It is no secret that the United States government likes to have its own control system in place for certain industries. For television it is the Federal Trade Commission, who keeps a tight rein on television, despite the occasional wardrobe malfunction or swear word that slips through the censors, and doles out fines to those who they think have gone to far.
But according to a Bloomberg report, the FCC wants to regulate other things including video games. FCC regulators are considering a single ratings system for television, video games, and wireless telephones - all under the guise of keeping questionable material out of the hands of children and helping parents.
According to the Bloomberg account, the FCC will begin an inquiry into such a system after an agency report is delivered Aug. 31 to Congress on the subject of media blocking and rating techniques. This report is the result of an inquiry by congress on whether children are harmed by inappropriate content, such as sex, violence and obscenity and whether or not the existing FCC system for TV would be a good fit for other content.
West Virginia Senator Jay Rockefeller seems to be at the center of this movement; the Democratic Senator who chairs the Commerce Committee, said at a hearing in late July of this year that his constituents are “horrified” by some programming. The report is the result of a law passed in 2007 mandating such a report to be researched and compiled.
Meanwhile mobile phone providers like AT&T and Verizon Wireless, and software makers like Microsoft have come out strongly against such an idea. The ESA, which created the Entertainment Software Rating Board and the system which currently rates game by content, says that the FCC has no jurisdiction over games.
No doubt this will be a matter of contention for regulators and lawmakers, who see the connected world in which we now live in as highly regulate-able. But as the Internet has remained mostly regulation free, how will the government justify such regulations on content on private services? Will it attempt to regulate Microsoft’s Xbox Live service? Mobile phone networks? Social networks? Opponents see it as a slippery slope for a multitude of content platforms.
We’ll follow this story as it continues to develop.
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Battlefield 1943 PC pushed to 2010
Are you a PC-only gamer who longs to fight in the South Pacific like you brethren on Xbox Live and PlayStation Network ala Battlefield 1943? Well, you’ll have to wait until 2010, says developer DICE. In a recent interview with G4’s The Feed, DICE Producer Gordon Van Dyke said that the game will take a lot longer for the PC because there’s a lot of work to be done to make things just right for PC gamers. The features still being tweaked include server support, an increase in the number players above and beyond 32 per session, Voice over Internet support, and plenty of other PC specific features.
And on a related note, some sad news for Xbox Live and PlayStation Network players looking for some new maps and other content for the game: nothing is currently in development, according to a report on Joystiq - also quoting DICE Producer Gordon Van Dyke. Apparently a lot of resources are being put into Bad Company 2. DICE is, however, working on the squad-swapping bug, which it hopes can be dealt with by a server side fix.
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Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen DLC on the way
Some fresh content is coming to Activision’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen - assuming that you are still playing it and enjoying it (i’m sure some of you are). The downloadable content pack developed by Luxoflux is being worked on as I type this that will launch later this summer.
Set to launch later this summer for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions of the game, the DLC offering is apparently being designed to appeal to fans of both the original Transformers animated series and the films starring Steven Spielberg’s lover Shia LaBeouf (he may be dreamy to some of you, but in my opinion he’s not that great of an actor - go argue about it wherever girls argue about Hollywood heartthrobs).
The DLC pack will contain over ten new multiplayer characters including fan favorites such as G1 Starscream and movie favorites like Sideswipe, three new multiplayer maps, mew playble characters for both the Autobot and Decepticon single player campaigns, a new expert difficulty mode with a set of new leaderboards and new Achievements and Trophies to earn.
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Galactic Arms Race: changing content generation in online games
An interesting game experiment by the Evolutionary Complexity Research Group (EPlex for short) at the University of Central Florida is showing how content can be automatically generated in an online game. The experiment, a prototype game called Galactic Arms Race (or GAR), generates weapons all on its own based on user preference.
Galactic Arms Race lets players payers pilot a gunship from one of three alien factions in the galaxy. As the game progresses players earn levels, new skills and more powerful weapon systems. But the real interesting part of this multiplayer space shooter is cgNEAT (content-generating NeuroEvolution of Augmenting Topologies), a spaceship weapon systems that automatically evolves based on player behavior through a specialized version of the NEAT evolutionary algorithm. New variations of weapons that players like are continually created and recreated by the game itself. Because of this the game is always changing.
The developers call it “Space Diablo“, offering real-time combat, particle system weapons, and RPG-style leveling and skill trees.
A video showing off exactly what this means and how it affects ongoing gameplay can be found below , but you would do well to download this neat little experiment from gar.eecs.ucf.edu.
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Crispy Gamer Partners With Tribune, McClatchy-Tribune and GamerDNA
I’m excited to finally announce that Crispy Gamer has inked partnership agreements with Tribune Media Services (TMS), McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT) and GamerDNA. These new partnerships will see our content distributed in print and online all over the United States and delivered to users of the GamerDNA community.
While I can’t speak for everyone else here at Crispy Gamer, I’m excited to see our content and our unique voice being delivered to new audiences. It’s been a good first year here with lots of major milestones and excellent growth, so I am excited about our plans for the rest of 2009 - which will be helped with these and other new partnerships.
You can read the full press release after the break for more details.
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Warhammer Online: A Call to Arms
Mythic Entertainment is planning to start rolling out new content for Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning beginning in March called “Call to Arms.” Call to Arms will apparently include live events, new Realm vs. Realm content, two new character classes, and a brand new dungeon. The roll out begins in March and continues on until June. Some other incidentals like added functionality to the Realm Wars section of the WAR website, the opening of the official WAR Forums, and a new free trial version of the game.
A full accounting of all the new content, including some choice screenshots and art, can be found after the jump.
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The Last Remnant Gets DLC Next Month
If Square Enix has its way, it may be a while before gamers see the last of The Last Remnant. Early today, the publisher announced details of four upcoming packs of downloadable content for the game, due to release next month over the Xbox LIVE Marketplace.
The first two DLC packs, “Purgatory’s Sins” and “The Key of Ancient Ruins” will be made available for free to Xbox LIVE Gold members on the first of December, with Silver members able to get their hands on it a week later on the 8th. “Purgatory’s Sins” is described as a pack of “ultra-challenging guild tasks”, while “The Key of Ancient Ruins” will open up access to a new area of … well … “ancient ruins” for players to explore.
The games we're pulling together in this feature won't appear on any of those best-of lists and get confused looks when you mention them in conversation. Just because time has forgotten these titles, though, doesn't mean you should forget them, too.
Some fresh content is coming to Activision’s 
I’m excited to finally announce that Crispy Gamer has inked partnership agreements with Tribune Media Services (TMS), McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT) and GamerDNA. These new partnerships will see our content distributed in print and online all over the United States and delivered to users of the GamerDNA community.
Mythic Entertainment is planning to start rolling out new content for 
If Square Enix has its way, it may be a while before gamers see the last of 