You know, I actually don't find that offensive. A bit tacky, but not offensive.
I hear a lot of hate from gamers that think advertising is evil no matter how it's done. But I just don't see it that way. When done properly, as the examples in the summary, it doesn't detract from the experience.
Burger King has been doing the unlockable thing for quite some time. I believe there's been 2 or 3 race games that they had an unlockable vehicle already. Having 'The King' be in your entourage is hilarious to me. I might even work towards that, if I were inclined to play sports games at all.
NFS:U used Cingular for all their cellphone communications in-game. That was huge advertising. They made it a bit too gaudy, though... They should have toned it down and had it be more subliminal. Instead they made it way too obvious that they were trying to pound their name into your head.
Time will iron out these wrinkles. If the currently ad companies can't figure out how to do it right, new ad companies will be born that can.
A friend is looking forward to this and I said 'Ah, I'll have to try the demo' and he told me there wouldn't be one. My response? 'Oh, it'll suck then.'
There's only 1 reason not to provide a demo of such a hyped game: They think they'll get more sales if people have to buy it blind.
Sad, but true.
People used to say it was a size problem blah blah blah... There's demos over a GB on XBLA. Size is no excuse.
I think another aspect of the social bit is that if you are social, you are much more easily noticed and remembered. People pay attention to what you do, on and off the clock, and you are remembered when a new position comes open. If you aren't seen and simply quietly do your work, it's very easy to forget you.
I know, because I'm the second example in most jobs. Luckily, the company that I'm in now is small enough that it's impossible to hide.
There are 2 ways to get rid of someone: Fire them or promote them. This is not a Dilbert-ism, but reality. Sometimes it's just easier to promote someone out of your area and into an area that they aren't competant enough to handle, and they can be fired from there.
Oh man, I was going to suggest each chapter is about episode length, too. You beat me to it:( (By an hour. lol)
But seriously, they are. I think each of the Rings books could have easily been split like this and had a little more character depth. There was plenty of cliffhanger points, about 1 for each chapter... Oddly enough.
That's what you get when you have a good writer... The tale transcends the medium. (Wow, that sounded really good.) Any way that you choose to tell the story is possible. Book, movie, tv series, comic book, picture book, whatever.
I don't see the Star Wars movies making a successful TV series. And I don't see 'new stories' being much better. Each ep would be like Dragon Ball Z where each ep is 2 missed punches (or 1 that connects) and a ton of talking.
Heh, yeah. It's funny what'll get you hooked and how little it takes to draw you away from 'work'. (Slashdot, for example. -sigh-)
I had the same homework issue most of my school life. The only time I did homework was when it would seriously affect my grades. (This is from middle school on, not just highschool/college.) This is mainly because the classes weren't a challenge at all. To prove that point... During Honors Physics in highschool, there was a group of 4 of us that played cards. All period, every period. We all aced every test. If there was a lab, one of us (we took turns) did the lab and the other 4 copied the results down. The labs were 'group' projects anyhow, so it didn't matter. The other 3 pulled a 4th from the class and kept playing cards. Any homework was always done during some other class period, where they weren't enlightened enough to let us have fun while learning. The key ingredients were aceing the pop quizzes/tests and not disturbing the rest of the class.
I realize not every kid finds school this easy, and some actually DO badly need the study time. But as you said, limiting play options is not a way to encourage studying. The other play options will simply be chosen instead.
The majority of the time spent so far was on engine development and art resources, I'm sure. Now they've got a month at a time to produce an episode. I could very well see these episodes only taking an hour to complete, for the hard-core point-and-click gamers.
I'm still waiting to see if they captured the feeling the original game at all. The video they released didn't, so now I'm waiting on a demo.
I'm wondering how I can get paid to sit at home and earn points for people... Cuz seriously... Wow. I've got over 4000 points on my gamer tag now in less than a month, and that's -while- holding down a salaried job and playing other systems, too.
I mean, I doubt I could make a living off of it... But it could be fun. There are certain games that it's pretty easy to make 1000 points. (dw5:empires, for 1)
I think it was something different, actually... FF7 was the first departure from the old FF structure. The 3d aspect helped a lot, but the battle system and Materia and many other factors made it quite a bit different from FF1-6. The whole game felt different.
FF8 gets so much flack because all those tons of people that loved FF7 didn't want to see it change... And 8 was different yet. And 9 was more old-school, but with modern twists, so it was 'hated'. (I loved it.) FF10 continued the evolution from 8 with more changes yet, and a 'less than manly' story.
