Virtual property is a topic that gets lots of attention from legal scholars. There is something intriguing about the lawlessness of virtual worlds. Second Life and World of Warcraft create places where people from every legal jurisdiction in the world can connect and share one virtual space. Most of the legal writing in this area focuses on which laws apply and whether traditional legal principles can be transfigured to apply to virtual worlds. As I have mentioned in earlier posts in this series, the focus of these articles is not the theoretical, but practical information for people who make games.
This article covers the first and second parts in a series about Video Game Law. There is a wealth of academic information on the topic of game law on the Internet, but my hope is to provide more practical legal insight in a way that could actually help a game developer or startup tackle some of these issues in practice and understand the lay of the land. As much fun as it is for lawyers like me to contemplate hypothetical issues like whether there is such a thing as rape in a virtual world like Second Life, these issues don't generally help people make games. The goal of this series is to give game makers a practical look at the legal issues that they should consider when running a game company. My clients don't pay me to wax philosophic about laws that don't exist yet, but I do spend a lot of time answering real questions that game makers face. This series of articles will share that insight with you.
It’s been about two years since we first started hearing about Will Wright’s next game, Spore. The game blew me away when I saw the demo from GDC, but it has been so long that my interest has waned. That may change with the release of Spore Creature Creator next week. EA [...]
Who would have thought that manipulating amyloid-beta precursor proteins could be fun? Foldit, a game developed by University of Washington students along side professional game developers, is designed to harness the collective brain power of gamers for the purpose of making advances in protein science:
Can humans really help computers fold proteins?
We’re collecting data to find [...]
Four friends need to cross a bridge.
They start on the same side of the bridge.
A maximum of two people can cross at any time.
It is night and they have just one lamp.
People that cross the bridge must carry the lamp to see the way.
A pair must walk together at the rate of the slower person:
Rachel: [...]
It will be interesting to see if this will have any effect on the market for video game related virtual items (e.g., swords, armor, gold and land in MMOs).
eBay Bans Auctions Of Digital Goods: “We’ve pointed out more than a few times how digital goods muck up traditional markets that are based on the concept [...]
Rock Band drum kit modded for beatbox control: “
Filed under: Gaming
digg_url = ‘http://digg.com/hardware/Rock_Band_drum_kit_modded_for_beatbox_control’; The Rock Band drum kit continues to attract modders of all stripes, and we’re loving the crazy directions people are taking it — like this beatboxing kick drum mod from Kevin Child. It’s a simple hack — Kevin simply used a Thumper [...]
As a follow up to our story about Wii Remote head tracking, here is a link to a story at Engadget describing a camera only based system that is being developed for the Sony PS3. Check out the video at Engadget:
LEGO Universe: ‘LEGO Star Wars Multiplied By A Million’ | Game | Life from Wired.com
: “LEGO Universe: ‘LEGO Star Wars Multiplied By A Million’
By Earnest Cavalli EmailFebruary 21, 2008 | 5:54:11 PMCategories: GDC 2008
Luconcept
Update: We’ve just added newly received concept art from the title to the end of this post. Enjoy!
SAN FRANCISCO — LEGO Universe, [...]
TN Games’ impact-generating FPS Vest goes on sale:
Are you a hardcore gamer? No, seriously — a hardcore gamer. If so, you should have no qualms throwing down $169 for TN Games’ FPS Vest now that it’s available for order. The entire bundle includes an ‘impact-generating’ wearable, an air compressor, USB cable, power supply and [...]
Monday, July 28, 2008
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