Toys for Kids & Adults

Cyber Monday Video Game Deals

Cyber Monday, the online retailer version of Black Friday, is happening today.

Best Buyhas some deals on games including $10 off any $40 accessory when you buyAssassin's Creed.

Amazon.comhas a few deals, but most importantly,Bioshockfor $40.

Buy.comclaims to have some good deals on video games, although mostly they're just touting Xbox 360 and PS3 bundles that everybody else is selling as well. Still, it's worth clicking through their 20+ pages of deals as you may find something else that you want.

Walmart's site is currently broken, so I don't know if they have any deals or not. Circuit City didn't seem to have any deals.

In summary, your best bet is to getBioshockat Amazon. Otherwise, there aren't really any great deals out there on video games, the red-headed step child of sales.

Gamecock sorry about crashing Ken Levine's VGA speech
TodayJoystiqis reporting that game publisher Gamecock has apologized for its staffers running up on stage with leadBioShockdeveloper Ken Levine who was accepting the VGA forBioShockas Game of the Year. Yadda, yadda. Apology accepted, who cares, right?

The reason I'm posting this is because of the accompanying video. I just had to show it for all to see, so you could experience the bad taste Spike's VGAs leave in every gamer's mouth who isn't a 15 year old boy (my apologies to 15 year old boys who are also annoyed with this).

Seriously, they painted the winners of each category on the bodies of naked women? And, seriously, adults who work for a game publisher thought it would be funny to storm the stage? I guess showing the slightest bit of class when dealing with what we love is out of the question, eh? Gawd, I hate the VGAs.

CEI rates ESRB the best…but why the report?

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) yesterday released a study titled,Politically Determined Entertainment Ratings and How to Avoid Them.

The authors conclude that the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB) provides the most comprehensive and useful ratings of any major media ratings system. While I agree with this, I have to wonder if it's a predetermined conclusion based upon the fact that the ESRB is the least regulated ratings system.

The CEI, afterall, "is a non-profit public policy organization dedicated to advancing the principles of free enterprise and limited government."

To further this suspicion of mine, the CEI sets up a supposed "apples to apples" comparison between the ESRB and radio saying:

On the other hand, in the radio market, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) imposes vague but sweeping content guidelines over almost all broadcasts. The threat of FCC-imposed fines has done nothing to give parents greater control over their children’s radio listening habits—they have virtually no way to protect their children from adult material like explicitly sexual “shock jocks” and violent hip-hop lyrics. Heavy regulation and the absence of a private ratings system have made radio worse for parenting.

More on this…

Feliz Navidad, Pac-Man
Nothing says "Merry Christmas" like a huge tree with an electronic Pac-Man display, like this one found in the heart of Madrid, Spain.

GameSpots's Gertsmann Fired, Fallout is Harsh

I've been so busy writing theLBMass EffectWalkthroughthat I haven't had a chance to point out this story to you.

Jeff Gertsmann, until recently the editorial director at GameSpot, was fired for a not-so-kind review of Eidos'Kane and Lynch, or at least that's what most people are speculating.

If you need to do some catching up, Joystiq has it covered wellhere,here, andhere.

What's most interesting to me is that this is bringing out the long held notion that game reviewers are under pressure to write favorable reviews for games so that the game companies will then advertise (or continue to advertise) on/in said reviewers site/magazine.

While it's still unclear what really happened the fallout from this story is far more important than any truth. The notion of biased game reviewers is instilled in gaming culture and this story, fact or fiction, only serves to perpetuate that notion.

It then goes further and brings in a giant parent company, CNet, who perhaps undeservedly so, is being cast as the evil villain squashing the independent, gamer-centric reviews of Gertsmann for the all-important advertising dollars.

I'll continue to keep my eye on this story as it is one of those situations where the perceived notions are, most likeyly, worse than reality, but that simply doesn't matter.