At what point did you obliviously miss game systems, other consoles, and just went with Xbox360 as the sole console?

Just thought it was weird. Though I'd like to know how it would work on Nintendo's Wii. More than Xbox360 and PS3, do they get updates in the top right like the big boys?

@Volomon

Shoot, that's too bad it wouldn't work, because I was totally serious.

This is useful. I don't want to get sucked up into a tornado while I'm playing 9 hours of L4D2.

I don't know how to react to this. On the one hand, it's part of the climate of fear that post 9/11 governments have been instilling into it's people as a form of control (much like they did with the cold war, in fact), and thus any mention of the word 'terrorism' activates my inbuilt British aversion to sensationalism rendering me cynical and sarcastic.
On the other hand, natural disaster warnings could be EXTREMELY useful, life saving even, when broadcast directly to video gamers, because the last thing we need is to be stuck trying to find a savepoint as the tornado draws near.

If the world really was ending I think I'd like to go out blissfully unaware while playing a video game.

@Voz: If you think bitching about the government is actually going to change things then you're just a tad naive. Also, the constant politicization of everything is getting old. Are you getting paid by the RNC or something?

@mrandydixon & Xzyliac

Except, you know, it would kind of suck if you got a message about an impending terrorist attack, and you're all "ha ha there goes that wacky game again, all War of the Worlds and shit" and you ignore it, then you die in a fire because a terrorist crashed a plane into your house, which you could have been avoided had you taken the message seriously and got the hell out. Extreme example is extreme, I know, but still...

@Voz

See, that, right there, is exactly what Xzyliac was talking about. You, bitching about the government here on Destructoid, are fucking tiresome. I really don't want to hear that shit here. Take it to fucking freep, if you really must rant about it. And just because something "probably wouldn't have done much, at least in recent times" isn't a good reason to just poo-poo the idea altogether. Just because it might not have been effective in the past (and of course we have no way of knowing if it would or would not have been) is a dumb reason to say it won't work in the present. About the only thing I agree with you on is that if they frequently tested this, and they probably would do exactly that, it would be incredibly annoying.

I like this idea. If we are gaming we aren't likely to have our radios on or be watching tv. This is good.

Honestly, this is a really smart idea. I know that I often have no clue what is going on in the news, so having an alert system in place while playing Online could really save a few lives.

Totally Lame!
The Govt only informs you of natural disasters like wildfires and floods.
If it was something more serious they would be afraid people would panic so they'd let them get nuked. If they don't have enough time to evacuate safely then you're toast anyway and won't be informed.
The TV is good enough and if it isn't people would be tweeting like mad about it anyway and more people pay attention to their cell phones than their TV's!
More Govt waste! Let the politicians pay for this program out of their own pockets if they think it's so great. That would kill it faster than anything!

@Xzyliac

Color code it. Game related messages are one color, news alerts are another. The end.

Well, I was talking more about mrandydixon's War of the Worlds idea, and color coding would just defeat the purpose of making it seem like a "real" thing.

But yeah, aside from that, for just general purpose messages not meant to trick people into thinking there's an alien invasion happening and such, it could be a cool thing to have, whether it's game related or OMG YELLOWSTONE IS ERUPTING KISS YOUR ASS GOODBYE related. Color coding would indeed be good to distinguish the two.

@ The people saying that TV is good enough so why bother doing this in video games?

Um... if you're playing a video game using your TV, there's an ever so slight chance that you're not actually watching TV at that time, you know, so it'd be kinda hard to see the alert that's on TV wouldn't it? I know I don't ever use my TV for anything at all other than video games, because TV generally sucks, so even if they were doing a Emergency Broadcast whatsit on every channel in the country, I'd never see it. However, if a pop-up appeared while I was playing some Xbox game or other telling me that a tsunami was about to smash into my city, that is information that could be of potential use to me that I otherwise would not have, and that would be a good thing.

Terrorist attacks my arse. Jeez, a coupla planes hit a coupla buildings ONCE and the whole freaking country is permanently on standby for an assault.

And how many 11/9 (sic) victims would've been saved by an XBox messaging system? Don't make me laugh, it's a pointless idea.