Fiona :: Blog

The Edinburgh Interactive Entertainment Festival (EIEF) is due to be held in Edinburgh, Scotland on the 11th and 12th August 2005, just days after the Women in Games Conference in Dundee, Scotland, which I previously mentioned in Upcoming Conference in Dundee.

Although this event is mainly targetted towards the games industry it might prove interesting to some readers. The Guardian Gamesblog has an excellent look ahead at the EIEF as part of it's Scotland's week of games conferences series. Part 2: EIEF. Part 1 focused on the upcoming Women in Games conference. Part 1: Women in Games. As an aside: attendees of the Women in Games conference receive a discount if attending the EIEF as well.

As for me, I will be attending the Go Play Games event which is held in Edinburgh also on the 10th to 14th August 2005, in conjunction with the EIEF. This event is specifically targetted at gamers and tickets are only £3.00!

Following on from a post I made yesterday (July 18th) called What's bad is good, I have since come across a very interesting post by Steven Johnson himself on his weblog called The Kids Are Better Than Alright.

In this post he refers to the recent release of the Nation's Report Card in America and explains why he believes this report card should silence all the doomsayers for once and for all. The comments on his post are numerous and very interesting also.

If you haven't read his book, which I previously recommended in Book of the month - June 2005, then I would.

Following on from a previous post about a then upcoming conference called Games+Learning+Society (GLS) in Madison, Wisconsin, I have decided rather than spending all my time writing a report on the conference, I would instead link to three excellent reports (written better than I ever could!!) available at the Terra Nova website and at the Wisconsin Technology Network website and also at Mark Wagner's Educational Technology and Life website. I had the pleasure of meeting Mark for the first time at the conference, and I look forward to working with him in the future (hi mark!).

For those who missed the GLS conference, many of the talks were webcast. These webcasts are available here.

Has anyone been following the Grand Theft Auto San Andreas (GTA San An) "Hot Coffee" debate at all? Days after the launch of the PC version of the game a code modification (mod) was found that could unlock sex mini-games with in the main game.

What was at first thought to be just rumours (for the sake of sales, one would think) turned out in early June to be fact. It was believed to be present solely in the PC version of the game but the code was then confirmed to be present in the Playstation 2 (PS2) version also. The mod has become known as "Hot Coffee" because the player calls in to an establishment within the game for 'coffee' and from there is able to play these sex mini-games.

The debate has been raging for over a month now. I have found the controversy fascinating to follow (following the story for the most part thanks to gamespot). In this blog posting I am going to try to link together the main stories that surround this debate. I will add updates to this story as the debate rages on.

{{cut}}I have followed most of the Hot Coffee coverage on gamespot.com, the majority of the links are to gamespot.

The mod story began as rumour. But quickly was confirmed as fact. Link here to the BBC News website article Sex controversy over GTA game. The Boston Globe's Sex scene stirs up a fuss over Grand Theft Auto.

It was believed to be only found in the PC version of the game but the code was then confirmed to be present in the Playstation 2 (PS2) version also.

And so the "Hot Coffee" debate begins. Politician, Leland Yee, wants San Andreas rated Adults Only.

ESRB (Entertainment Software Ratings Board) investigating San Andreas sex minigames. Slashdot games also have the story GTA Sex Game Leads to ESRB Fracas.

The debate intensifies with reports from gamespot Debate intensifies over Hot Coffee sex in GTA and slashdot GTA Sex Game Debate Intensifies.

Hot Coffee sex probe spills over to Australia as an Aussie ratings board opens ESRB-like investigation of its own.

Rockstar (creators of the GTA series) release an official statement concerning the alleged sex mini-game found in GTA San Andreas. Gamespot report that Rockstar Games blames Hot Coffee on hackers. The New York Times report that Rockstar blame hackers for the mini-games.

Senator Hillary Clinton joins the debate. Gamespot report Hillary Clinton to take on Rockstar over Hot Coffee and Clinton calls for federal game regulation. The BBC report that Clinton wades into GTA sex storm. Game Girl Advance's A Common Enemy.

Jack Thompson, the anti-gaming crusader from Florida (where else), has since been reported to have weighed in on the Hot Coffee situation.

