Games News for Games Heroes
Critics: 'Left Behind' game glorifies violence
Talk about warfare. A Christmas season turf war is underway over whether a new computer game, laced with violent virtual battles and spiritual messages stressing the urgent need for salvation, is authentically Christian.
An alliance of Christian progressive groups fired first, calling for Wal-Mart to stop selling Left Behind: Eternal Forces, a $39.99 real-time military strategy game based on the best-selling Left Behind Apocalyptic novels. Players battling the Anti-christ, the ultimate in evil, can pray to increase their strength, recruit converts to the Christian cause, even conduct exorcisms.
YOUR OPINION: Do you think the game should be pulled?
"It's faith-based killing that teaches God wants people dead if they don't see Christ as you do," says the Rev. Tim Simpson, head of Christian Alliance for Progress, who has played the game. "Jesus would turn the other cheek."
Shooting back in self-defense, conservative Christians and the game's producers say the computer game battles are all between good and evil, with no explosive blood or gore. They say it takes spiritual weaponry, not firepower, to win.
"These groups don't attack other violent video games. Their real attack is on our theology," says Tim LaHaye, co-author of the novels, who endorsed the game.
SEE THE GAME: The 'Eternal Forces' website | CEO's statement on the controversy
And the game isn't about mindless violence, says Jeffrey Frichner, president and co-founder of Left Behind Games. True, he says, "Players can engage in battle, fire guns, even kill innocents in the game, but there will be severe consequences. In fact, you can win this game without ever firing a shot, using weapons of spiritual means, such as prayer and worship."
If a player increases his force's spiritual strength, angels will even come to his assistance. But it's the action, not the angels, that has put the game in 10,000 locations, including Wal-Mart and Circuit City, since its November release, he says.
Spokeswomen for both chains said Wednesday they have no plans to discontinue sales.
"It's selling like crazy here," says Brian Bridges, a clerk at the Manassas, Va., branch of Family Christian Stores, where a $59.99 collector's version includes a Bible.
The Campaign to Defend the Constitution, an alliance of groups including Simpson's, launched its attack on the game this week. Simpson calls Frichner's descriptions "weasel words."
Simpson says it's true that "once you do a kill, it causes your 'spiritual points' in the game to go down, but all you need to do is pray and you're good to go again, as if nothing else happened," says Simpson.
He adds that the bad guys are non-Christians and that a stand-in for the
United Nations is portrayed as the army of the Anti-christ, the embodiment of evil.
Alliance co-founder Clark Stevens says they've rallied 26,000 e-mails so far to Wal-Mart, because the game "advocates intolerance toward other religions."
New Testament scholars have long objected to a literal reading of Revelation, the Bible's final book.
A violent video game for Jesus is ironic, says Craig Hill, professor of New Testament at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. "Jesus saw the great enemy as evil, which is in all of us, not something at which we can fire bullets."
Ultimately, the battle over the game may be a win for both sides, "in the real war, the one for attention," says Nancy Ammerman, a sociologist of religion at Boston University. Now's the time of year, she says, when people try to score points for their religious views.
Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY.COM
Contributing: Mike Snider
YOUR OPINION: Do you think the game should be pulled?
"It's faith-based killing that teaches God wants people dead if they don't see Christ as you do," says the Rev. Tim Simpson, head of Christian Alliance for Progress, who has played the game. "Jesus would turn the other cheek."
Shooting back in self-defense, conservative Christians and the game's producers say the computer game battles are all between good and evil, with no explosive blood or gore. They say it takes spiritual weaponry, not firepower, to win.
"These groups don't attack other violent video games. Their real attack is on our theology," says Tim LaHaye, co-author of the novels, who endorsed the game.
SEE THE GAME: The 'Eternal Forces' website | CEO's statement on the controversy
And the game isn't about mindless violence, says Jeffrey Frichner, president and co-founder of Left Behind Games. True, he says, "Players can engage in battle, fire guns, even kill innocents in the game, but there will be severe consequences. In fact, you can win this game without ever firing a shot, using weapons of spiritual means, such as prayer and worship."
If a player increases his force's spiritual strength, angels will even come to his assistance. But it's the action, not the angels, that has put the game in 10,000 locations, including Wal-Mart and Circuit City, since its November release, he says.
Spokeswomen for both chains said Wednesday they have no plans to discontinue sales.
"It's selling like crazy here," says Brian Bridges, a clerk at the Manassas, Va., branch of Family Christian Stores, where a $59.99 collector's version includes a Bible.
The Campaign to Defend the Constitution, an alliance of groups including Simpson's, launched its attack on the game this week. Simpson calls Frichner's descriptions "weasel words."
Simpson says it's true that "once you do a kill, it causes your 'spiritual points' in the game to go down, but all you need to do is pray and you're good to go again, as if nothing else happened," says Simpson.