So I think it wasn't so much that it was their first FF game, as that it was the first FF game that they were capable of liking.
I think the answer is that if you are the type to learn, you will learn at whatever you are doing. If you are the type to do only the minimum and resist learning as much as possible, you won't learn.
It won't matter whether you're playing video games or mowing the lawn, the results are the same.
There's something this study does -not- say. What should those kids be doing instead of gaming? Sitting and staring at the ceiling? Out at the club partying? Extra-curricular activities at school? If the answer is 'studying' I have news for them... You can forget that. Even if they stare at the book for hours, they aren't actually -learning- anything extra from it, and they'll hate you for it.
Previous posters have mentioned the relaxing effect of video games. I don't wholly agree, but I do agree they relieve stress. Just because it's not as stressful as being behind on your rent and work 3 jobs just to stay even, that doesn't mean school isn't the most stressful thing they've ever done. They need to learn to handle that stress, instead of having it eat them alive for the rest of their lives.
Now, I know some people jumped at the 'extra-curricular' activities option... And that's great for exercise, social networking, and learning to work as a team... But it doesn't really teach anything else. And apart from the exercise, games do all of that already. (Well, some... But then, some EC activities don't, either.)
No, the answer is to make the kids do their studying -before- they game (or watch tv, or whatever), and then let them at it.
Sorry, but that's hideous. When I think windmill I think of a quaint little old-fashioned thing, and I think 'yeah, I'd put one of those in my yard. It'd look neat.' When I see that thing... Eww. I think even -I'd- complain if I were in an upscale neighborhood and someone put one up.
While I don't actually parade around town screaming 'M$ is teh evil' or anything, I do believe that they abuse their monopolistic power. That hasn't actually stopped me from using the best tools for the job, though... If that means Windows XP, WinXP it is. If that means buying a new xbox 360... Yeah, I bought one.
It doesn't matter how many right-headed people boycott MS at this point. Their products are superior to the competition in the ways that matter to the unwashed masses, and they will continue to buy. Those ways may mean nothing at all to techies (herd-effect, etc) but they matter to the general public. That may actually change soon. Despite the 1-button mouse thing, I'm actually starting to consider an Apple for the first time in about 15 years. Unfortunately, I can do most of what I want in Kubuntu, and Apple doesn't take care of the rest. So I dual boot Kubuntu and WinXP. The winds of change are blowing, though.
I heartily support that goal. Unfortunately, most people don't seem to even understand it.
My personal goal is 1 person, 1 vote, every issue. You can choose to abstain, or miss the vote by missing the deadline, but you'll have your voice if you care. The argument on the other side is always 'That's too complicated, we can't do that' and 'Do you really want all those idiots voting?'
My answer is always the same: We're now better connected than we ever have been before, and it can be done. And yes, I want the idiots to vote. People will then only be voting on things they actually care about, because they won't have time to vote for things they don't. Having idiot corrupt politicians make these decisions for me cannot possibly be better.
So you suggest that they don't vote for politicians? Who then?
The problem is not the people voting. It's the people running for office, and the people who choose to put them there. There is very very little chance of someone who is not corrupt making it to the head of a corrupt institution. And so his/her name will never be on the ballet to vote for. From what you've said, they have gained critical mass in corruption and it will be nearly impossible to clean up in any reasonable amount of time.
And this also assumes that people can tell which politicians are corrupt in the first place. How do they really know? And don't say the Media... That's not likely.
Yeah, I'm afraid next-gen does indeed have more to do with graphics and processing power than anything else. In a sane world, creating a new (?) interface for gaming would be easily classed as 'next gen' because it evolved. Of course it isn't truly new, as motion sensing has been done before. Just not from the ground up.
Nintendo's 'next gen' consoles and handhelds do indeed seem to lack when compared to their competition, but they really -are- fun. And that's what gaming was supposed to be about. These days, gaming seems to be more about entertainment (IE: lack of boredom) than fun. Nintendo still tries for fun.
Not that I don't enjoy my x360 and psp. They've got some great games. But most of them are more about staving off boredom during my free hours than actively enjoying the experience.
My examples: Test Drive Unlimited. I hate driving, and yet I play this game... I've actually driven over 200 miles in game, and yes, that took as long as it does in real life. (Well, at 100+ MPH.) Why? I don't freaking know. But I enjoyed it, oddly enough.
