Try-before-you-buy, with a bunch of really cool peripherals set up (to encourage sales of these, too)
You know, they used to do that back when FuncoLand was more than just a memory of days gone by. You'd ask an employee for help, they'd unlock the drawer the console was kept in, they'd pop in your game, and you'd be playing it. You knew the game worked, you could tell if you were going to like the game or not, and the system generally worked well.
Now, if the game's not on the manufacturer-issued demo disc, you don't get to test it before you buy it. And if it's used, you'd better pray it's in good shape, especially since you don't see the condition of the disc unless you specifically ask to beforehand (and even then, I've been brushed off).
Really, doing things like this that would help to make customers happier...I don't see how this could be a bad thing, but I also don't run a business. I guess I'm just too dumb to understand.
I was able to get through to the post, but it took a VERY long time for it to load. Because the majority of comments so far are complaining about not being able to access it, here's the post in its entirety...
How to crash an in-flight entertainment system Submitted by Hugh Thompson on Fri, 2007-02-09 16:08.
One of the most interesting examples of a software "abuse case" came to me rather abruptly on an airplane flight from Las Vegas to Orlando in mid 2005.
Each seat in the airplane had a small touch screen monitor built into the head rest of the chair in front, and on this particular airline, passengers could watch a variety of television channels and play a few simple games. One such game looked remarkably similar to the classic strategy game Tetris, where players use their skills to manipulate falling blocks on a screen to try and form horizontal lines. I'm a big fan of Tetris; for a few months in 1998 I was borderline obsessed with it. I would start looking at everyday objects and start mentally fitting them together with other tings in the room to form weird line configurations. One of the options on this particular airborne version of Tetris was to alter the number of blocks one could see in advance on the screen before they started falling.
To give myself the biggest advantage in the game, I pressed the + control as many times as it would allow and got to the maximum value of 4. I then put on my "bad guy" hat on and asked: How *else* can I change the value in this field? Near my armrest was a small phone console; you know, the one where you can make very important calls for a mere $22 per minute. I noticed that the phone had a numeric keypad and that it also controlled this television monitor embedded in the seat in front of me.
I then touched the screen in front of me to highlight the number "4" in the options configuration shown in Figure 1. I tried to enter the number 10 into that field through the phone keypad with no luck: it first changed to the number "1" followed by the number "0". Frustrated, I then made the assumption that it would only accept single digit values. My next test case was the number "8"; no luck there either, the number didn't change at all. I then tried the number 5: success! '5' is an interesting test case, it's a "boundary value" just beyond the maximum allowed value of the field which was '4'. A classic programming mistake is to be off by 1 when coding constraints. For example, the programmer may have intended to code the statements:
0 value 5
When what actually got coded was
0 value = 5
I now had the software exactly where I wanted it, in an unintended state; the illegal value 5 was now in my target field. I then turn my attention back to the screen and hit the + button which, to my complete surprise, incremented the value to 6! Again, an implementation problem, the increment constrain probably said something like "if value = 4 do not increment." In this case, the value wasn't 4 but 5 so it happily incremented it to 6! I then continue to increment the value by pressing the + button until I get to 127 and then I pause for a moment of reflection. 127 is a very special number; it is the upper bound of a 1 byte signed integer. Strange things can happen when we add 1 to this value, namely that 127 + 1 = -128! I considered this for a moment as I kicked back a small bag of peanuts and in the interest of science I boldly pressed the + button once more. Suddenly, the display now flashes -128 just for an instant and then poof...screen goes black.
Poof...screen of the person next to me goes black.
Screens in front of me and behind me go black.
The entire plane entertainment system goes down (and thankfully the cascading system failure didn't spill over to the plane navigation system)!
After a few minutes of mumbling from some of the passengers, a fairly emotionless flight attendant reset the system and all was well. I landed with a new-found respect for the game of Tetris and consider this to be the most entertaining version of it I have ever played.
Normally, I'd be on the customer's side in a scenario like this.
That said, considering how often these "deals" get exploited by thousands of people via FatWallet, SlickDeals and the like, I can't help but think that Amazon got reamed by this. And considering the kind of greedy bastards that frequent those sites - the ones who'd order fifty copies of each show, brag about it online, and then post them all on eBay a week later - I can't say I feel for them if that's the case.
Really, it's hard to say that Amazon did anything wrong here from my POV. It wasn't a pricing mistake - it was a software glitch. Same end result, maybe, but no living person at Amazon agreed on that transaction, and they sure as hell wouldn't have if they'd had the chance to.
