Media coverage of violent video games spikes twice every year in the same months, April and November, according to "data journalist" David McCandless.
In a recent TED talk, McCandless showed charts that he believes reveal the patterns and rhythms of recurring stories reported by the media to an anxious public. The video game bit starts just after the four-minute mark.
McCandless conjectures that April and November are the peak months for the media to cover violent video games, the former due to the anniversary of the Columbine massacre and the latter because of the release of new games for the Christmas shopping season.