October CGM and Hot Coffee

You can find my interview with Doug Lowenstein, the President of the Entertainment Software Association, in October's Computer Games Magazine. The interview itself ranged over a few topics, but the edited version in the magazine focuses on Mr. Lowenstein's reactions to the "Hot Coffee" controversy and the possible industry response to it. The interview is in a sidebar to Steve Bauman's thorough summary of the "crisis" and the issues it raises for game developers and gamers.

This is, by the way, my first non-review contribution to the magazine.

I haven't discussed the Hot Coffee episode here at Portico, mostly because I had nothing to say that hadn't already been said by a few thousand other people in a few thousand other places. I found the reactions from all sides to be a little overblown and think that a lot of the doomsayers predicting the decline of mod-friendly gaming are a little overexcited. It's really too soon to know what the fallout from Hot Coffee will be. I doubt it will be very severe.

(This month's CGM also has Bruce Geryk's review of Crown of Glory. He gives it 3 stars and echoes some of my concerns about the game. 3/5 is an "above average" score at CGM, and is a little higher than I would have given it. The text of the review is spot on, though.)