I'd say taking a franchise from RTS to MMORPG requires at least some innovation. Innovation doesn't necessarily require an entirely new setting; if the mechanics and the game itself change significantly (as did Warcraft), that could be enough on its own.w
Besides, "MMO" doesn't entail the same thing as "MMORPG." If Blizzard were to release a Starcraft MMORPG, I suspect that it would cannibalize subscribers from WoW more than it would bring in new players. Since we don't know anything yet, why not have a little bit of faith?
Between the hiring of RTS developers, the constant hints about Starcraft, and the fact that the game's tenth anniversary is coming up...well, it's just a hunch, really, but it's starting to sound more and more likely that this project is some kind of Starcraft MMOG, however that would work.
I know that I'm not the only one considering this, and that there have been thousands - if not millions - of wrong predictions about gaming. That said, considering how popular Starcraft still is today, if Blizzard doesn't bring the franchise back in some form in the future it would be a horrendously bad business decision. As long as the game isn't terrible (and Blizzard's track record is still very solid, lest we forget), it'd sell like hotcakes and would help to bring in money from the crowd that's not up for the time commitment and fees that MMORPGs require.
As was mentioned in another article, it's not a recall. The replacement is entirely voluntary, and Nintendo has stated that their product testing showed the original strap was sturdy enough (though these douche bags seem intent on proving otherwise).
Not that that alters your point in the slightest, but this might end up playing into the lawsuit somehow, maybe in that since it's not mandatory they're allowing people to continue using "defective products" or some kind of bullcrap like that.
Yes, it's innovative, but since when has innovation paid off in the games industry of late?
The Nintendo DS? Guitar Hero? Katamari Damacy? Geometry Wars?
Say what you will about the definition of innovation (and I know that this will probably lead to arguing about just that), but the DS and the games listed were all significant departures from most of what's being churned out today...and they all sold remarkably well because of it.
You could speculate that perhaps quantaties of the game - and especially the Wii hardware - have become near-impossible to secure in Japan...
Speculate? Unless Japan's love of Nintendo has fallen off a cliff, that's exactly what's happening. You don't buy the game if you don't have a Wii. There aren't any Wiis to buy. Therefore, people aren't going to buy the game.
Personally, I'm amazed there are enough 360s in Japan for the game to sell that well, going from Microsoft's abysmal track record there thus far.
I'm going to take a wild guess and assume you didn't even read the full summary.
I saw a copy of the PC game Grim Fandango, a complete masterpiece that most people never played, for $6 on eBay. Since it came out in 1998, you can probably find an abandoned computer on the curb that will play it. You'll be experiencing about 98.5 percent of the fun that the Getty heir who bought the PS3 is having, at about 1 percent of the price.
$6 game + $0 computer = $6. No Dreamcast involved there.
One of my friends who's a diehard addict to BF2 downloaded the demo and said it took him three full rounds to even notice the ads, and that they didn't bother him once he did. I've heard the same from my other friends who are fans of the series, which leads me to think that this really isn't as big of a deal as people on Slashdot and Digg make it out to be. Of course, there's sales figures as well; I don't think EA's noticed a drastic drop in the number of copies of BF2142 sold as compared to BF2, though I'm basing that off of observation (stores not having the game in stock and online discussion) and sales charts.
Take Two is a different company, yes, but they're undoubtedly smart enough to make sure that the ads won't intrude on the game itself.
Game publishers exist to make money. This is a method for them to do it. You can complain about paying for a game that includes ads; by that same logic, you could complain about buying a DVD (trailers before the main menu) or a magazine and boycott those too. Unless things change significantly, this is a trend that's only going to continue.
The game is user moddable, and this is a user mod. I could do an HL2 model of JT (theoretically) and shoot him up, and apparently that'd be Valve's fault.
Well, wasn't it Rockstar's fault that a user mod allowed people to have wild sex in GTA: San Andreas? According to our buddy Jack, that was definitely the case. True, the content was on the physical disc, but since there wasn't any way to access it sans mod, I think it falls into the same general category.
Blaming Valve for that - or, here, blaming Activision for the create a fighter screenshot - seems to be right in line with his previous actions.
My high school had a similar issue, and their reaction was simple. They removed all - ALL - but maybe five programs from the start menu. If you wanted Microsoft Office or Internet Explorer, you were in luck. Anything else...well, not so much. If that wasn't bad enough, they also removed access to Windows Explorer, which made using things like USB drives virtually impossible, meaning that, because of the exceedingly strict filter, the only possible way to send files home at all was floppy, and even that was strongly discouraged.
