gaming

Editor's note: Updated at 11:35 a.m. PST to include additional information from Matheson's office about the bill.

A new bill in the U.S. Congress would force retailers to card kids attempting to buy video games bearing "mature" or "adults only" ratings.

In addition to the identification-checking requirement, Reps. Jim Matheson (D-Utah) and Lee Terry (R-Neb.)'s Video Game Ratings Enforcement Act, introduced on Wednesday, would also require stores to post explanations of what the ratings, devised by the industry-backed Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB), actually mean, according to a press release. … Read more

Over on Techdirt Thursday morning, there's a report about some angry PC users of Electronic Arts games.

The gamers are upset, according to a post in the Mass Effect forums, because EA is apparently implementing a new Internet-based digital rights management system, known as SecuROM, that they find onerous, intrusive, and inconvenient.

Techdirt writes that a new version of SecuROM being employed by EA "is causing controversy due to an online verification system connected to its CD key. The system requires a connection to the Internet during installation to check (that) the CD key is valid, and then … Read more

Though Halo 3 held the all-time entertainment industry record for single-day sales for eight months, it could be a long time before anyone bests the record-shattering sales achieved by GTA IV.

On Wednesday, Take-Two Interactive, which owns GTA IV developer Rockstar Games, announced that the new game had raked in all-time records of $310 million on its launch day of April 29 and $500 million during its first week. The single-day figure shattered the previous record, set last September by Halo 3, of $170 million.

And given how quickly Bungie Studios' Halo 3 was reduced to second place, it stands … Read more

Update 1:14 p.m. PDT: This has been edited to reflect some new information about what's in the package and its source.

Usually when I get a UPS package it's some boring book or prospectus. But the Express Envelope that landed on my desk Wednesday certainly got my attention.

Inside were the following things: a sticker with the words "Scientific Anarchy Now" and "Holomove;" a photocopy of a memorandum purportedly from Los Alamos National Lab dated January 30, 1985, regarding the termination of a scientist named Eugene Gough; and lastly, and most disconcertingly, … Read more

Libe Goad joins the guys of the 404 to talk about how the Wii gets hacked, GTA IV gets a lot of cash, get in shape with Wii Fit, Boom some Blox and some silly-ass stop signs. We also make fun of her husband, but shh...don't tell him.

Listen now: Download today's podcast

When Take-Two released GTA IV to the masses last week, some wondered just how big this game would be. Most analysts pegged the eventual first week sales at around $400 million and thought that was a huge week. But in an interesting turn of events that should press Take-Two's asking price higher, the company is poised to announce that it realized over $500 million in revenue in just the first week of Grand Theft Auto IV's availability.

But before it was met with such success, GTA IV garnered some of the biggest hype we have ever seen in gaming. Unlike any other title released in recent memory, the story of Niko Bellic and his rise in the criminal underworld achieved blockbuster status and quickly realized the full potential of a title that can totally change the way we're expected to think of gaming in general.

With that in mind, I entered the world of GTA IV wondering what would confront me. Would it be just another example of debauchery and disregard for humanity like some critics believe or a title that would change the way I think about gaming?… Read more

Knowing that I still use a Palm Treo 650 (yes, people who review phones don't necessarily have fancy ones), a colleague alerted me to the fact that PDAmill Game Studios has made all its Palm OS games free. The company stopped making games for this platform since February 2007 but still has a reasonable stable of applications for Windows Mobile. Some of these games are quite good and may be worth a download for those still using a Palm OS device.

TreoCentral reported on this and noted a few other developers giving away their previously for-sale software. These include … Read more

Gaming is one of the greatest uses of Flash technology. There are tons of places to get your Flash gaming on, and one of my new favorites is Nonoba. I found my way there earlier this morning from a link on Download Squad for a particularly fun game called Comboll that's a cross between Breakout and a scrolling level of Super Mario Bros.

The site offers the same communal experience of playing games with others as Kongregate does, with built-in user chat, reviews and commenting, along with achievements and a built-in social network. There's also a revenue-sharing program … Read more

This weekend was a major time for both the video game and film industry. Whether you sat at home playing Grand Theft Auto IV or decided to head down to your local theater and check out Iron Man, you had choices to make. And it's that choice -- video game or movie -- that has been setting the movie industry's profits ablaze and creating an entertainment environment that could be turned upside down.

Now I know what you're thinking -- "the movie industry is as mainstream as you can get and the video game business is still a niche." Sure, some may espouse those beliefs, but this past week has shown that games like GTA IV are capable of competing at the same level with major movies and become a mainstream focus in this industry.

In other words, the outdated notion that the video game industry is for the geeks and the film industry is for everyone else, simply doesn't hold water anymore. Instead, we're currently knee-deep in an environment that's not only welcoming to the video game industry, but has proven to be damning to the film business.

And I, for one, couldn't be more ecstatic about it.… Read more