It is really nice to read an article in a major (Canadian) paper covering the maturing of games as a sophisticated medium. Special focus is paid to the morality questions presented in Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (ie, playing on the Dark of Light side for the Force). I suppose it is forgivable that the journalist had no sense of this existing in games before (the Ultima series from the past, Black&White more recently, just to name two examples)…

Along the lines sophistication, I get super excited when smart people put together smart events like the recently announced “The State of Play: Law, Games, and Virtual Worlds“. I spoke a bit with these folks and gave some suggestions on topic areas and speakers… Sadly, I’ll miss the event as it is right between my trips to speak at the first International Digital Games Research Conference and the Australian Game Developers Conference .

And, another display of sophistication is the mock court planned for the Black Hat security/hacker conference. The “Hacker Court” will try the case of a man accused of hacking into a MMOG server and destroying another player’s digital gear. The DoJ will be there, along with a Federal Judge and the pioneer of MMO economics, Edward Castronova (as an expert witness). Mature and sophisticated indeed!