This was two years ago, mind you.
Whatever you do, don't go that route. Someone will always find a way to break the system and to have fun with it, but it's entirely possible to make the computers so dysfunctional that they lose any value as an academic tool.
I wasn't surprised to come here and see the "Physical copy with better quality and extras = WIN" argument posted, over and over and over. Unless I've missed it, though, the people making the argument are missing a key point...
Most people don't know or care about the differences between digital media and the physical DVD.
The retailers have already figured out through the music poriton of the iTunes store that, for millions of people, the difference in quality, flexibility, and future usability doesn't matter enough to justify getting the physical version instead of paying for the (often cheaper and easier) download. And if it can meet the needs of the person who bought it, why complain? After all, if all they want is for it to play on their iPod now, why not download it?
Not that this is anything new, mind you, and I'm not saying that I disagree with the users here...it just always amazes me how many are shocked and awed by the fact that anyone would even CONSIDER downloading that DRMed piece of "crap."
I see someone's finally figured out how to have an entertaining Slashdot thread.
If you post a link to the patent instead of an article, you're virtually guaranteeing that no one will read the fucking article, let alone understand it! And just think of the wacky hijinks and hilarity that are bound to ensue from there!
Because of the format choice, there might be some people that don't have any choice but to download the song, either legally (assuming iTunes sells it like they do some of his other albums) or through other means.
Oh, awesome. Then where's my Sonic Mega Collection Plus for PSP?
You're right - that doesn't exist and probably never will. To be fair, though, I don't believe you mentioned the PSP once in your original post, and because the number of people who own a PSP is very, VERY small compared to the number who own a PS2, I guessed PS2 instead of PSP.
And regardless of Sega's management mishaps, you've got to admit that it makes zero business sense to remove a product that's still viable and not technologically outdated from the market by replacing it yourself is a boneheaded move. Again, this was written with the PS2 assumption in mind.
They're included; the catch is that you've got to unlock most of them by playing the games you start out with a set number of times (twenty, I believe).
Even if those HADN'T been included, though, the compilation is still well worth your $20 if you're a fan of Sonic.:)
Where's your Sonic 3 and Knuckles? In the Sonic Mega Collection Plus, of course. They've got Sonic 3 and Knuckles, the Sonic 1 and Knuckles bonus stage game, Sonic 2 and Knuckles...why, everything you think is missing! And for only $20 to boot!
Sega isn't run by idiots. Including all of the Sonic games in the package would mean that the incentive for buying the Mega Collection is close to zero. Even if it's an older title, it's still being produced and there's still some level of demand for it.
In any case, there won't BE another collection, more than likely, because this covers most of the bases as far as notable Genesis titles go. It might not be perfect, but this is easily one of the strongest retro compilations we've seen yet, and anyone who doesn't think it'll sell well is a fool.
In all seriousness, if you're going to go and do something...do it right. Go big.
Ann Arbor's a college town with 30,000+ students. Between the sheer size of the campus and the fact that the College of Engineering is a target perfectly suited for this, I bet you could whip up a very nice protest. You could definitely organize something big enough to get the Detroit media's attention, and if done right, it could go farther than that.
And if you do, I'll be there. After all, when you go to the college in question, it's easy to get there.:)
One part of the argument seems to be...well, crap.
SIMS2 - selling poorly compared to the outdates Sims and the 65,000 expansions packs that sold at the same price.
Of course, The Sims was a 2D game that wasn't very taxing on older machines. The Sims 2, however, is pretty shiny 3D and requires a more powerful machine to run.
That 65,000 number, too, doesn't mean a ton - between bundling expansions together and price drops, they haven't been sold at anywhere near full price. Hell, the original and all of the expansions (in some form, usually in bundles of three) are still being sold today. The Sims 2 has years ahead of it to catch up, unless EA decides to let it go instead of adding more and more content to it like they did for the original.
Slashdot Mirror
That's true, but the fact she didn't even attempt to take one of the basic precautions and is now suing over it is, frankly, ludicrous.
If she had a robots.txt file, then she could at least claim she'd attempted to stop her site from being spidered.
Try-before-you-buy, with a bunch of really cool peripherals set up (to encourage sales of these, too)
You know, they used to do that back when FuncoLand was more than just a memory of days gone by. You'd ask an employee for help, they'd unlock the drawer the console was kept in, they'd pop in your game, and you'd be playing it. You knew the game worked, you could tell if you were going to like the game or not, and the system generally worked well.