And Okami. About half of this game you wander around feeding animals and drawing flowers. Why do I do it? I dunno. But it's entertaining. (Lord knows it isn't the regular battles that I play it for. -yawn-)
But the DS has games like Trauma Center (it was fun up until 2-4, which was ridiculously hard and I quit.)
What's the difference? I think it's the amount of involvement. With Trauma Center, you are really there, cutting things out and stitching it back up. You don't just press a button and jiggle an analog stick. You actually draw the lines for the sutures and cuts.
I'm hoping the Wii continues this and games like Elebits are actively fun to play and experience, instead of just sitting back and pushing buttons.
His example is slightly flawed verbage-wise, but you got the gist of what he was saying.
The answer is different, though. It's not a violation of GPL, it's a violation of copyright. You were given no rights to peek into the application and use the logic within for another non-GPL purpose. The GPL is the only thing granting you rights to that code and it's structure/logic. Technically, you can't 'violate' the GPL. You violate copyright laws. The GPL is just legal permission to use the work in certain ways.
So this really has nothing to do with the GPL... That's a red herring.
Look at it this way: If you peek at the Windows source, then write something like WINE... Would MS sue you? Yes, because you violated their copyrights. It doesn't matter what license MS used to allow you to look at the source, there was no permission given to use that knowledge to create a competing product.
That's why this needs a clean room. You could have 2 teams do this. 1 would pick apart Apache and write details specs on what it does, and the other uses those specs to create a product. This guarantees no code contamination and has been proven completely legal. (I think it's also nearly useless at this point for software... It's too massively complicated to cleanroom things when you could just write it from scratch in the same amount of time and have a unique (and hopefully better) product just by having some idea what the application does and how it could be better.
Let's look at video. How many 'epic' tv shows can you count? How many movies? I'm betting you have a lot more movies on the list than tv shows, and I bet the tv shows took a LOT more time to get to that status for you.
The same applies to video games. You get a 5 hour game every month for 6 months and it'll just seem ho-hum. If you get a 30 hour game with the same plot, it's a lot more dramatic. Why? Maybe because of how it has to be written. The 30 hour game doesn't have to constantly remind you who the characters are. You remember from last week. The episodic game has to not only remind the players of previous eps, but also provide enough information for new players that didn't start from the beginning. That's time lost that could be telling story, or fighting, or whatever.
No thanks. Give me the old all-in-one games any day.
Yes, it'll be 'good enough' 10 years from now, as long as you don't plan to do any more then than you do today. Don't buy any more hardware or software and hope to hell you have no problems.
Face it, computers are one of the fastest changing technologies. Intel plans to have some ridiculous hardware in only 5 years. 80 core CPUs? Crazy. If you think your current dusl dual-core setup (I'm assuming you have the best PC possible to back up that 10 yr statement) will be able to handle what an 80-core doesn't blink at, you're crazy. It's going to have approx 20 times the power, assuming no other advances in speed.
No, that logic works great for cars and toasters, but computers just change too much.
XBLA... Hmm... I bought Uplink and Darwinia already... Uplink gets pretty boring, though. I wonder if they'll release Darwinia free to those who have already paid? Or reduced price, since I'm sure MS wouldn't let them do it for free. Still, I may buy it for the 360 if/when it's released for that... Darwinia was a pretty neat game.
No, I think we thought a little bit further than you did. To continue your train of thought, head off to "but there's only 4 processors, and the other 4 doesn't mean anything" and then switch tracks to "that would be confusing for everyone, and horribly confusing for Joe Consumer."
No, if he was 18 and the game affected that way he is not only a fully responsible adult, but the rating system says the game was okay for him. Once you are 18, you are mostly out of the impressionable age and have moved on to having to think for yourself, instead of your parents monitoring you.
At 14, your parents still have a LOT of control over your life. They can still tell you that you've done wrong, and you'll listen. (If you won't, they went wrong long before this and Lord help all of you.)
I totally agree with 1 and 3 from your points. But #2... I disagree. People throughout history have proven that violence is part of the human makeup. Some people manage to rise above it, but even the best of us still have violent urges. If the existance of violent video games can help people control those urges, instead of acting them out on the streets, I'm all for it.
On the other hand, at the rate we pick fights with other countries, we will have good use for their combat skills when they are of age.
Slashdot Mirror
You know, I actually don't find that offensive. A bit tacky, but not offensive.
I hear a lot of hate from gamers that think advertising is evil no matter how it's done. But I just don't see it that way. When done properly, as the examples in the summary, it doesn't detract from the experience.
