justice
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Stolen iPhone cuts assault spree short, helps nab suspects
A group of three teen boys attacked a 30-year-old Winnipeg man and by the next day the three were placed in cuffs, thanks in large part to the fact that the suspects decided to steal the victim's iPhone during the assault. As CBC reports, after assaulting the first victim and snatching his Apple smartphone, the teens took photos of themselves using the stolen device and were eventually tracked down thanks to what is being described as "a tracking app" by the authorities -- I'm guessing it was Find My iPhone or something similar. Later in the evening, a second victim was assaulted, this one just 15 years old, and the police were able to link the two crimes thanks to photos the suspects unknowingly were syncing to the iPhone owner's iCloud account. The following day, all three were tracked down, arrested and charged. Isn't technology wonderful? [via The Daily Dot]
Leaderboard: Would you like a criminal justice system in your MMO?
So I've got indentured servitude jury duty this week, and if you've never had it, believe me when I say that it sucks. And, at least where I live, there's no getting out of it unless you fancy a ride in the back of a squad car and another summons during the next call-out. Why am I telling you this on an MMO blog? To vent, mostly, but also because it's an adequate lead-in to this week's Leaderboard. Aside from ArcheAge, I'm hard-pressed to think of an MMO that has implemented a significant criminal justice mechanic. Plenty of games from Ultima Online to EVE let you be a criminal six ways from Sunday, but since sandbox developers have completely dropped the ball when it comes to discouraging crime or otherwise building civilized virtual societies, there are no repercussions for repeatedly unleashing your inner jackhole. Let's say it were up to you, though. Would you implement some sort of criminal justice system in your favorite MMO? If so, what sorts of behavior would you attempt to regulate? If not, why not? Vote and discuss after the cut! Ever wish that you could put to rest a long-standing MMO debate once and for all? Then welcome to the battle royal of Massively's Leaderboard, where two sides enter the pit o' judgment -- and only one leaves. Vote to make your opinion known, and see whether your choice tops the Leaderboard!
Patch 5.2: Getting ready for release day
Earlier today, we mentioned Bashiok's patch 5.2 release date estimate of late February. However, the blog post in which this tentative release date was mentioned contains a lot of great information on preparing for the patch which should not be missed. Some of the topics covered include: How to reach the Isle of the Thunder King and entering the new raid instance. Throne of Thunder normal difficulty available in the first week, Heroic difficulty opens the week after Throne of Thunder on Raid Finder opens the same week as Heroic raids (Week 2) with a new section each week after that 480 item level needed to enter Throne of Thunder on Raid Finder All Valor points will be reset and converted down to Justice points Current Valor items will have their costs reduced (25-50% reduction) Valor item upgrades won't be available in patch 5.2 Recapping the Legendary meta gem and what will happen to your Sha-Touched weapons Ability to champion select reputations for the first Heroic and Scenario queue of the day The Tillers can also help your reputation by issuing you work orders from the various factions. 5.2 Valor items are tied to raid reputation from boss kills and not dailies (which can be earned via Raid Finder) If you're still looking for ways to prepare for patch 5.2, our very own Kristin wrote up some excellent points to get yourself ahead of the pack.
Patch 5.1: Upgrading your gear with valor
What do you do with thousands of Valor points when you already have all the gear that you can buy from the Valor vendors? Coming in with patch 5.1, one of the cool things is the ability to upgrade your own gear. In previous expansions, we'd reach a point where we'd have tons of Valor or Justice points and nothing to buy. Head on over to visit the local ethereals in the major capital cities and look for the item upgrade NPC. The process for upgrading items is simple. Drag the item you wish to upgrade over to the item slot, then hit the upgrade button. Only items that are 458 ilvl or higher can be upgraded. Blue quality items can be upgraded once for an 8 item level increase for 1500 Justice or Honor points. Epic quality items can be upgraded twice with a 4 item level increase per upgrade for 750 Valor or Conquest points. Once an item is upgraded, there's no way to get them refunded. Choose them wisely! If you're not sure what to upgrade first, I would suggest focusing on your weapons and trinkets. For most classes, you should notice a slight increase in your character's performance. Mists of Pandaria is here! The level cap has been raised to 90, many players have returned to Azeroth, and pet battles are taking the world by storm. Keep an eye out for all of the latest news, and check out our comprehensive guide to Mists of Pandaria for everything you'll ever need to know.
