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Video Mods

"The concept behind the show proved popular--or popular enough at least to warrant a renewal and a lineup of beefier talent. The Beastie Boys, Breaking Benjamin, Taking Back Sunday, Yellowcard, and the ubiquitous Killers will star in video mods, using assets from games like EA's NBA Street V3 and Medal of Honor 3: European Assault, Konami's Silent Hill and Dance Dance Revolution, NCsoft's Lineage II, and Valve's Half-Life 2" (Tor Thorsen, Gamespot)

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La Repubblica & Real Life (tm)

"L'Inghilterra salvata a colpi di videogame. Quel tragitto in macchina verso l'aeroporto racconta di frustrazioni, di ambizioni fallite, del placido e riconosciuto orrore del quotidiano che solo il possesso di un'auto imponente riesce a compensare. Ma e' anche qualcos'altro: e' l'inizio della nuova vita di un uomo qualunque che diventera' il terrorista piu' crudele e ricercato del pianeta. Nonche' l'incipit di Real Life, ultimo romanzo del geniale scrittore scozzese Christopher Brookmyre, uno dei pochi a poter azzardare una spy story raccontata nella modalita' narrativa del videogame. Perche' a ritrovarsi e sfidarsi negli orrori di una Gran Bretagna che teme un attentato ancor piu' distruttivo di quelli che stanno insanguinando il mondo, sono due assassini: uno reale, Simon, e uno virtuale, Raymond. Il primo e' sfuggito alla monotonia diventando un terrorista. Il secondo, suo antico amico, ex musicista inchiodato alle responsabilita' familiari, e' un campione di videogiochi online. Si riconosceranno e si sfideranno: come in una straordinaria e irripetibile partita. I ritmi e il linguaggio (ben sostenuti dalla traduzione di Anna Feruglio Dal Dan) sono malinconici, crudeli, feroci. In sostanza, Brookmyre e' bravissimo."
(Loredana Lipperini, Il Venerdì di Repubblica, 06.24.2005)

The Gamer's Quarter #2 available

"The most fascinating thing about the frothy eruption both for and against “New Games Journalism” is the attachment commentators have to the term “journalism” as a measure of worth. As anyone who has ever worked a beat and asked intrusive questions of the victims of crime, accident and tragedy knows, there’s very little glamour to be found in the field, and the cycle of misery and corruption never ends." (M. O' Connor, "New Advice Journalism. Keep Your Fonzie Offa My Gonzo")

Issue #2 of The Gamer's Quarter is now available for download. This issue features 112 pages of content spread over 18 articles. Three recommendations: "Four Games -From Russia to New York via Games" by seryogin, "Pongism. Theory and Practice. A Study of the Distilled Essence of the Video Game" by Ajutla, and "New Advice Journalism. Keep Your Fonzie Offa My Gonzo" by dhex. Good stuff indeed.

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Fans, bloggers, gamers, and... Lego players

"BrickJournal is a quarterly publication that will focus on the Adult Fan of LEGO (AFOL) community. BrickJournal will also invite the general public to meet and join the community. With a variety of articles on many of the aspects of the LEGO hobby, interviews with people who have impacted the hobby or community, building tips and instructions, and other fun things, BrickJournal will be an outreach to the public - introducing the LEGO hobby by showcasing the best the community has to offer!"

This is genius. Donwload the first issue right here (PDF file).

Houellebecq in L.A.

“A passerby stopped at the table and stared down at the cup. “Is that a quadruple espresso?” he asked in amazement, and everyone except Houellebecq burst out laughing. What the passerby couldn’t know, of course, was that Houellebecq was a French writer; that all French writers worth their salt drink terrifyingly strong coffee, usually in enormous quantities; and that, historically, the crème de la crème like Jean-Paul Sartre have added to their coffee habit several packs of cigarettes a day along with amphetamines in the morning and barbiturates at night. It’s a tough tradition to follow, but Houellebecq was doing his best.” (Brendan Bernhard, LA Weekly)

The L.A. Weekly profiles Michel Houellebecq. Amazing article.

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Product Integration into Editorial Content

"Ad-page volume at magazines last year came in below that of 1998 -- meaning the medium's recent advertising wipeout erased the gains of the dot-com boom and then some. Advertisers point to reality TV and say, hey, why not? And they're not terribly interested in print's traditional ad-edit divide. "I just don't think it represents what's happening in the world today," says Meyer." (Job Fine, Business Week)

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The Fantastic Mister Fruity

"The Fantastic Mister Fruity is an exciting new game from the talents of Jonathan Cauldwell with music from Matthew Westcott. The game is Advanced Fruit Machine Simulator meets Bomberman, in which Mister Fruity must take out the roaming foe from each level by opening up a portal to another dimension. As the portal opens, a fruit machine spins and once the reels have stopped a blast is thrown in four directions that will obliterate anything in its path. Spinning the reels can also help to gain points, and three stars in a row will gain an extra life"

Yep. A brand new game for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum. And yes, it is 2005.

More info here.

Alitalia Hates Videogames

Alitalia, Italy's tragicomically always-on-strike psuedo-plane company has the most idiotic policy when it comes to playing videogames on board, as Gizmodo reports. If you wish to play your PSP or DS at 10.000 feet, you might want to book British Airways or Air France instead.

Tactical Iraqi

"Tactical Iraqi is a computer-based, self-paced, learning program that in about 80 hours teaches English-speaking people totally unfamiliar with Iraqi Arabic how to speak enough to accomplish tasks and missions in Arabic. Tactical Iraqi is ideal for military and civilian personnel who must rapidly train to accomplish missions that involve interacting with Iraqis but who are not linguists, don’t already speak Arabic and don’t have time to take immersive language training courses." (from the official website)

Seriously. Games.

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Trash TV

"There was nothing senatorial to the tone of last night's powerful few minutes that talk-show host Nancy Grace devoted to the upcoming Eidos-published 25 to Life. Grace, who helms the eponymous Nancy Grace, weekdays on CNN, tucked a conversation surrounding the game into the very end of her 60-minute show Tuesday night." (from Gamespot)

CNN is, once again, desperately trying to increase its share. I cannot think of any other any reasons why the Atlanta-based tv network would air this stuff. I actually saw this 'show" live at the Vancouver airport while waiting to get on my plane and was equally amused and annoyed. This is trash TV in its pure form: Jerry Springer in comparison is the BBC. Nancy Grace epitomizes what's wrong about the media debate on game violence. Juxtaposing the images of real cops killed on duty and the images of the fictitious cops killed in the videogame is gratuitous and offensive. The real problem is not the game per se, but the fact that parents ignore game ratings, as the BBC reports. Actually, the real problem is TV talk shows...

Read more. And here's the full transcript of the show from CNN (sigh).