He adds that the bad guys are non-Christians and that a stand-in for the
United Nations is portrayed as the army of the Anti-christ, the embodiment of evil.
Alliance co-founder Clark Stevens says they've rallied 26,000 e-mails so far to Wal-Mart, because the game "advocates intolerance toward other religions."
New Testament scholars have long objected to a literal reading of Revelation, the Bible's final book.
A violent video game for Jesus is ironic, says Craig Hill, professor of New Testament at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. "Jesus saw the great enemy as evil, which is in all of us, not something at which we can fire bullets."
Ultimately, the battle over the game may be a win for both sides, "in the real war, the one for attention," says Nancy Ammerman, a sociologist of religion at Boston University. Now's the time of year, she says, when people try to score points for their religious views.
Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY.COM
Contributing: Mike Snider
Labels: News
Video games ease sick kids', parents' pain
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - When 11-year-old Gus Luna was able to play one of his favorite video games while recovering from exploratory brain cancer surgery in intensive care, his mother breathed a big sigh of relief.
"It was brain surgery... it was so scary. That made me feel like things seemed OK," said Marcela Luna, whose son has been undergoing chemotherapy since last year, when surgeons were unable to remove his tumor.
Gus, an all-star soccer player and tae kwon do green belt, was president of his fifth-grade class before falling ill. Now being home schooled, he cannot imagine getting through his treatments without video games: "It would be really hard without this ... You never know what's going to happen next."
Games let him focus on something other than the illness, doctors and hospital visits that dominate his life.
Gus is being treated at Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, which is among 1,000 hospitals worldwide with video game Fun Centers that roll from bed to bed, just like regular hospital equipment.
"You're like a regular kid," he said. "You forget about needles, you forget about what's all around you."
NOT JUST KIDS STUFF
Over the last decade, researchers around the world have done hundreds of studies probing the value of video games and other forms of virtual reality to help children, and their parents, cope with medical-related anxiety and pain.
Results have been mostly positive and continue rolling in.
The University of Southern California's Keck School of Medicine earlier this year published details from a study of 20 children having an intravenous line inserted.
Half of them underwent the procedure while playing "Street Luge," a fully-immersive virtual reality game in which players control characters who race downhill while reclining on a big skateboard. The children wore a helmet fitted with headphones and glasses that delivered game sounds and images. They also used a rumbling joystick.
Children who did not play the game reported a four-fold increase in pain intensity from the procedure, while those who used virtual reality distraction reported no change in pain intensity.
The University of South Australia's Center of Allied Health Evidence did a study of children with serious burn injuries and found "strong evidence" supporting the use of virtual reality-based games in pain management.
In similar fashion, doctors at
Israel's Chaim Sheba Medical Center used Sony Corp (NYSE:SNE - news).'s (6758.T) PlayStation II EyeToy -- a camera that connects to a video game console allowing users to see themselves on TV -- as a rehabilitation tool for patients with severe burns. In a published article they said it proved to be an efficient and affordable alternative.
GAMING FOR GOOD
Nintendo Co. Ltd. (7974.OS) executive Don James designed the current Fun Center and said the company will start shipping units that include its new Wii video game console in mid-2007.
The Japanese game giant sponsors more than 3,500 of the 5,000-plus Fun Centers in hospitals through a program created and run by Starlight Starbright Children's Foundation, whose aim is to combat the isolation and fear experienced by hospitalized kids.
A donation of $3,250 covers a current-generation Fun Center with a GameCube console, flat-screen monitor and DVD player, as well as its lifetime upkeep, a Starlight spokeswoman said.
Jeffrey Gold, program psychologist for the pediatric pain management clinic at USC-affiliated Childrens Hospital Los Angeles, was on the team that did the university's virtual reality pain study and continues to research the subject.
Hospitalized children are in a foreign environment with none of the familiar comforts of home, he said.
"There is no normalcy. When you roll in a video game, there is some normalcy," Gold said.
Parents also benefit, he added. "If you have children and you see them in distress, then you're in distress. If they're more calm, you're more calm."
That's something all moms -- from Marcela Luna to movie star and author Jamie Lee Curtis, a Starlight proponent -- know first-hand.
Five years ago, Curtis' son was hospitalized with a ruptured spleen and nurses wheeled in a Fun Center.
"It made him forget he was in the hospital ... It changed our experience," she said.
Lisa Baertlein
www.reuters.com
Labels: article
Nintendo to replace broken straps on new Wii console
TOKYO (AFP) - The Japanese electronic game maker Nintendo said it would replace wrist straps on its new Wii console with a "newer version" after reports of controllers crashing into users' television screens. But the company denied it was recalling the equipment, saying there was "no problem with the current wrist strap if it is used reasonably and instructions furnished by Nintendo in user manuals included with the game are followed."
