TheBard

This is insane. (in before "This is Sparta" - Halo 3 is in a whole bunch of other threads).

Really, I agree with Savery. I've got a MacBook Pro to work and do internetty stuff, and a 360 and DS to game. Also, 360 games look nice. Sure, Crysis also looks nice, *very* nice even, but not five gazillion bucks nice.

I would love an adventure game DESIGNED for Wii. Classic puzzles are ideal for mini games. You need a bucket of water to wake up the sleeping guy? Pump it with your wiimote! Even simple things like opening a door could be represented by moving the wiimote up and down ... thus making a SCUMM like interface unneccessary. You could just use gestures to achieve different things.

I am impressed that this game, even in version 1.0, runs really well on my now over three years old system:

Intel 3.0Ghz HT
ATi Radeon 9800XT
1 Gig DDR Ram

The story is really nice, the game is pretty and the rules are very well implemented.

But what really bugs me is the user interface. Why can't I put offhand weapons or weapon sets on the quickbar, like in NWN1? Also, why does the game flood your primary disc with gigs of cached data? Why can't I decide where to put the cache? C: is small, only my OS.

Other than that, fine game though.

This list is incomplete without "A boy and his blob". The game was so-so, but the title was beyond bad.

There is nothing wrong with boy on boy kissing. Homosexuality is accepted nowadays, right? At least here in Germany.

Anyway, I'm really looking forward to the public response to this. Because you cannot just say it's bad influence, right? If you do say that, however, then the public outcry from the gay community would be immense.

This is gonna be fun.

I want to make something clear which is often misunderstood:

##There are no bans of Videogames in Germany.##

Well... there are a few. The last that I remember was Manhunt, which was way over the top. But let me explain:

Germany has a youth protection program which is based on a rating system. This works just fine in most cases. Games can even receive an 18+ rating, which is the age of adulthood in Germany. These "normal adult games" are sold and advertised like any other game.

But very violent Games like Dead Rising, Condemned and Gears of War are rated as some kind of danger for youth. I can't really translate "Jugendgefaehrdend". These are marked as "unrated", which means they are still legally treated like 18+ games. But these unrated games are im most cases examined by another ratings board and eventually put on the infamous Index. Here the fun, and misunderstandings, begin:
These games still can be legally bought by every adult! The only restriction is, that they may not be openly advertised.

This is a problem for publishers. No shelf space (which would be this "openly advertised" mentioned above) means less sales... but most games are released here, anyway.

Microsoft does something different. Boris Schneider-Johne, product manager of XBox here in Germany, once explained the problem in his Blog: Microsoft decided that they won't release ANY game which is unrated. It's a youth protection thing. And because the Xbox 360 has a nice youth protection feature based on ratings built in, publishing games without a rating just works against that.

To make it short:
Gears of War isn't banned in any way.
The USK didn't give GoW a rating, but it may still be legally sold here, and may be eventually put on the Index, which only means that you cannot advertise it. Nothing more. But Microsoft has a policy of not releasing unrated games, so they won't publish it in Germany.

I hope this helps to clear this up ... it's really annoying to read everywhere that Germany bans games and whatnot. German media is really very liberal and open minded. Also: Tits on free TV! ;)

I really love game manuals. But sadly, there is absolutely no reason to read them anymore. No useful information whatsoever.