Jack Thompson - fruitbat

I'm still wading through my old mail and I'm up to October in one account and I see this article in WaPo. Jack Thompson (if you don't know who he is you should totally look him up - he tried to hire a game designer to create a game where you killed video game retailers with baseball bats so he could prove video games are too violent) managed to convince a Florida judge that the game Bully could violate Florida public nuisance laws.

Mind you this was BEFORE the game was released. Given the fairly high security on the game I doubt he knew anything about the game beyond the name and the fact that it takes place in a school. He actually called it a "Columbine simulator."

He says he's going to make the judge watch the entire game, through all possible story arcs, no matter how long it takes. I hope he had to pay for the judge's time when the judge realized he's delusional.

Here are a couple of choice quotes:

Thompson filed the lawsuit a month ago, claiming that the game would violate Florida's public-nuisance laws, which are more typically used to prosecute environmental polluters. Besides Take-Two, the suit also names retailers Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and GameStop Corp.

"My view is that the game potentially impinges on public safety," he said. "I'm pretty sure that the game is harmful to minors."