Burger King has been doing the unlockable thing for quite some time. I believe there's been 2 or 3 race games that they had an unlockable vehicle already. Having 'The King' be in your entourage is hilarious to me. I might even work towards that, if I were inclined to play sports games at all.
NFS:U used Cingular for all their cellphone communications in-game. That was huge advertising. They made it a bit too gaudy, though... They should have toned it down and had it be more subliminal. Instead they made it way too obvious that they were trying to pound their name into your head.
Time will iron out these wrinkles. If the currently ad companies can't figure out how to do it right, new ad companies will be born that can.
A friend is looking forward to this and I said 'Ah, I'll have to try the demo' and he told me there wouldn't be one. My response? 'Oh, it'll suck then.'
There's only 1 reason not to provide a demo of such a hyped game: They think they'll get more sales if people have to buy it blind.
Sad, but true.
People used to say it was a size problem blah blah blah... There's demos over a GB on XBLA. Size is no excuse.
I think another aspect of the social bit is that if you are social, you are much more easily noticed and remembered. People pay attention to what you do, on and off the clock, and you are remembered when a new position comes open. If you aren't seen and simply quietly do your work, it's very easy to forget you.
I know, because I'm the second example in most jobs. Luckily, the company that I'm in now is small enough that it's impossible to hide.
There are 2 ways to get rid of someone: Fire them or promote them. This is not a Dilbert-ism, but reality. Sometimes it's just easier to promote someone out of your area and into an area that they aren't competant enough to handle, and they can be fired from there.
Oh man, I was going to suggest each chapter is about episode length, too. You beat me to it :( (By an hour. lol)
But seriously, they are. I think each of the Rings books could have easily been split like this and had a little more character depth. There was plenty of cliffhanger points, about 1 for each chapter... Oddly enough.
That's what you get when you have a good writer... The tale transcends the medium. (Wow, that sounded really good.) Any way that you choose to tell the story is possible. Book, movie, tv series, comic book, picture book, whatever.
I don't see the Star Wars movies making a successful TV series. And I don't see 'new stories' being much better. Each ep would be like Dragon Ball Z where each ep is 2 missed punches (or 1 that connects) and a ton of talking.
Heh, yeah. It's funny what'll get you hooked and how little it takes to draw you away from 'work'. (Slashdot, for example. -sigh-)
I had the same homework issue most of my school life. The only time I did homework was when it would seriously affect my grades. (This is from middle school on, not just highschool/college.) This is mainly because the classes weren't a challenge at all. To prove that point... During Honors Physics in highschool, there was a group of 4 of us that played cards. All period, every period. We all aced every test. If there was a lab, one of us (we took turns) did the lab and the other 4 copied the results down. The labs were 'group' projects anyhow, so it didn't matter. The other 3 pulled a 4th from the class and kept playing cards. Any homework was always done during some other class period, where they weren't enlightened enough to let us have fun while learning. The key ingredients were aceing the pop quizzes/tests and not disturbing the rest of the class.
I realize not every kid finds school this easy, and some actually DO badly need the study time. But as you said, limiting play options is not a way to encourage studying. The other play options will simply be chosen instead.
You could always just search for code under the license you want. Instead of all code.
The majority of the time spent so far was on engine development and art resources, I'm sure. Now they've got a month at a time to produce an episode. I could very well see these episodes only taking an hour to complete, for the hard-core point-and-click gamers.
I'm still waiting to see if they captured the feeling the original game at all. The video they released didn't, so now I'm waiting on a demo.
I'm wondering how I can get paid to sit at home and earn points for people... Cuz seriously... Wow. I've got over 4000 points on my gamer tag now in less than a month, and that's -while- holding down a salaried job and playing other systems, too.
I mean, I doubt I could make a living off of it... But it could be fun. There are certain games that it's pretty easy to make 1000 points. (dw5:empires, for 1)
I think it was something different, actually... FF7 was the first departure from the old FF structure. The 3d aspect helped a lot, but the battle system and Materia and many other factors made it quite a bit different from FF1-6. The whole game felt different.
FF8 gets so much flack because all those tons of people that loved FF7 didn't want to see it change... And 8 was different yet. And 9 was more old-school, but with modern twists, so it was 'hated'. (I loved it.) FF10 continued the evolution from 8 with more changes yet, and a 'less than manly' story.
So I think it wasn't so much that it was their first FF game, as that it was the first FF game that they were capable of liking.