"Nintendo is offering to replace the original version of the wrist straps for the Wii Remote with a newer version," the company said in a statement posted on its website.
"We have received some reports that when consumers swing the Wii Remote with the original version of the wrist-strap using excessive force and accidentally let go, the cord connecting the controller to the wrist strap can break, potentially causing the Wii Remote to strike bystanders or objects."
Earlier Friday, Nintendo spokesman Yasuhiro Minagawa said the first version of the controller strap "turned out to be insufficient in its strength for some customers" and would be replaced with a thicker one.
"The decision comes after reports that some users in the United States threw their controllers when playing with Wii sports software," he said.
The new Wii features a controller that can be used as a sword, tennis racket or car steering wheel in the games shown on screen.
Wii set itself apart from Microsoft's
Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3 consoles by designing a system that got players moving and encouraged family or friends to join in the activity.
But websites dubbed "Wii have a problem" and "Wii damage" have chronicled injuries and wreckage reportedly inflicted by Nintendo game controllers sent awry in the heat of play by wild swipes, loose grips or snapped wrist straps.
Wii controllers have been hurled or thrust into television and computer screens, according to online accounts, breaking windows, glasses, dishes, stereos, walls and ceiling fans.
The official Wii website warns users to "hold the Wii Remote firmly and do not let go" when playing, while taking a moment to dry perspiring hands to prevent injury to people or damage to objects.
Nintendo, which launched the Wii in the United States last month and in Japan on Saturday, has been getting rave reviews for its new controller and games that shy away from blood-and-guts action.
The Wii outsold the rival PlayStation 3 by more than double in the United States in November, according to industry tracking group NPD, which estimates that Nintendo sold 476,140 of its Wii consoles against Sony's 196,580 PS3s.
Consoles shipped from early December already have the thicker strap.
Nintendo also said Friday that it would recall 200,000 AC/DC power adaptors for Nintendo DS and Nintendo DS Lite portable game machines.
Nintendo said some adaptors supplied by Nagano Japan Radio Co Ltd (JRC) between January and October this year could generate excessive heat and possibly cause burn injury during charging.
Nintendo said to date, it had recorded nine such incidents of overheating. One such incident burned a hole in the body of the portable game machine but no injuries have been reported.
The Kyoto-based company said models with defective AC/DC adaptors were sold only in Japan.
Cumulative sales of Nintendo DS and Nintendo DS Lite have so far reached 13 million units.
Kyoko Hasegawa
www.afp.com
"We have received some reports that when consumers swing the Wii Remote with the original version of the wrist-strap using excessive force and accidentally let go, the cord connecting the controller to the wrist strap can break, potentially causing the Wii Remote to strike bystanders or objects."
Earlier Friday, Nintendo spokesman Yasuhiro Minagawa said the first version of the controller strap "turned out to be insufficient in its strength for some customers" and would be replaced with a thicker one.
"The decision comes after reports that some users in the United States threw their controllers when playing with Wii sports software," he said.
The new Wii features a controller that can be used as a sword, tennis racket or car steering wheel in the games shown on screen.
Wii set itself apart from Microsoft's
Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3 consoles by designing a system that got players moving and encouraged family or friends to join in the activity.
But websites dubbed "Wii have a problem" and "Wii damage" have chronicled injuries and wreckage reportedly inflicted by Nintendo game controllers sent awry in the heat of play by wild swipes, loose grips or snapped wrist straps.
Wii controllers have been hurled or thrust into television and computer screens, according to online accounts, breaking windows, glasses, dishes, stereos, walls and ceiling fans.
The official Wii website warns users to "hold the Wii Remote firmly and do not let go" when playing, while taking a moment to dry perspiring hands to prevent injury to people or damage to objects.
Nintendo, which launched the Wii in the United States last month and in Japan on Saturday, has been getting rave reviews for its new controller and games that shy away from blood-and-guts action.
The Wii outsold the rival PlayStation 3 by more than double in the United States in November, according to industry tracking group NPD, which estimates that Nintendo sold 476,140 of its Wii consoles against Sony's 196,580 PS3s.
Consoles shipped from early December already have the thicker strap.
Nintendo also said Friday that it would recall 200,000 AC/DC power adaptors for Nintendo DS and Nintendo DS Lite portable game machines.
Nintendo said some adaptors supplied by Nagano Japan Radio Co Ltd (JRC) between January and October this year could generate excessive heat and possibly cause burn injury during charging.
Nintendo said to date, it had recorded nine such incidents of overheating. One such incident burned a hole in the body of the portable game machine but no injuries have been reported.
The Kyoto-based company said models with defective AC/DC adaptors were sold only in Japan.
Cumulative sales of Nintendo DS and Nintendo DS Lite have so far reached 13 million units.
Kyoko Hasegawa
www.afp.com
Labels: nintendo wii
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