Major victory for video game industry

Score one for the game industry, and a big hit against software piracy. The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) announced today that a federal court in California recently ordered a group of defendants to pay over $9 million in damages for the violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). The penalty comes as a repayment to the industry for damages incurred from the defendants' distribution and sale of console mod chips and a software application called HDLoader. The mod chips are devices that disable the integrated copyright protection of the consoles and video game software, and HDLoader allows copies of video games to be downloaded directly to a console's hard drive. Once installed, they enable the console to play illegal copies of games.

Considering the amount of money lost to software piracy, in the U.S. video game industry alone, is in the range of $3 billion dollars a year, this victory for the game industry is just a drop in the bucket, though it's surely a start. Software piracy is something that hurts legal gamers everywhere. The costs of software piracy, and the costs involved in attempting to prevent software piracy, get passed on to the end user of the software (the gamers), and hurts the profitability of developers and publishers. These are the teams that put their hearts and souls in to designing great games for people to play, and they shouldn't have to worry about someone stealing their hard work. To learn more about anti-piracy laws and software copyright laws go to www.theesa.com/ip/anti_piracy_faq.php, and to learn more about The Entertainment Software Association, go to www.theESA.com.

Like Hilary Duff? Want The Sims 2 Pets? How about both?

If you're a fan of Hilary Duff and have been waiting to get The Sims 2 Pets, which is releasing October 17^th, then you'll be glad to hear this latest announcement from Electronic Arts. EA announced today that not only would the teen actress, singer, fashion/perfume line owner be appearing in the game, but her pet chihuahua, Lola would be as well. “I’ve logged hundreds of hours playing The Sims games, so I jumped at the chance to be in The Sims 2 Pets,” said Duff. “I love creating Sims characters and guiding them through life, designing their houses and then blinging them out with cool furniture. Now, in The Sims 2 Pets, EA has combined two things I really enjoy — pets and The Sims!” For the really serious Hilary Duff fans, EA will be running a satellite feed of Duff playing The Sims 2 Pets, footage of her and Lola in the game and an interview with Hilary Duff on October 5^th. We're sure that quite a few TV networks will be picking that up, so if you're interested, keep an eye out. To read more News Pop! on The Sims 2 Pets, you can check out News Pop! 09/14/06, and for more information about The Sims 2 Pets and the rest of The Sims franchise go to www.thesims.com.

Buena Vista Games gets Desparate

We're sorry, we couldn't resist. As if there wasn't already enough news about simulation games today, we're bringing you this. Buena Vista Games announced that they began shipping Desparate Housewives: The Game today. The game puts players in the role of a new housewife who moves to Wisteria Lane and “unlocks the delicious scandals hidden in the seemingly 'perfect' neighborhood.” Unlike never-ending sim games, Desparate Housewives: The Game has a twelve episode story with a script written by series writer Scott Sanford Tobis, which incorporates both drama and dark humour. Desparate Housewives: The Game is available in stores today, for PC, for $19.99 USD and is rated T for Teen.

Logitech preps for PS3

Logitech is showing that it's already prepared for the release of the Playstation 3, this November. The company unveiled its Chillstream controller for the next gen console. The controller uses Logitech's Chillstream built-in fan-based cooling system to keep players hands cool and dry while playing. The technology is already out for other consoles, but this will be the first and, from what Logitech is saying, only gamepad to use the technology for Playstation 3. Logitech also announced that several of its products which are already on the market will be fully compatible with the PS3. To find out more about Logitech's Chillstream line of products go to www.logitech.com.

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