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A kid in suburban Chicago boosted a credit card and bought some games and virtual currency online. When the cops showed up to ask some questions, they found his folks, uh, "Victory Garden." More »
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Alcopops are a huge concern for fear-addled parents, because they're sweet, alcoholic, and a gateway drug to total douche behavior. So Illinois is taking a courageous stand by banning alcopop ads from video games. More »
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Canceling your subscription to Final Fantasy XI isn't easy. Illinois resident Alex Edwards found this out after playing the game for a few months. He couldn't cancel online, and no phone number was readily apparent. Eventually his parents got the number off their credit card statement and managed to cancel the account after being on hold for 45 minutes, but this wasn't good enough for Alex or his parents, one of which - Frank Edwards - is an alderman in Springfield, Illinois and a good friend of his local State Rep. To make a long story short, Illinois just passed a law that makes Final Fantasy XI illegal. Well not FFXI specifically, but the amendment to the Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act passed this week makes it an unlawful business practice to run an internet gaming service without some way of canceling the service online, without requiring customers to call a phone number or mail a letter. Hit the jump for the full synopsis of the law. More »
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From GamePolitics comes a news article stating that Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich blew through a million dollars of taxpayers' money trying to fight "a 2005 federal court ruling that a state law banning the sale of violent or sexual-explicit video games to minors was unconstitutional." More »
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Don't quote me on this, but when they say "video games", I think this bill is talking about allowing video gambling machines similar to those legal in the UK (fruit machines and the like), not necessarily the consoles sitting under or around your television as we speak. However, the article, including its headline, includes the phrase "video games", which makes this recently passed Illinois gambling bill confusing: More »
]]> http://kotaku.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=261262&view=rss&microfeed=true A federal judge told Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich that "the time for waffling has passed" and that the state needs to develop a plan for paying legal fees in a video-game lawsuit it lost. More »
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This one got me belly laughing: The State of Illinois has been told that they have to pay the video game industry more than half a million dollars for being chowderheads. Technically, "chowderhead" doesn't enter into the ruling handed down by Judge Matthew F. Kennelly, but you know he was thinking it. More »
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The Chicago Tribune reports that Illinois Governor and temporarily defeated moralist Rod Blagojevich planned to launch a "multi-pronged effort" in his continued quest to protect the youth of America from the evil video game industry. Blagojevich also plans to work with Senator Hillary Clinton on passing a similar law on a Federal level. Maybe a Federal court can strike these moronic attempts at law making down once and for all? Is that asking too much, dear judicial system of America? More »
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Friday, the Illinois Safe Games Act that Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich signed back in July were deemed unconstitutional. Next Generation wrote up a sizable piece on the decision, gleaning some of the best stuff from the fifty-plus page legal decision. So what's next? A couple of things, I'd bet. Blagojevich appeals the decision and we start to see similar cases (like California's) hopefully suffer the same fate the Safe Games Act did. More »
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