California assemblyman, Leland Yee, reacts to the latest wave of debate concerning game violence (a debate he set in motion) Leland Yee talks Hot Coffee.

The Guardian games blog has also been covering this story over the past few weeks. A post today (June 18th) entitled GTA creators choke on their "hot coffee". Industry feels the burn. sums up the past few weeks of controversy with various links to even more coverage.

For further reading, also check out Game Girl Advance's Story Who is the Master of Unlocking?

Updates on this story will be added as often as possible. Comments?

UPDATE: From the NY Times Technology section comes the news that Grand Theft Auto has now been rated Adult only with many major retailers in America taking the game off their shelves Video Game Known for Violence Lands in Trouble Over Sex. From gamespot.com comes the same story (with an excellent debate summary) San Andreas rated AO, Take-Two suspends production.

The facility uses electroshock, psychotherapy to treat gamers whose long hours online affect their physical and mental health. Read more here at gamespot.com.

The debate over whether or not habitual gamers are genuine addicts still rages and has been highlighted previously by gamespot.com - read more on this debate: When does online-game fervor become addiction?.

Note: a recent BBC News article entitled Chinese gamer sentenced to life detailed how a Shanghai online gamer had been given a suspended death sentence for killing a fellow gamer over ownership of a virtual sword. Video game addiction gone too far?

In light of the current Grand Theft Auto "Hot Coffee" Debate and the negative headlines that video games constantly receive, it seems encouraging that Professor Mark Griffiths, Professor of Gambling Studies at Nottingham Trent University, England, has stepped forward to say that computer games can aid children's health and do not deserve a wholly negative reputation.

Writing in the British Medical Journal, he reports that children suffering from cancer and other severe conditions were actually distracted from their pain by videogames under test conditions. The full report can be read here.

The BBC News covered the story: Computer games 'do have benefits'.

Aside: Compare Mark's research into the health benefits of video games to the research being carried out in Germany, which was recently highlighted in a BBC News article entitled Games 'prime brain for violence'.

A little outside my research focus, but still of interest to me from a gaming culture stand point - the UK pro-gaming team Four-Kings has had one of its best weekends with several members racking up wins. Read the entire BBC News article here.

Also look back at a previous article on the BBC News website entitled "Gamers start to take on the world" in which Philip Wride, one of the managers of the UK's Four-Kings pro-gaming clan, gives a preview of the year ahead for the team.

Following on from one of my previous posts called Book of the month - June 2005 in which I recommended Steven Johnson's book: Everything bad is good for you: how today's popular culture is actually making us smarter.

I have come across an interesting post from the June archives of the game girl advance weblog called "What's bad is good" (June 18 2005).

The comments on this posting are interesting also with a plug from North Star Leadership Group promoting the book they were involved in writing Got Game: how the gamer generation is reshaping business forever, another book I recommend and which I mentioned in a previous post entitled Tapping the Potential of the Gamer Generation.

Taken almost directly from the Innovate online website:

Innovate-Live webcasts offer an opportunity to synchronously interact with the authors of the articles in Innovate. These webcasts are produced as a public service by our partner, ULiveandLearn. If you wish to participate, please register here.

The July webcast features Marc Prensky, who wrote "What Can You Learn from a Cell Phone? Almost Anything!". Prensky encourages educators to reconsider their view of mobile technology and to imagine a pedagogy that embraces its potential as a new learning tool in the classroom of the future.

Date: July 18th
Time: 19:00 PM GMT

You can participate in this webcast by typing your questions/comments in the chat area of the screen. If you would like to interact with Marc Prensky using audio, you can do so but you will need to have the proper equipment and training to use the Macromedia Breeze conferencing program.

If you cannot attend this webcast, note that I will add the webcast archive here as soon as it is made available.

Check out a recent article by Jane Wakefield, BBC News website technology reporter.

She states that "women are about to invade the male dominated gaming world, a games conference in Scotland is to be told." The games conference referred to in the BBC article is detailed further in one of my previous blog postings. Games consultant Ernest Adams, who is a keynote at the conference, is the main source for this BBC article.

The article publishes some of the results of an Elspa white paper on women in gaming. To find out what women really DO play check out the BBC article.