Those who think downloaded games are the future might want to look at stuff like this, showing how companies will milk every dollar out of the consumer. For the first six months after purchase from EA’s online store, you’re covered. You can re-download the game at will. After that, you’ll need EA’s Extended Download Service, which lets you go for two years knowing your content is always available. Of course, this will cost you an extra $7. If you don’t get it and you lose the digital file via a virus or HDD crash, you’re done for.

Isn’t digital downloading supposed to fix stuff like this? Why should consumers have to pay extra for content they rightfully own? The company that handles EA’s store is Digital River, and they seem to be the culprit, and certainly take most of the blame.

The upcoming Alien title from developer Gearbox (who helmed Brothers in Arms Hell Highway) is apparently in trouble. The developer recently dropped between 15-25 employees, citing poor sales of Brothers in Arms. Gearbox president, Randy Pitchford, stated the game hasn’t been canceled, but merely put on hiatus.

Halting a licensed title seems odd, especially since the license has already been purchased. Can’t imagine Fox (movie owners) are too happy about this either. The game looked promising in early previews, and knowing Gearbox’s history, it certainly had the potential to be great.

An infamous game addiction clinic that opened in Amsterdam has come out and stated that gamers aren’t addicts. Nope, they’re simply clueless on the social side of things, and become compulsive gamers. Apparently, compulsive behavior isn’t too bad.

Now, of course since addiction isn’t a problem, the clinic is going to close its doors, right? Ha! There’s still money to made from clueless, worried parents. Instead of treating an addiction, the clinic will now work with patients to develop social skills to make them relevant in that thing known as the “real world.”

So, you’re relaxing, having a good time, playing some games. And then, well, everything happens. An argument between young customers and the manager took a nasty, ugly turn, leaving five people dead (and two injured) when weapons were brought into the fray. There’s still no stated reason for the escalated argument that sent 20 people into the brawl. There’s a chance it had nothing to do with gaming at all.

As a precaution, Chinese police are stepping up security at all Internet cafes until the heat dies down.

I’ll admit it. I’m dorky enough to collect gaming magazines. How dorky am I? I own thousands, all chronologically ordered, with the defunct ones given their own spaces. Unfortunately, one of the true, long running greats has the possibility of leaving us before it hits its 20th anniversary.

Ziff-Davis has been in trouble financially for a while, shuttering multiple magazines. However, EGM has always been a staple, and looking beyond the idiots who believe they’re biased against whatever system they like, it’s one of the best out there (though considering what’s left, that’s probably not high praise to many).

Ziff-Davis chief executive, James Young told the New York Times that they would consider moving the magazine online, although not before the end of the year… which is a month away. Come on guys. If it has to happen, hopefully it can make it 20 years. That would be a fine collection.

After filing one of the more ridiculous lawsuits in recent memory, it seems THQ was happy enough with the results. The problem? Box art on THQs Baja Edge of Control and Activision’s Baja 1000. Seems there was far too many similarities to let it go, and since THQ launched first, they sued.

Instead of taking this fiasco to court, Activision agreed to change the box art (seen above)… after the game has been out for a few weeks. In other words, the biggest burst of sales are done, and not they’re releasing a new batch with new art. Perfectly logical, and a waste of paper.

So, say you had $207 million laying around (and really, who doesn’t?). What could you possibly do with that money? What’s that? Buy a major video game company. Yeah, I was thinking the same thing, mostly because I just typed it.

Aside from that, it turns out someone did have that idea, and that someone was Koei. They purchased longtime gaming staple Tecmo, makers of Ninja Gaiden, Tecmo Bowl, and Dead or Alive. Now, let’s all sit back and wait for the inevitable Dead or Alive Dynasty Warriors cross over. I’m already frothing at the mouth at the possibility.

There’s officially only one game in town since the Championship Gaming Series has gone kaput. MLG will reign supreme with no competitors in site. CGS has called it quits citing that “profitability was too far in the future.” In other words, they’re broke and operations have ceased. They claim their concept came too early, although Korea has turned gaming into a national sport. Why not focus over there and cease operations in countries where the money for this type of thing isn’t available? It’s going to be sometime before the US picks up on gaming as a sport.

Just about every classic retro title you can think of has been ported to flash in some form. There was a glaring blank spot though, and that was Doom. Worry no more. Some poor sucker decided to port the classic FPS’s first chapter to Flash with surprising accuracy. You’ll be losing out on the music and the sound effects are off, but the gameplay is still intact. You’ll need Flash 10 in order to play it, and assuming you have a relatively new PC, it should run smoothly. Hopefully the rest of the game is due down the road.

After the release of Mortal Kombat vs DC and Blitz the League II, Midway will drop between 20 and 30 staff members from their team. Midway says it’s standard practice and normal after the release of a major title. On the other hand, after discovering Midway’s current financial issues, it seems like cost cutting. Also, it seems like Chicago isn’t a great place for game development either. EA closed their Chicago studio entirely after the failed Def Jam Vendetta. Thankfully, Midway Chicago will remain open:

“Our Chicago studio will continue to be the home of the Mortal Kombat team, and we have several support groups and major prototype teams working in the facility as well.”

Hopefully, their prototypes don’t include any more cross overs.

The ESRB recently debuted “rating summaries.” These are handy guides, accessible online or via your web-enabled phone, dive a littler deeper into the reasons for a games rating. It’s undoubtedly a great tool for parents, but for gamers, not so much. It seems that a couple of them have begun divulging story spoilers to help parents understand more clearly exactly why the rating was given. In the case of Resistance 2, the origin of the Chimera is given away (although it’s fairly obvious from the start).

In other words, if you’re a gamer who routinely checks the ESRB for hidden game announcements (happens all the time), you might want to shy away from the summaries for upcoming titles. We wouldn’t want you finding out that Samus Aran is a chick…. oops.

One of Blizzard’s April Fools Jokes was a 2600 version of World of Warcraft. Leave it to the gaming community to make it a reality. While not technically a 2600 title (it’s not playable on an emulator), the Windows version is now available for download. The massive, hard drive filling 2MB file will net you about 20 minutes of gameplay, and graphics more sophisticated than the real thing.*

The Molten Core as it’s called is a two-player adventure, so grab a friend for this one. Hey, it has to be as authentic as possible, right?

*That wasn’t a joke.