Now, if the game's not on the manufacturer-issued demo disc, you don't get to test it before you buy it. And if it's used, you'd better pray it's in good shape, especially since you don't see the condition of the disc unless you specifically ask to beforehand (and even then, I've been brushed off).
Really, doing things like this that would help to make customers happier...I don't see how this could be a bad thing, but I also don't run a business. I guess I'm just too dumb to understand.
Shit. Beaten to it multiple times in the space of the two minutes it took me to put my post together. So much for noble intentions... >_
I was able to get through to the post, but it took a VERY long time for it to load. Because the majority of comments so far are complaining about not being able to access it, here's the post in its entirety...
How to crash an in-flight entertainment system
Submitted by Hugh Thompson on Fri, 2007-02-09 16:08.
One of the most interesting examples of a software "abuse case" came to me rather abruptly on an airplane flight from Las Vegas to Orlando in mid 2005.
Each seat in the airplane had a small touch screen monitor built into the head rest of the chair in front, and on this particular airline, passengers could watch a variety of television channels and play a few simple games. One such game looked remarkably similar to the classic strategy game Tetris, where players use their skills to manipulate falling blocks on a screen to try and form horizontal lines. I'm a big fan of Tetris; for a few months in 1998 I was borderline obsessed with it. I would start looking at everyday objects and start mentally fitting them together with other tings in the room to form weird line configurations. One of the options on this particular airborne version of Tetris was to alter the number of blocks one could see in advance on the screen before they started falling.
To give myself the biggest advantage in the game, I pressed the + control as many times as it would allow and got to the maximum value of 4. I then put on my "bad guy" hat on and asked: How *else* can I change the value in this field? Near my armrest was a small phone console; you know, the one where you can make very important calls for a mere $22 per minute. I noticed that the phone had a numeric keypad and that it also controlled this television monitor embedded in the seat in front of me.
I then touched the screen in front of me to highlight the number "4" in the options configuration shown in Figure 1. I tried to enter the number 10 into that field through the phone keypad with no luck: it first changed to the number "1" followed by the number "0". Frustrated, I then made the assumption that it would only accept single digit values. My next test case was the number "8"; no luck there either, the number didn't change at all. I then tried the number 5: success! '5' is an interesting test case, it's a "boundary value" just beyond the maximum allowed value of the field which was '4'. A classic programming mistake is to be off by 1 when coding constraints. For example, the programmer may have intended to code the statements:
0 value 5
When what actually got coded was
0 value = 5
I now had the software exactly where I wanted it, in an unintended state; the illegal value 5 was now in my target field. I then turn my attention back to the screen and hit the + button which, to my complete surprise, incremented the value to 6! Again, an implementation problem, the increment constrain probably said something like "if value = 4 do not increment." In this case, the value wasn't 4 but 5 so it happily incremented it to 6! I then continue to increment the value by pressing the + button until I get to 127 and then I pause for a moment of reflection. 127 is a very special number; it is the upper bound of a 1 byte signed integer. Strange things can happen when we add 1 to this value, namely that 127 + 1 = -128! I considered this for a moment as I kicked back a small bag of peanuts and in the interest of science I boldly pressed the + button once more. Suddenly, the display now flashes -128 just for an instant and then poof...screen goes black.
Poof...screen of the person next to me goes black.
Screens in front of me and behind me go black.
The entire plane entertainment system goes down (and thankfully the cascading system failure didn't spill over to the plane navigation system)!
After a few minutes of mumbling from some of the passengers, a fairly emotionless flight attendant reset the system and all was well. I landed with a new-found respect for the game of Tetris and consider this to be the most entertaining version of it I have ever played.
Normally, I'd be on the customer's side in a scenario like this.
That said, considering how often these "deals" get exploited by thousands of people via FatWallet, SlickDeals and the like, I can't help but think that Amazon got reamed by this. And considering the kind of greedy bastards that frequent those sites - the ones who'd order fifty copies of each show, brag about it online, and then post them all on eBay a week later - I can't say I feel for them if that's the case.
Really, it's hard to say that Amazon did anything wrong here from my POV. It wasn't a pricing mistake - it was a software glitch. Same end result, maybe, but no living person at Amazon agreed on that transaction, and they sure as hell wouldn't have if they'd had the chance to.
