In the Groove
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In The Groove to "respect" Dance Dance Revolution
Konami, publisher of Dance Dance Revolution, has settled a lawsuit with In The Groove's developer Roxor. With mighty samba moves and Euro Beat legal techniques, Konami now owns the intellectual property rights to In The Groove -- guess the games were a little too similar.The best part of the agreement is that Roxor must agree to "respect Konami's intellectual property rights." Can you feel that pimp-slap Roxor?Roxor may have been the developer of In The Groove, but Red Octane was the publisher. Red Octane is also the publisher of Harmonix's Guitar Hero, which shares similarities to Konami's GuitarFreak. RedOctane, owned by the Activision, may not have put up too much of a fight to lose In The Groove, but you know the nails are coming out if Konami's legal team goes after the infinitely more successful Guitar Hero. RedOctane may become better known for their legal issues than their games soon.
Overtime Fitness gym for teens includes video games
One day in the future, we're sure that everyone will be strong, good-looking and above-average. But today, given that 16 percent of American children aged 12-19 are overweight according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, there have to be ways to get kids into more healthful habits. As we all know, everyone's supposed to be exercising regularly in order to stay well and fit -- thankfully, kids have a new type of fitness center in Mountain View, California (home of Google!) which aims to appeal to the children of Silicon Valley reared on a steady diet of gadgets. Overtime Fitness, which opens tomorrow (and restricts membership to kids 13-18) includes a regular workout equipment area, a "study center" with PCs, Macs and free WiFi (for the Linux laptop-toting set?), a DDR-clone called "In The Groove 2" and the Cybex Trazer, a virtual reality-type game that maps physical movements to the on-screen action. If all that gear wasn't enough, there's always the Xbox hooked up to something called a Kilowatt Sport, which includes a "resistance rod" to merge the real world with the virtual, or as Ars Technica puts it: "if you're playing Madden '06 and want to run a fullback dive, you're going to have to lean hard against the resistance rod to break through the defensive line." Our only question is this: exactly how are parents going to react when they find out that the $60 monthly fee is being spent so that their kids can play even more video games?[Via Ars Technica]
