11/12/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
Dana Bruno runs the one-woman-show, The Bruno Report (www.brunoreport.net), which has been getting more than a little notice recently due to her high profile involvement in the Search 4 E. Search 4 E (www.search4e.org) is a project underway from True Crime Press to utilize Websurfing civillians to help solve the mystery of what happened to the even more mysterious "E" (Ed Sobian, Eric Sobel, or Emil Sobiak, take your pick). Currently there is reluctance in the law enforcement community to take up the missing persons case, largely due to the fact that it is hard to determine whether E was kidnapped or ran away, so in a move spearheaded by James Pitt (the well-known author) and True Crime Press, private investigators have been brought in. The allure of large amounts of money and valuable items found by professional and amateur investigators researching the case has helped generate serious interest.
11/06/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
It turns out that in Montgomery County, Maryland, police are looking into "tips" they received on their sniper hotline concerning Grand Theft Auto 3, as described in this article from The Jeffersonian. Callers phoning the line apparently reported that in Grand Theft Auto 3 you could use a sniper rifle to shoot whomever you'd like. So in the interest of thoroughly investigating the case, several police officers from the Montgomery County Police Department have purchased GTA3 from a Circuit City over the past couple weeks. Are these guys doing a bunch of hard work, or are they simply catching up on their games?
10/20/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
It is the plague of gamers everywherehow do you get the one you love to love your gaming habit? The most obvious and commonly attempted ploy is trying to get your significant other to develop his or her own habit. But sometimes this is a more difficult prospect than one might expect. I have heard many of my male counterparts bemoan the fact that his wife or girlfriend just doesn't understand his need to spend hours on the console or computer and that it is jeopardizing both of the loves of his life. As I am a firm believer in the "love me, love my obsessions" philosophy, I decided put my mind to work figuring out how to lure your partner into the gaming fold. After much thought, I finally came up with a strategy that I think will work for almost anyone. So here goes?my best advice for winning over your one and only.
10/09/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
Here at Gamesfirst! we like to talk about games--interactive art, we'll tell you, and the future of art and storytellinga force more powerful and more frightening than its parent, the movie, or its grandparent, the stageboth terrifying in their own way, in their own time. But did you ever wonder where the word "videogame"came from? "Video" meets "game"--it sounds like a pretty straightforward etymology to get to the word that brings us all so much joy, but what we have here is a strange union between two ancient words who's roots stretch across recorded timeand further, in fact, into the dark night of prerecorded time.
09/27/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
Last Spring US District Court Judge Stephen N. Limbaugh Sr. determined that videogames do not qualify as "speech" and are therefore not protected under the First Amendment. The case was brought before Judge Limbaugh by the Interactive Digital Software Association (IDSA) and St. Louis videogame retailers and arcade owners who were upset about an ordinance passed by the St. Louis City Council regulating violent and mature videogames. In the court's ruling, Judge Limbaugh wrote that there is "no conveyance of ideas, expressions, or anything else that could possibly amount to speech. The court finds that video games have more in common with board games and sports than they do with motion pictures."
09/23/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
Yahoo! has built a lot of things in the past. Beginning as a list of websites circulated through email and newsgroups, it could be said that Yahoo! is a good portion of the reason the World Wide Web took off the way it did we wouldn't be surfing around so much if we had to rely on JoeBob's List of Kickass Links to get the job done. The company has always been on the cutting edge; from their unique ad campaigns to their development of community-oriented online spaces, they have done a lot to enhance our experience of the Web and to bring new users online.
09/05/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
A word to all of our Greek readers: Fight the power. We have heard from you on occasion, and thanks to your heads-up and some reporting from the BBC World News (their article can be seen here), we can now give the rest of the world the story.
07/17/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
Richard Garriott. Lord British. I remember reading those names when Ultima Online was first announced, about the time when massively multiplayer games first began to come into realization. The names, both describing the same person, are synonymous with boundary-pressing game design and personal adventure. Professionally he's the founder of Origin Systems, the creator of the Ultima series, the power behind one of the first games to pioneer the concept of massively multiplayer. Having become involved with NC Soft and the incredibly popular Lineage, he's still making waves in the world of online role-playing. In person he's a charismatic fellow in blue jeans who just happens to have a lot of experience turning dreamy fantasies into working reality. I got a chance to speak with Garriot at E3 2002.
07/17/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
Richard Garriott. Lord British. I remember reading those names when Ultima Online was first announced, about the time when massively multiplayer games first began to come into realization. The names, both describing the same person, are synonymous with boundary-pressing game design and personal adventure. Professionally he's the founder of Origin Systems, the creator of the Ultima series, the power behind one of the first games to pioneer the concept of massively multiplayer. Having become involved with NC Soft and the incredibly popular Lineage, he's still making waves in the world of online role-playing. In person he's a charismatic fellow in blue jeans who just happens to have a lot of experience turning dreamy fantasies into working reality. I got a chance to speak with Garriot at E3 2002.
07/04/02 | | GF! Back Catalogue 10/2004 => 1995
During the Nintendo press conference at E3, my mind began to wander somewhere that I'm sure they never intended; I began to think about? my mother. It all started during a promotional commercial for their new title, Animal Crossing, in which we see several seconds of humorous footage where a crazed-looking mother has stolen her child's GBA and is sitting at the kitchen table playing while her child attempts to wrest it from her grasp. I couldn't help but recall the stolen hours that my mother had spent on games such as Space Invaders and Legend of Zelda, Tomb Raider and Riven. These were seemingly decadent hours that I'm sure my father thought could have been spent more productively. But as I remember, her gaming was no less earnest than that of her offspring, and I believe she had no less (dare I say it?) fun.
Support your local independent website.