Mists of Pandaria Beta: Item upgrade strings surface
Two interesting new client strings were unearthed early this morning on MMO-Champion related to the elusive item upgrade system that Blizzard has yet to completely flesh out for players. Valor points are changing their focus in Mists of Pandaria, to be used as a way to upgrade existing gear rather than being used to buy all-new pieces. This new system has yet be comprehensively explained, and these new client strings are our first hint at the system's actual implementation. The basic understanding of the item upgrade system is that justice points will be used to purchase the first pieces of gear from vendors, and valor points will be used to turn that gear into better gear. What this hopefully means is that rather than having two vendors selling the same items with different stats, we can have a justice vendor who sells you items and then upgrades them via some interface dealie with valor points. Hopefully, the number of vendors decreases, because right now it's sort of a pain. ITEM ITEM_UPGRADE - Item Upgrade ITEM_UPGRADE ITEM_UPGRADE_DESCRIPTION - Use your valor points to upgrade a weapon or piece of armor that is level 375 or higher. Honestly, I've been under the impression that Blizzard itself still had the system in flux, so anything being said about just wasn't set in stone. Now, with new client strings and references to upgrading your raid items, it looks like the system is closer to completion. It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
The Raid Finder, the Dungeon Finder, point caps and you
I have a theory that either our various caps for justice and valor points are too low, or the amount we get per activity is too high. I'll relate my thinking. I have several level 85 characters I'm running through the Dungeon Finder and Raid Finder tools. Clearing both halves of the Raid Finder Dragon Soul gets me 500 valor; I then run four random heroics, and I'm capped. This means that playing my main any further that week is effectively a waste of time. (I usually cap my valors out before I even raid for a week, which makes raiding just about the gear, but I'm OK with that.) My problem is, I like my main. I'd play him more if there was anything to do. As it is, I tend to cap out on justice points rather than run on one of my alts, and even then, they usually cap on valors as well. (At least two of them do.) I even sometimes cap on honor, and with the new conquest point gains for Random BGs, I could cap on conquest if I really set my mind to it. And while I understand why we have both weekly and total caps on points, it often feels like I'm being penalized for liking the game and wanting to play it.
Dance Central adds Tone Loc, Dem Franchize Boyz, Justice on April 19
No "Funky Cold Medina" 'round these parts, just folks doing the "Wild Thing." Dance Central is adding three more pieces of DLC on April 19.
Former Apple employee admits he sold confidential info, cost the company in excess of $2 million
Paul Devine, the man who last August collected a pretty lengthy list of charges against his name from the FBI and IRS -- which collectively amounted to an accusation of "screwing Apple" -- has now admitted his guilt. Specifically, Devine has fessed up to wire fraud, conspiracy and money laundering, in which he engaged while exchanging confidential information about upcoming Apple products for cold hard cash from interested parts suppliers. He's now having to forfeit $2.28 million in money and property that resulted from his nefarious exploits, with sentencing scheduled for June 6th. Devine's lawyer is quoted as saying he's a "good man who made a mistake, and now he's trying to make amends." Indeed, the mistake of getting caught and the amends of trying not to go to prison. Jump past the break for a full statement on the matter from the US Department of Justice.
Patch 4.0.6 PTR: Justice point trade goods prices
Patch 4.0.6 will bring a new vendor who sells raw materials and resources in exchange for justice points. Many players now capped on justice points have been struggling with ways to spend them. Blizzard has added in these vendors as a kind of points dump for some extra resources, so you're not letting those points waste away into nothingness in your currency tab. Here is a current list of the resources sold and their justice point cost: 1 Hypnotic Dust 200 1 Greater Celestial Essence 800 1 Heavenly Shard 1,200 5 Savage Leather 750 20 Embersilk Cloth 2,500 20 Elementium Ore 2,000 Satchel of Freshly-Picked Herbs (20 random Cataclysm herbs) 3,000 Now, if you think these prices are high, remember that these items are not meant to be bought efficiently with justice points; rather, leftover justice points are supposed to be converting into a little extra in the materials department for you. So far, I think it's a pretty good price list, but I'd love to see Maelstrom Crystals on there for 4,000 points each, which would make some of the upper-end enchants easier. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm has destroyed Azeroth as we know it; nothing is the same! In WoW Insider's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion, from leveling up a new goblin or worgen to breaking news and strategies on endgame play.
iPad versus Kindle: even the Supreme Court can't decide (video)
Supreme Court judges are supposed to be some of the sagest dudes and ladies around, but even they can't agree on which e-reading device is best. Amazon's multimillion-selling Kindle is the weapon of choice for newly appointed Justice Elena Kagan, however old pro Justice Antonin Scalia prefers to battle the bulge of briefs using his iPad. Who will prevail in this titanic struggle? Probably good old paper, actually, as both are said to use their electronic devices as supplements to, rather than replacements for, the old fashioned reading method. See the video revealing these shocking facts after the break.
