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When attempting kick the cigarette habit, tasks and activities once associated with smoking make the cravings flare. In today's Speak Up on Kotaku, commenter Peter Pan Complex struggles with video games as a catalyst for puffing his life away. More »
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In a survey that's sure to be taken the wrong way by somebody, researchers at the Yale School of Medicine have discovered links between "problematic gaming" and negative health behaviors like smoking, doing drugs, and fighting. But first, good news! More »
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Fearing an adults only rating would hamper sales in one of the game's biggest markets, Blizzard is censoring the South Korean version of StarCraft II, recoloring blood and removing vulgar language to secure a more family friendly rating. More »
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Sega's iconic hedgehog advertising smokes in a Russian store. As seen by reader 2MON. More »
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If it sounds absurd - a video game, costing taxpayers $3.7 million, that nags people who do dangerous stuff all day long to quit smoking - know that "Escape With Your Life" is surprisingly effective. More »
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As a connoisseur of the MMO genre, I've often noticed that your average Chinese and Korean massively multiplayer online games tend to rely heavily on the mouse, often foregoing keyboard movement altogether in favor of the dreaded click-to-move system that I completely despise. So why do Asian MMO games lean so hard on the mouse? Perfect World product manager Jon Belliss believes he's discovered the answer - smoking. More »
]]> http://kotaku.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=5036547&view=rss&microfeed=true Honestly this anti-smoking message from the folks at Tobacco Free Florida could be channeling any future FPS, but I like to imagine it is Master Chief sneaking a smoke, and that it's opening his helmet in an alien atmosphere that kills him rather than the cigarette itself. Habit gets so ingrained that you often do it without thinking. I once lit up in my cubicle at work back when I did telephone tech support, and nearly got fired for it. Is absent-mindedly exposing yourself to the poisonous air on an alien world that much of a leap? I think not. More »
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During the 9-minute or so loading screen of Metal Gear Solid IV, gamers are treated to a close up view of old Snake sucking through cigarette after cigarette as game tips, warnings and public service announcements pop-up on the screen. They're certainly not worth sticking around to watch, but if you do you'll get two bits of wonderful hypocrisy. The first couple of times Snake taps his cigarette ash onto the unseen ground an message shows up telling you not to litter and to use an ashtray for your ash and butts. Then after about five minutes of him smoking you get a message about the harms cigarettes. More »
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Casual gaming site POGO wants you to stop smoking. And while we're a little late on the bandwagon since yesterday was National Smoke-Free Day (which, as there are no smokers left standing today, worked out just great), POGO is still offering special "kick the habit" play rooms, game nights, mini items and even e-cards (back away from the e-cards, people). It's a nice thought, and maybe video games are addictive enough to replace nicotine...but you'd probably have to light them on fire and breathe in the toxic fumes of burning box art paint for the full effect. [POGO via vh1] More »
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Today's Onion-esque story comes by way of humor tech site The BBSpot, which "reports" that Bungie has decided to do what most companies these days like to do when they want to do things better and cheaper - outsource the problem to another country. The company will be recruiting people all over the world to play Halo 3 instead of spending the money to get programmers to redesign the AI to their liking. More »
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