I just wanted to toss out my take on the story about the kid being murdered and blaming it on Manhunt. My favorite part of the article is this:

Lawyer Jack Thompson, who is campaigning against the sale of violent video games to children, said he had written to its producers warning that there would be copycat attacks.

He said there was evidence to suggest that teenagers playing such games had difficulty distinguishing between the fantasy and reality.

Last I checked Rockstar made games for adults. 17 year old kids are not adults. So a few things happened here to lead up to this. For starters, someone at the store sold it to him without checking his age. At 17 I barely had enough money for small stuff much less new video games. So we could make the assumption that his parents helped pay for the game, system, or tv he played it on. If they never saw the game then he must have a tv in his room. If he played it enough to influence him to kill someone then his parents must never go in his room or talk to him. How many of those are the direct fault of the game? Yeah, thought so.

Regarding the stupid quote above, I would love to see this evidence. When I was a teen we played games like that all the time (not as bad as manhunt, but still) and I never had a difficult time discerning reality from fantasy. One more fun quote:

“We have had dozens of killings in the US by children who had played these types of games. This is not an isolated incident.

“We have got to stop selling them to children because there is hard science – brain scan studies – that show that the games are processed in a different part of the brain in an adolescent than in an adult.

Dozens eh? What about the other 10 million teens that play this game on a daily basis and don’t kill anyone? Were they part of this study? That little part about the adolescent brain? Adolescents shouldn’t be playing ultra violent adult video games. If they are then I refer you to my previous paragraph. Luckily for us, Rockstar has been conducting some research of their own and has essentially concluded that there is no direct link between these games and the children’s violent behavior. I really wish people would mix in a tiny bit of responsibility and stop blaming everything. You chose to have kids now raise them.

We are just a few short days from the release of one of the most anticipated PC games of all time. I know many of you are still uneasy about the specs of your machine and the possibility of the game not running correctly. HardOCP got together with id and put out a Doom 3 Hardware Guide to help you PC gamers get the most out of this new game and your system. Definitely worth a read for those of you ready to get in some fresh new gaming with top notch performance.

One of the hardest things to keep clean in your computer case is the extra wires from your power supply. FrozenCPU started selling a form of modular power supply a while back and now they are carrying a line that made my jaw drop. If you are in the market for a new PS then I suggest you give these a look. Weighing in at 500W and only $129 is a great price and would make your case a lot cleaner.

I have just been reading about the new Madden that is about to come out next month. Storyline Central is where it is at, you will hear the players bitch and moan about the team, thier salary, or you can read it when it hits the papers. Not only do you have a franchise to run (into the ground) but you also have the keep the Prima Donnas in check. Oh baby. First player to bitch about playing time makes my special teams unit #2. Bring it on!