I'd say taking a franchise from RTS to MMORPG requires at least some innovation. Innovation doesn't necessarily require an entirely new setting; if the mechanics and the game itself change significantly (as did Warcraft), that could be enough on its own.w
Besides, "MMO" doesn't entail the same thing as "MMORPG." If Blizzard were to release a Starcraft MMORPG, I suspect that it would cannibalize subscribers from WoW more than it would bring in new players. Since we don't know anything yet, why not have a little bit of faith?
Between the hiring of RTS developers, the constant hints about Starcraft, and the fact that the game's tenth anniversary is coming up...well, it's just a hunch, really, but it's starting to sound more and more likely that this project is some kind of Starcraft MMOG, however that would work.
I know that I'm not the only one considering this, and that there have been thousands - if not millions - of wrong predictions about gaming. That said, considering how popular Starcraft still is today, if Blizzard doesn't bring the franchise back in some form in the future it would be a horrendously bad business decision. As long as the game isn't terrible (and Blizzard's track record is still very solid, lest we forget), it'd sell like hotcakes and would help to bring in money from the crowd that's not up for the time commitment and fees that MMORPGs require.
Considering that part of the appeal of Kingdom Hheats is the Final Fantasy characters, I'm sure Disney wouldn't let Square go very easily.
And lest we forget, weren't both of the games uber-successful? Why stop doing something that's guaranteed to give you buckets of money?
You mean that we're not supposed to throw the DS?
Oops. >_>
As was mentioned in another article, it's not a recall. The replacement is entirely voluntary, and Nintendo has stated that their product testing showed the original strap was sturdy enough (though these douche bags seem intent on proving otherwise).
Not that that alters your point in the slightest, but this might end up playing into the lawsuit somehow, maybe in that since it's not mandatory they're allowing people to continue using "defective products" or some kind of bullcrap like that.
Yes, it's innovative, but since when has innovation paid off in the games industry of late?
The Nintendo DS? Guitar Hero? Katamari Damacy? Geometry Wars?
Say what you will about the definition of innovation (and I know that this will probably lead to arguing about just that), but the DS and the games listed were all significant departures from most of what's being churned out today...and they all sold remarkably well because of it.
You could speculate that perhaps quantaties of the game - and especially the Wii hardware - have become near-impossible to secure in Japan...
Speculate? Unless Japan's love of Nintendo has fallen off a cliff, that's exactly what's happening. You don't buy the game if you don't have a Wii. There aren't any Wiis to buy. Therefore, people aren't going to buy the game.
Personally, I'm amazed there are enough 360s in Japan for the game to sell that well, going from Microsoft's abysmal track record there thus far.
I'm going to take a wild guess and assume you didn't even read the full summary.
I saw a copy of the PC game Grim Fandango, a complete masterpiece that most people never played, for $6 on eBay. Since it came out in 1998, you can probably find an abandoned computer on the curb that will play it. You'll be experiencing about 98.5 percent of the fun that the Getty heir who bought the PS3 is having, at about 1 percent of the price.
$6 game + $0 computer = $6. No Dreamcast involved there.
Anyone else remember the furor over Battlefield 2142 in-game ads from a few months back?
One of my friends who's a diehard addict to BF2 downloaded the demo and said it took him three full rounds to even notice the ads, and that they didn't bother him once he did. I've heard the same from my other friends who are fans of the series, which leads me to think that this really isn't as big of a deal as people on Slashdot and Digg make it out to be. Of course, there's sales figures as well; I don't think EA's noticed a drastic drop in the number of copies of BF2142 sold as compared to BF2, though I'm basing that off of observation (stores not having the game in stock and online discussion) and sales charts.
Take Two is a different company, yes, but they're undoubtedly smart enough to make sure that the ads won't intrude on the game itself.
Game publishers exist to make money. This is a method for them to do it. You can complain about paying for a game that includes ads; by that same logic, you could complain about buying a DVD (trailers before the main menu) or a magazine and boycott those too. Unless things change significantly, this is a trend that's only going to continue.
One correction - Pokémon was anything but toy based. The game came first.
The game is user moddable, and this is a user mod. I could do an HL2 model of JT (theoretically) and shoot him up, and apparently that'd be Valve's fault.
Well, wasn't it Rockstar's fault that a user mod allowed people to have wild sex in GTA: San Andreas? According to our buddy Jack, that was definitely the case. True, the content was on the physical disc, but since there wasn't any way to access it sans mod, I think it falls into the same general category.
Blaming Valve for that - or, here, blaming Activision for the create a fighter screenshot - seems to be right in line with his previous actions.