MagicJack sues Boing Boing, gets bounced out of court
The MagicJack is a VoIP dongle that hooks ye olde landline telephone up to the world of tomorrow via a humble computer. By all accounts, it seems to work pretty well and does the job it promises. Sadly, it doesn't seem like we can say the same about its management team. A post on Boing Boing in April 2008 addressed some pretty concerning aspects of the MagicJack EULA: it demands that you cede your right to sue the company and give it permission to "analyze" the numbers you call, but even more worrying was the fact that no links to said EULA were provided either on the website or at the point of sale. That is to say, every purchaser of the product was agreeing to something he or she hadn't (and couldn't have, without tracking the URL down via Google) read. Oh, and apparently the software comes without an uninstaller. The whole thing could've been just a nice warning tale about not getting into contracts without reading the fine print, but MagicJack CEO Dan Borislow, hardly a man who shrinks from controversy, felt so offended by Boing Boing's, erm, statement of factual reality that he took them to court, citing that his company was exposed to "hate, ridicule and obloquy" (we had to look that last one up, it's just another word for ridicule, which makes the whole thing a tautology. Lawyers, eh?). Unsurprisingly, he lost the case, but he did manage to squeeze in one last act of shady behavior prior to his loss by offering to pay for Boing Boing's silence regarding the proceedings and costs. After he was turned down, MagicJack's coffers were still lightened by $54,000 to cover the defendants' legal fees, whereas its reputation can now be found somewhere in the Monster Cable vicinity of pond scum central. Great job, Boing Boing.
From Azeroth to Canada: Tracking down a fugitive in World of Warcraft
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/Fleeing_fugitive_caught_through_World_of_Warcraft'; If you thought you could hide online, think again. Alfred "Rastlynn" Hightower just found out that when you're playing World of Warcraft, you can't hide from the law. Hightower was wanted in Howard County, Indiana for two charges of dealing a controlled substance and for dealing marijuana, but had fled the country to Canada. Howard County sheriffs had enlisted the help of the U.S. Marshals to track down the suspect, and were working with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to extradite him. However, they had to locate him first.
WaPo: DOJ preparing antitrust probe for Apple, among others
Apple, Google, Yahoo! and Genentech are subjects of a fresh antitrust investigation surrounding hiring and recruiting practices among companies in the tech industry, according to Washington Post staff writer Cecilia Kang. "By agreeing not to hire away top talent, the companies could be stifling competition and trying to maintain their market power unfairly," antitrust experts said in the article. Hiring and recruiting can sometimes be a touchy affair, as Apple found out late last year when trying to hire Mark Papermaster. The investigation may suggest some kind of written agreement among large tech firms to not hire away each other's top talent. According to the New York Times, Justice has only requested documents for the ongoing investigation. Neither the Justice Department nor any of the companies mentioned in the story had any comment. This comes in addition to another Justice investigation into ties between the boards of directors of Apple and Google, and whether or not having Google CEO Eric Schmidt on both (and Genentech CEO Arthur Levinson on all three) constitutes antitrust violations. Some consider Apple and Google to be competitors in certain areas such as phone handsets. The Obama administration is stepping up efforts to investigate anti-competitive activity among high-tech companies, and is already investigating Google's deal with book authors to republish their work via Google Books. [Via AppleInsider]
Lionhead, Stormfront early concepts revealed in art
It's always curious to see the different stages of life game concepts go through before making it into our grubby hands. It's reason enough why we can't stop flipping through the website for conceptual design studio Leading Light. Among the treasures found on the site are some fantastic pieces dedicated to BioShock, as well as a some early artwork from a pair of Lionhead concepts labeled "Survivors" and "Justice." Artwork for the former looks to be for an action game set against the backdrop of a catastrophic disaster, while the latter concept has a more futuristic, almost Blade Runner vibe. With Lionhead's Peter Molyneux set to talk on concepts his studio is tossing around next month during GDC, it'll be interesting to see if either of these projects is brought up during the panel. However, VG247 reports that according to a Lionhead rep, the pictures represent old material and neither project is in production at the studio. Leading Light's site also includes concept art from a project labeled "Titan," including some jaw-dropping set pieces pitting giant bugs against an even bigger robot. The fantastic-looking idea was apparently drummed up by Sony's Stormfront studio before it was shuttered in April 2008. Sure, it's possible that any of these projects might someday see the light of day, but you'll have to forgive us if we don't hold our breath. [Thanks, Adem]
Visions of Global Justice
This coming Wednesday, 19 March, the USC Network Culture Project will feature the work of thirteen talented virtual world artists on the theme of justice, all specifically created for this event to celebrate the International Criminal Court. The artists involved are a talented set indeed from visual, audio and performance fields: Tuna Oddfellow, AM Radio, Pavig Lok, Tooter Claxton, Juria Yoshikawa, Dancoyote Antonelli, Filthy Fluno, elros Tuominen, Chance Abattoir, Adam Ramona, Josina Burgess, Velazquez Bonetto, and Junivers Stockholm.
