source[/url])

The statement kinda irked me because the term "hacker" is used so interchangeably that
it became really funny to me. It was an unfair blanket of blame to a very important sector
of the computer community that is NEEDED, like the bacteria on our skin to protect us from
infections but I digress. Statement suited to put blame outside of their own. And it was
reasonable, why take blame for a MOD that was created and applied to their game.
Completely justifiable defense, modders added to the game, damn you guys.. It's bad
enough video games have a bad rap why would modders do something so insanely trivial,
it adds no real depth to the game, etc.

Then I saw this:

[i]"All the contents of this mod was already available on the original disks. Therefor the
scriptcode, the models, the animations and the dialogs by the original voice-actors were all
created by RockStar. The only thing I had to do to enable the mini-games was toggling a
single bit in the main.scm file. (Of course it was not easy to find the correct bit). The Nude
models that are used as a bonus in the Quick action version of the mod, were also already
present on the original disk.
But all this material is completely inaccessible in an unmodded version of the game. It can
therefor not be considered a cheat, easter-egg or hidden feature. But is most probably just
leftover material from a gameplay idea that didn't make the final release. I would really
like to stress that this material is only accessible after willfully applying the hot coffee mod
(or something similar) to the game."[/i] (Source)

WHAAAAAAAAAA!? Ok, here we go with the he said she said bullshit right? Well not really
because someone published the Pro-action Replay code for the PS2 that unlocked that.
Which confirms the above statement. Now this isn't the 1st time I've ever seen this kind of
content blocking done, it's usually done for easter eggs, tricks, cheats, etc.. "up up down
down" being the most famous of them all. Also peripherals like Gameshark and Pro-action
replay have long uncovered secrets left within games, even ones never meant to be seen
due to unspecified reasons. For example, the Lamborghini Diablo was removed from the US
version GT:A-spec due to licensing issues but not really. It was still in the game but it was
made inaccessible unless you put a proaction replay code and even then I believe they
made it uncontrollable in a way; it had 15,000 HP O.o.

When I read that this and remembered back to GT: A-spec I realized that Rockstar's
intention was never to really explain away the situation based on innocent boys playing in
the yard but rather setting the house on fire and then handing the matches to kids to let
them take the blame. Fuck that! You mean I go out, buy your game (that is fucking great
by the way) and somehow I'm at fault for something they did!? Not to mention the
unneeded negative attention it gave the industry, the ammunition it gave to douches like
Thompson and setting the way for the continue misinformation of sex in games that
followed, such as "Mass Effect". How a company can still be around after all that is fucking
amazing. How anyone else is actively going out and purchasing GTAIV after being fucking
blamed for their fuck up akin to Stockholm's syndrome. All this came back to me when my
friend mentioned to me "I thought you were the one who said 'fuck Rockstar for blaming
me for their fuck up'' and he was right.

I had forgotten about all this shit and now that I trolled the Internet for all this information
above it got me even more angry. Not just @ them but myself for allowing me to forget
how Rockstar tried to save it's own ass by blaming the gamers that had gone out and
purchased their game. I was part of that problem that allowed Rockstar to continue doing
business. I don't expect anyone to follow suit but I see video games as an art form. An
expression of art that allows us to be interactive and be told a story in a manner that was
never possible. Anyone who isn't bold enough to stand behind their art is just like someone
lying to me about who they are. This isn't about money because I know companies need to
make money for me to continue to be entertained but I have seen MANY video game
companies continue to do things THEIR way and not cave in due money. Fuck you Rockstar,
you won't be getting my $59.99 + Tax. Ooh... Now I can finally get Thrillville: Off the Rails,
3 times!


PS Destructoid, your BBCode is broke yo!