I think the answer is that if you are the type to learn, you will learn at whatever you are doing. If you are the type to do only the minimum and resist learning as much as possible, you won't learn.
It won't matter whether you're playing video games or mowing the lawn, the results are the same.
There's something this study does -not- say. What should those kids be doing instead of gaming? Sitting and staring at the ceiling? Out at the club partying? Extra-curricular activities at school? If the answer is 'studying' I have news for them... You can forget that. Even if they stare at the book for hours, they aren't actually -learning- anything extra from it, and they'll hate you for it.
Previous posters have mentioned the relaxing effect of video games. I don't wholly agree, but I do agree they relieve stress. Just because it's not as stressful as being behind on your rent and work 3 jobs just to stay even, that doesn't mean school isn't the most stressful thing they've ever done. They need to learn to handle that stress, instead of having it eat them alive for the rest of their lives.
Now, I know some people jumped at the 'extra-curricular' activities option... And that's great for exercise, social networking, and learning to work as a team... But it doesn't really teach anything else. And apart from the exercise, games do all of that already. (Well, some... But then, some EC activities don't, either.)
No, the answer is to make the kids do their studying -before- they game (or watch tv, or whatever), and then let them at it.
Sorry, but that's hideous. When I think windmill I think of a quaint little old-fashioned thing, and I think 'yeah, I'd put one of those in my yard. It'd look neat.' When I see that thing... Eww. I think even -I'd- complain if I were in an upscale neighborhood and someone put one up.
While I don't actually parade around town screaming 'M$ is teh evil' or anything, I do believe that they abuse their monopolistic power. That hasn't actually stopped me from using the best tools for the job, though... If that means Windows XP, WinXP it is. If that means buying a new xbox 360... Yeah, I bought one.
It doesn't matter how many right-headed people boycott MS at this point. Their products are superior to the competition in the ways that matter to the unwashed masses, and they will continue to buy. Those ways may mean nothing at all to techies (herd-effect, etc) but they matter to the general public. That may actually change soon. Despite the 1-button mouse thing, I'm actually starting to consider an Apple for the first time in about 15 years. Unfortunately, I can do most of what I want in Kubuntu, and Apple doesn't take care of the rest. So I dual boot Kubuntu and WinXP. The winds of change are blowing, though.
2 words: Vocal minority.
I had the same experience up until a lightning strike totalled my system. Not even a hard drive or NIC left. -sigh-
I heartily support that goal. Unfortunately, most people don't seem to even understand it.
My personal goal is 1 person, 1 vote, every issue. You can choose to abstain, or miss the vote by missing the deadline, but you'll have your voice if you care. The argument on the other side is always 'That's too complicated, we can't do that' and 'Do you really want all those idiots voting?'
My answer is always the same: We're now better connected than we ever have been before, and it can be done. And yes, I want the idiots to vote. People will then only be voting on things they actually care about, because they won't have time to vote for things they don't. Having idiot corrupt politicians make these decisions for me cannot possibly be better.
So you suggest that they don't vote for politicians? Who then?
The problem is not the people voting. It's the people running for office, and the people who choose to put them there. There is very very little chance of someone who is not corrupt making it to the head of a corrupt institution. And so his/her name will never be on the ballet to vote for. From what you've said, they have gained critical mass in corruption and it will be nearly impossible to clean up in any reasonable amount of time.
And this also assumes that people can tell which politicians are corrupt in the first place. How do they really know? And don't say the Media... That's not likely.
Yeah, I'm afraid next-gen does indeed have more to do with graphics and processing power than anything else. In a sane world, creating a new (?) interface for gaming would be easily classed as 'next gen' because it evolved. Of course it isn't truly new, as motion sensing has been done before. Just not from the ground up.
Nintendo's 'next gen' consoles and handhelds do indeed seem to lack when compared to their competition, but they really -are- fun. And that's what gaming was supposed to be about. These days, gaming seems to be more about entertainment (IE: lack of boredom) than fun. Nintendo still tries for fun.
Not that I don't enjoy my x360 and psp. They've got some great games. But most of them are more about staving off boredom during my free hours than actively enjoying the experience.
My examples: Test Drive Unlimited. I hate driving, and yet I play this game... I've actually driven over 200 miles in game, and yes, that took as long as it does in real life. (Well, at 100+ MPH.) Why? I don't freaking know. But I enjoyed it, oddly enough.