Xbox rage child killer convicted of third-degree murder
Tyrone Spellman was found guilty yesterday of third-degree murder for killing his 17-month-old daughter in 2006 after she knocked over his Xbox. The Philadelphia Inquirer reports the jury reached the verdict after eight hours, adding that Spellman faces 23.5 to 47 years in prison. He has three prior drug convictions.Apparently, after impulsively beating his daughter to death, Spellman propped the dead child by some barbells in order to mask the death as an accident in the eyes of arriving EMTs. In a post-verdict conversation, Prosecutor James Berardinelli was told by the forewoman that the jury believed Spellman acted "in a rage" but didn't mean to kill the child.
Badges of Justice may not be in WotLK
I sure thought that Badges of Justice were here to stay (especially since Blizzard has been ramping up where they're used and what they buy), but maybe that's not the case. When a player asks if they'll still be around in Northrend, Neth says it's not a sure thing, and that's a lot less certain than I thought I was.I really don't think Blizzard will abandon the turn-in system entirely-- although Badges are a little different than they've ever done it before (and yes, they probably do need a little tweaking in how they're given out), the system works. It gives people a reason to run instances, and it lets you choose what you want to run, and then choose the loot that you want from that run. Token-based loot, in general, is so far a great alternative to the drop or the quest system.However, I can definitely see Blizzard moving on to some new tokens. Maybe as WotLK comes out, they'll just spread these Badges around more and more, making the Heroic loot more and more easy to get, and then when we reach Northrend, the next iteration of token loot will go back to being much more rare.
Stubborn ex-customer takes Gateway to court for defective PC
"Me against the world" has taken on a whole new meaning for high school dropout Dennis Sheehan, who has taken Gateway to small claims court in a completely bizarre catch 22-laden case. Apparently, the now 46-year old Sheehan took his stubbornness out on the corporation who sent him a computer that "displayed scattered graphics" fresh out of the box. After the company purportedly refused to remedy the issue, the two have ended up in court where Gateway claimed that clicking through the EULA upon bootup eliminated his right to even sue; au contraire, claimed Sheehan, who explained that the malfunctioning PC wasn't even able to render the text and allow him the opportunity to read it. Interestingly enough, a tentative ruling on May 24th sided with the plantiff and maintained that the case would stay in small claims court, but it looks like finality is still a good ways off for the perturbed ex-customer.[Thanks, Mike]
Capcom registers "Apollo Justice" trademark
Don't object to our speculation, but Capcom has registered a trademark that sounds like it may have relevance in our daily lives. "Apollo Justice" ... hmm. The first name is taken from a mythological figure, one associated with law and truth, and the last name is also legal-themed. Oh, we got it-- this is the name of the next Resident Evil game.Oh, or Ace Attorney. "Apollo Justice" would be a pretty good name for Odoroki Housuke, the protagonist of Gyakuten Saiban 4. And if that's what the trademark is for, then it's a good sign for those of us hoping for a localized version.[Via NeoGAF]
DS Fanboy Favorites: Jason's top five
All this week, the DS Fanboy staff is letting you in on a few of their favorite titles. Each day, a different member of the staff will present their personal top five DS games along with a snapshot of their gaming paraphernalia and habits, in an effort to provide our readers with a little more information on the tastes and personalities of our writers.It's odd; in the past two years, I've played my DS more than any other system, console or otherwise. However, I very rarely play outside of the comfort of my own room. Sure, I have the ten minute bus ride to campus everyday, and an hour break between classes, but the bus ride is relaxing and the hour I spend on campus, playing chess with some friends. It's really a testament to the quality of the library on the DS, that it would stand against the heavy-hitting consoles without the added advantage of portability.I'm a bit of a Renaissance gamer, playing titles far and wide. Sure, I've grown tired of the World War II shooters, but if a game is innovative and/or well-crafted, I'll give it a shot. I also like bunnies and salsa dancing and figure skating; I'm so macho.