My high school had a similar issue, and their reaction was simple. They removed all - ALL - but maybe five programs from the start menu. If you wanted Microsoft Office or Internet Explorer, you were in luck. Anything else...well, not so much. If that wasn't bad enough, they also removed access to Windows Explorer, which made using things like USB drives virtually impossible, meaning that, because of the exceedingly strict filter, the only possible way to send files home at all was floppy, and even that was strongly discouraged.
This was two years ago, mind you.
Whatever you do, don't go that route. Someone will always find a way to break the system and to have fun with it, but it's entirely possible to make the computers so dysfunctional that they lose any value as an academic tool.
I wasn't surprised to come here and see the "Physical copy with better quality and extras = WIN" argument posted, over and over and over. Unless I've missed it, though, the people making the argument are missing a key point...
Most people don't know or care about the differences between digital media and the physical DVD.
The retailers have already figured out through the music poriton of the iTunes store that, for millions of people, the difference in quality, flexibility, and future usability doesn't matter enough to justify getting the physical version instead of paying for the (often cheaper and easier) download. And if it can meet the needs of the person who bought it, why complain? After all, if all they want is for it to play on their iPod now, why not download it?
Not that this is anything new, mind you, and I'm not saying that I disagree with the users here...it just always amazes me how many are shocked and awed by the fact that anyone would even CONSIDER downloading that DRMed piece of "crap."
I see someone's finally figured out how to have an entertaining Slashdot thread.
If you post a link to the patent instead of an article, you're virtually guaranteeing that no one will read the fucking article, let alone understand it! And just think of the wacky hijinks and hilarity that are bound to ensue from there!
The (semi-ironic) twist here?
The album, according to Amazon, is being released as a DualDisc, and that means that some computers and players won't be able to handle the album. Of three computers in my dorm room last year, none of them could play the newest Springsteen album.
Because of the format choice, there might be some people that don't have any choice but to download the song, either legally (assuming iTunes sells it like they do some of his other albums) or through other means.
Oh, awesome. Then where's my Sonic Mega Collection Plus for PSP?
You're right - that doesn't exist and probably never will. To be fair, though, I don't believe you mentioned the PSP once in your original post, and because the number of people who own a PSP is very, VERY small compared to the number who own a PS2, I guessed PS2 instead of PSP.
And regardless of Sega's management mishaps, you've got to admit that it makes zero business sense to remove a product that's still viable and not technologically outdated from the market by replacing it yourself is a boneheaded move. Again, this was written with the PS2 assumption in mind.
They're included; the catch is that you've got to unlock most of them by playing the games you start out with a set number of times (twenty, I believe).
:)
Even if those HADN'T been included, though, the compilation is still well worth your $20 if you're a fan of Sonic.
Where's your Sonic 3 and Knuckles? In the Sonic Mega Collection Plus, of course. They've got Sonic 3 and Knuckles, the Sonic 1 and Knuckles bonus stage game, Sonic 2 and Knuckles...why, everything you think is missing! And for only $20 to boot!
Sega isn't run by idiots. Including all of the Sonic games in the package would mean that the incentive for buying the Mega Collection is close to zero. Even if it's an older title, it's still being produced and there's still some level of demand for it.
In any case, there won't BE another collection, more than likely, because this covers most of the bases as far as notable Genesis titles go. It might not be perfect, but this is easily one of the strongest retro compilations we've seen yet, and anyone who doesn't think it'll sell well is a fool.
In all seriousness, if you're going to go and do something...do it right. Go big.
:)
Ann Arbor's a college town with 30,000+ students. Between the sheer size of the campus and the fact that the College of Engineering is a target perfectly suited for this, I bet you could whip up a very nice protest. You could definitely organize something big enough to get the Detroit media's attention, and if done right, it could go farther than that.
And if you do, I'll be there. After all, when you go to the college in question, it's easy to get there.
One part of the argument seems to be...well, crap.
SIMS2 - selling poorly compared to the outdates Sims and the 65,000 expansions packs that sold at the same price.
Of course, The Sims was a 2D game that wasn't very taxing on older machines. The Sims 2, however, is pretty shiny 3D and requires a more powerful machine to run.
That 65,000 number, too, doesn't mean a ton - between bundling expansions together and price drops, they haven't been sold at anywhere near full price. Hell, the original and all of the expansions (in some form, usually in bundles of three) are still being sold today. The Sims 2 has years ahead of it to catch up, unless EA decides to let it go instead of adding more and more content to it like they did for the original.