First things first: As a PC player I’m staunchly against the inclusion of DRM (benign or otherwise) in games, because it punishes the customer and does nothing but give pirates bragging rights. I also believe that piracy is not nearly as much of a threat as publishers make it out to be, often used as an excuse to treat PC players unfairly. That said, this is an example of why we’re treated so poorly at times....

Destructoid teamed up with Gunnar Optiks togive away a pair of shadesthat help prevent gamers from suffering from headaches or eyestrain as they play videogames. In order for you to have won the glasses valued at $99, we wanted to hear about the worst headache or pain you’ve ever experienced from gaming to see if you truly deserved the glasses.BluDesign, congratulations! You’ve won the glasses for getting grounded by playing too muchSuper Star Warsand your DS/Japan horror story....

We got an interesting press release today announcing a series of licensed “gaming surfaces” featuringStarcraft II. Now, when I hear the phrase, “gaming surface,” I instinctively think, “table,” seeing as that would be a surface on which you would play a game. I do not think, “mouse pad.” And that’s what these are. They’re mouse pads. Now, I understand the desire to make your product stand out from the pack and, from the description in the press release, I’m sure they’re very nice mouse pads....

It’s become a common joke that the new Xbox 360 Slim prevents Red Rings of Death simply because Microsoft took the red lights out. However, it’s been revealed that there is arealpreventative measure built into the Slim, as opposed to a simple aesthetic avoidance of the issue. The new Xbox 360 SKU voluntarily shuts itself down if it’s not ventilating properly, in a bid to avoid damage from overheating. If the 360 detects that it isn’t getting enough ventilation, it will give the player a warning message before entering shutdown mode, whereupon its power light will flash....

Those masters of the microtransaction over at Zynga have announced the sequel to their popular organized crime game,Mafia Wars. According to this trailer, the appropriately titledMafia Wars 2will put you in the role of a guy who’s been shot and left for dead only to rise and become master of a massive criminal enterprise. Sounds like every third gangster story but, hell, at least there’s a story. That’s something. Mafia Wars 2has a planned release date of “coming soon,” but Zynga will be filling in curious parties on aFacebook pagethey have conveniently set up....

It’s a shame aboutModern Warfare 2‘s state on PC, but at least we’ve gotCall of Duty 4to fall back on for our ridiculously impressive mod needs. A total conversion mod called “Galactic Warfare” was foundover on Bitmob, and it’s too neat for me not to share with the rest of you. That video up there should be more than sufficient in explaining what the mod is all about. More or less, it takes the rock solid multiplayer ofModern Warfareand tosses in a whole lot ofStar Warsfun....

When it comes to my rock n’ roll-themed videogames, don’t get me wrong — I like to rock out. But I can’t find any other way to describe this bundle by ArtGuitar as anything other than completely bat s**t crazy. According to ArtGuitar, the RiffMaster Pro bundle is “a complete speaker system and guitar controller package designed to improve the experience of guitar-based music videogame tournaments in bars and nightclubs.” The package includes a fully-functional PA system by Peavy, powered by four 10″ high powered speakers and two tweeter drivers....

The 1UP Network has released their list of nominees for game of the year, and voting is now openat the 1UP Web page. We noticed something while scanning through the list of nominees:Kane and Lynch: Dead Menmade the cut. By now you know whatwe think about the game, and you may have hearda little something about a bit of controversyon another recent review of the same title, but somehowKane and Lynch: Dead Menhas made it into 1UP’s Best Action Game nominees list....

AFrench Web sitereleased a game on the Internet calledNew York Defenderseveral years ago, a so-called satirical game in which you get a chance to “fight back” by shooting at a multitude of planes before they hit the Twin Towers. While shocking online games are nothing new and this one in particular is quite old, it has recentlyhit mainstream news sources, ensuring that a flood of reactions and screaming from people who should probably just ignore it is now underway....

An Xbox 360 demo forAlone in the Darkhas been confirmed for “around launch”by an adminfor the Atari Europe forums. The game launches on 360, Wii, PS2, and PC on June 20 and June 24 in North America and Europe respectively, so expect a demo around then. The PlayStation 3 version will hit stores at an unknown date. Since demos for the other systems haven’t been confirmed yet, some of you might end up having to purchase a retail copy ofAlone in the Darkto experience the wonders of setting things on fire and combining household items to create powerful explosives that MacGyver himself would admire....

Yesterday, many of us were jawing excitedly about Phosphor Games’ potentially magnificent superhero game,Awakened. The concept trailer was pretty rough, so here’s a second one. It’s still in a very early, unpolished state, but it looks a lot better. No Sigur Ros this time, unfortunately. However, it is replaced by a teleporting woman who does a series of impressively animated acrobatic jumps and also has a ninja sword. Fair trade....

[For our firstPromoted Musingthis month, KingSigy tells us why Yakuza 3 totally blew him away. Want to write your own musing for this month? Head over to ourCommunity Blogsand get your post done before the month is over. — JRo] While gaming is my oldest past time and I’ve become very passionate about it, not many games have drawn me in during our current generation. I’m not sure if it’s the graphical prowess that’s off putting or the gritty, dark and brown worlds, but there are few games that have really gotten me exceptionally involved....

Call of Duty: Black Opson PS3 is considered by fans tonot be very good, and if PS3 fans are good at one thing, it’s complaining about injustice. Apparently, the complaints have gotten so bad that Activision is considering pulling the servers altogether, denying anybody the opportunity to play online. Senior support representative Dov Carson made the threat in reply to an angry blogger, who was emailing Activision to complain about the PS3 issues....