During the mid-90's, first person shooters were the primary form of entertainment for tormented and sheltered teenagers. This boon pushed the PC industry quickly through several phases of graphical and processing hardware. Early on, a small sect of nerdy bands roamed this unexplored land seemingly ruled by the company id Software. These bands often promoted themselves solely through imitation and borne from that bequeathed a slew of gun-happy games.



Although this genre has far from vanished, the FPS is now often considered mindless and even 'casual' to the ever-expanding base of video game players. The abundancy of genres that now make up the video game market abase the FPS to a minority. Many developers even try to hide the fact that their game is, at its core, an FPS in hopes of reaching a larger audience. However, because of the apparent ease of FPS creation and the pace at which a player can pick up and play them, I doubt we will ever see full demise of the first person shooter.



Recently, I downloaded a demo of Cellfactor: Psychokinetic Wars and although the game was rather plain, I thought the concept had value. For a few dollars, a gamer could download a complete FPS, cause some mayhem, and not end up feeling like they invested a wad of cash for a few hours of fun. Sometimes I think that developers tack on a single-player campaign to an FPS just to fulfiill some kind of contractual requirement. Properly marketed and maintained (keeping the scenery fresh of course), I personally believe that a developer could create simple FPS games and sell them at a fair prices entirely through console stores. PopCap Games has made a killing selling only casual games online. Although the rest of us gamers are getting older and our casual time is getting shorter, we all don't like spending our time playing with balls and jewels.

Just an idea .

By the way, I just preordered Painkiller: Resurrection off of Steam. For $26 it came with Painkiller: Black Edition and Painkiller Overdose. Pretty good deal I think.

Venezuela to outlaw violent video games, toys

"Venezuela would be one of few countries to impose an all-out ban on the "manufacture, importation, distribution, sales and use of violent video games and bellicose toys." The proposed law would give Venezuela's consumer protection agency the discretion to define what products should be prohibited and impose fines as high as $128,000.

Similar concerns have prompted many countries, including Brazil, Germany and China, to prohibit the sale of specific video games. Most, including the United States, have opted for ratings systems to warn parents and users of violent or sexual content."

Video games: political and parental scapegoat. Proper guidance begins at the foundations. Increased piracy, as witnessed in China, will be a natural reaction to this ban.

Yes, first blog in half a year and it will be only a few lines. Since Silent Hill: HC was fairly disappointing for us long-time series fans, I thought a header change was in order. So here's another golden opportunity for a developer to screw it all up. However, I doubt in Team Ico's case they'll perform any less than stellar. It's not like they're handing it off to a US company, right? Nope, they understand what a precious commodity a good idea is. So here we go, the theme of the blog: Another 'Games as Art' topic .... noooo, don't zone off into space on me because this one's going to be easy. What games would you personally classify as art? You don't have to rationalize your decision unless you really want to of course. Here's mine: Bioshock 2, Silent Hill 2, and Shadow of the Colossus. These games understood what atmosphere and emotion can do for a game.