It’s a me, Kuno! And today’s link roundup features that little Italian rapscallion, Mario Mario.
Mario’s many mustaches
Paper Mario comes to life
Super Mario World vs. the Many-Worlds Interpretation of Quantum Physics
Super Smash Bros Brawl sells 800K in Japan
Super Mario Race
Got links? Stop bogarting them!
Cool stuff from the web, steamed and pressed for your edutainment.
Bizarre GTA3 branded promo item
Wiimote hack turns your punching bag into an interactive punching bag.
Wiipons
God save the Q-Wii-N
Could Super Mario Galaxy really happen?
Got a cool link? Email me.
Videogames and films, violent or otherwise, are helping decrease violent crime rates, according to two economists.
Their logic is simple; violent films and videogames appeal to young men with violent propensities. And during the time these violence-prone people spend in the theater or in front of the TV, they are not out committing violent acts.
And this logic is supported by the data, according to Gordon Dahl of UC San Diego and Stefano DellaVigna of UC Berkeley. Continued…
A poll finds that 60% of consumers believe the US government should directly regulate the sale of “violent” videogames. Fifty-one percent want the government to regulate game content, according to a poll by New York based PR firm Hill & Knowlton.
In other news, 51% of Americans have never heard of the First Amendment.
The Entertainment Software Association released a statement criticizing both the findings, and the timing of the statement during the Christmas shopping season.
Hill & Knowlton’s decision to release these findings was both unprofessional and unethical and its timing is questionable. We understand that parents have concerns about mature content getting into the hands of children and we are working to help make sure that does not happen. Continued…
A study comparing the effects of “violent” media to health risks such as smoking and AIDS has concluded that violent television and videogames are almost as deadly as smoking.
The authors repeat the claim that videogames desensitize children to violent acts.
Increased heart rates, perspiration, and self-reports of discomfort often accompany exposure to blood and gore. However, with repeated exposures, this negative emotional response habituates, and the child becomes “desensitized.” The child can then think about and plan proactive aggressive acts without experiencing negative affect.
The conclusions were published in the December 2007 Journal of Adolescent Health. Continued…
New Scientist reports on a study of which personality types do best in real-time strategy games — and neurotic players do better than aggressive players.
[Austrian researchers] created aggressive, defensive, normal and neurotic versions of the AI software in the war strategy game Age of Mythology, drawing on “the big five” emotional dimensions to personality recognised by psychologists. Continued…
Richard “Lord British” Garriott, the World’s Greatest Game Designer (sorry, Cliffy B), announced today he will be the first gamer in space.
The designer of the Ultima Series, Ultima Online and Tabula Rasa will visit the International Space Station in Fall 2008, as part of NASA’s Space Adventures program.
Garriott will travel to the space station on the 100th Soyuz mission, TMA-13.
Other millionaires who have signed on space journeys include Santhosh George Kulangara from India (via Virgin Galactic) and Daisuke Enomoto of Japan.
Garriot’s father, Owen Garriott, is a former NASA astronaut who participated in such missions as Skylab and Spacelab-1 in the 1970s and ‘80s.
Link to Garriott’s Space Mission website.
Be sure to read part one!
“Sam! Help me, Sam!” If you get that movie reference, then you win one free Internet. The Kiyomori Samurai Robot has a human-like stride, with stretchy knees, 39 joints, and a flexible hip — “so it doesn’t stagger like Tom Cruise just off a horse.” It participated in Shinto prayers for the “safety and progress of future robot industries.” Continued…
I decided to go to Wired Magazine’s NextFest on a whim. I can get in for free as a journalist, and I figured there might be a couple of gaming-related items to see.
Welcome to the future! Funny, the future looks just like E3. And the spaceport from Starship Troopers. Continued…
An epidemiologist is in negotiations with Blizzard, to perform research within the World of Warcraft.
In 2005, a patch introduced an in-game “disease,” called Corrupted Blood, intended by WoW’s designers to disable inexperienced avatars within a certain area.
But there were unintended consequences. The disease spread throughout the game world, with teleports and pets providing vectors. Programmers tried to quarantine the effect — but in the end, they were forced to reboot the affected servers. Continued…