And Okami. About half of this game you wander around feeding animals and drawing flowers. Why do I do it? I dunno. But it's entertaining. (Lord knows it isn't the regular battles that I play it for. -yawn-)
But the DS has games like Trauma Center (it was fun up until 2-4, which was ridiculously hard and I quit.)
What's the difference? I think it's the amount of involvement. With Trauma Center, you are really there, cutting things out and stitching it back up. You don't just press a button and jiggle an analog stick. You actually draw the lines for the sutures and cuts.
I'm hoping the Wii continues this and games like Elebits are actively fun to play and experience, instead of just sitting back and pushing buttons.
His example is slightly flawed verbage-wise, but you got the gist of what he was saying.
The answer is different, though. It's not a violation of GPL, it's a violation of copyright. You were given no rights to peek into the application and use the logic within for another non-GPL purpose. The GPL is the only thing granting you rights to that code and it's structure/logic. Technically, you can't 'violate' the GPL. You violate copyright laws. The GPL is just legal permission to use the work in certain ways.
So this really has nothing to do with the GPL... That's a red herring.
Look at it this way: If you peek at the Windows source, then write something like WINE... Would MS sue you? Yes, because you violated their copyrights. It doesn't matter what license MS used to allow you to look at the source, there was no permission given to use that knowledge to create a competing product.
That's why this needs a clean room. You could have 2 teams do this. 1 would pick apart Apache and write details specs on what it does, and the other uses those specs to create a product. This guarantees no code contamination and has been proven completely legal. (I think it's also nearly useless at this point for software... It's too massively complicated to cleanroom things when you could just write it from scratch in the same amount of time and have a unique (and hopefully better) product just by having some idea what the application does and how it could be better.
The big thing for me is content.
Let's look at video. How many 'epic' tv shows can you count? How many movies? I'm betting you have a lot more movies on the list than tv shows, and I bet the tv shows took a LOT more time to get to that status for you.
The same applies to video games. You get a 5 hour game every month for 6 months and it'll just seem ho-hum. If you get a 30 hour game with the same plot, it's a lot more dramatic. Why? Maybe because of how it has to be written. The 30 hour game doesn't have to constantly remind you who the characters are. You remember from last week. The episodic game has to not only remind the players of previous eps, but also provide enough information for new players that didn't start from the beginning. That's time lost that could be telling story, or fighting, or whatever.
No thanks. Give me the old all-in-one games any day.
Yes, it'll be 'good enough' 10 years from now, as long as you don't plan to do any more then than you do today. Don't buy any more hardware or software and hope to hell you have no problems.
Face it, computers are one of the fastest changing technologies. Intel plans to have some ridiculous hardware in only 5 years. 80 core CPUs? Crazy. If you think your current dusl dual-core setup (I'm assuming you have the best PC possible to back up that 10 yr statement) will be able to handle what an 80-core doesn't blink at, you're crazy. It's going to have approx 20 times the power, assuming no other advances in speed.
No, that logic works great for cars and toasters, but computers just change too much.
XBLA... Hmm... I bought Uplink and Darwinia already... Uplink gets pretty boring, though. I wonder if they'll release Darwinia free to those who have already paid? Or reduced price, since I'm sure MS wouldn't let them do it for free. Still, I may buy it for the 360 if/when it's released for that... Darwinia was a pretty neat game.
No, I think we thought a little bit further than you did. To continue your train of thought, head off to "but there's only 4 processors, and the other 4 doesn't mean anything" and then switch tracks to "that would be confusing for everyone, and horribly confusing for Joe Consumer."
No, it has been confirmed that there will be no Linux version on the shipping date.
There was hope that it would be available for download soon, though. (I believe they even named the programmer that was working on it.)
No, if he was 18 and the game affected that way he is not only a fully responsible adult, but the rating system says the game was okay for him. Once you are 18, you are mostly out of the impressionable age and have moved on to having to think for yourself, instead of your parents monitoring you.
At 14, your parents still have a LOT of control over your life. They can still tell you that you've done wrong, and you'll listen. (If you won't, they went wrong long before this and Lord help all of you.)
I totally agree with 1 and 3 from your points. But #2... I disagree. People throughout history have proven that violence is part of the human makeup. Some people manage to rise above it, but even the best of us still have violent urges. If the existance of violent video games can help people control those urges, instead of acting them out on the streets, I'm all for it.
On the other hand, at the rate we pick fights with other countries, we will have good use for their combat skills when they are of age.