Video Game Law Review - June 22

Original image from: ParentsTV.org


Here's what's happening in the Video Game Legal world this week and last:

Louisiana Passes Separate 'Obscene Games' Bill

HB1381 the bill in the LA legislature covering violent video games, was passed into law last week. The Entertainment Software Association ("ESA") looks to challenge its validity in court. But, another video game-related bill, SB340 has the full support of the ESA and much of the mainstream video game industry. It deals only with only with "explicitly pornographic sexual content in games, not violence". The overwhelming support from just about everyone in the industry for this new law which will be modeled after LA's obscenity statutes, "and treat the sale of games with sexually explicit content to minors, much the same as the sale of pornography" pretty much confirms the fact that as Americans we will expose our kids to gruesome killing over an immoral sexual images anyday.

Immersion Counters Sony With TouchSense Vibration

From Gamasutra: "Immersion Corporation, which is currently in the process of suing Sony over alleged misuse of controller rumble patents, has officially announced its TouchSense vibration technology for next-generation consoles.

"This technology supplies a wider range of vibration effects that "attempt to offer greater realism than that which is offered on existing console platforms", and is clearly a counter to Sony's E3 claims that the PlayStation 3 controller will lack a rumble feature - due, they say, to hardware interference caused by its recently-announced gyroscopic controls."

This is Immersions way of saying: "IN YOUR FACE SONY!" But seriously, Sony's excuse for a lack of vibration technology in their upcoming PS3 controller was pretty lame, especially considering the fact that the the Nintendo Wii controller is built around motion capture and has pretty robust vibration capabilities. All-in-all, Sony should have just inked a licensing deal like everyone else, avoided a $90 million CA federal district court judgment against them, and spared us the lameness of potentially paying $600 for a PS3 system w/o vibrating controllers.