Rockstar’s controversial and extremely violent action game Manhunt 2 has become the first to be banned in Britain for a decade.

The sequel to the original game – Manhunt - had been condemned by The British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) on the grounds of “unrelenting focus on brutal slaying” and “constantly encourages visceral killing”.

The ruling by the authorities means the game set for PlayStation 2 and Nintendo Wii cannot be legally sold anyway in the United Kingdom.

David Cooke, director of the BBFC, said: “Rejecting a work is a very serious action and one which we do not take lightly.

“Where possible we try to consider cuts or, in the case of games, modifications which remove the material which contravenes the board’s published guidelines. In the case of Manhunt 2, this has not been possible.”

The original game was given an 18 classification back in 2003 and was later blamed for the murder of a 14-year-old boy.

Stefan Pakeerah was stabbed and beaten to death in Leicester in February 2004 and his parents claimed the killer, Warren LeBlanc, 17, was inspired by the computer game.

At the time, the BBFC described the game as being “at the very top end of what the board judged to be acceptable at that category”.

The mother of the victim, Giselle, was “absolutely elated” that Manhunt 2 had been banned.

“Manhunt represents a genre of games that are not, in my view and the views of many other people, fit for public consumption,” she said.

“We have been campaigning against these games for a long time and the BBFC made the right decision. Why don’t these companies invest their energies into creating material that is helpful to society?”

Issuing a certificate to Manhunt 2 would risk the possibility of “unjustifiable harm” to adults and minors, the BBFC concluded.

“Manhunt 2 is distinguishable from recent high-end video games by its unremitting bleakness and callousness of tone in an overall game context which constantly encourages visceral killing with exceptionally little alleviation or distancing,” said Cooke.

“There is sustained and cumulative casual sadism in the way in which these killings are committed, and encouraged, in the game.
“The game’s unrelenting focus on stalking and brutal slaying and the sheer lack of alternative pleasures on offer to the gamer, together with the different overall narrative context, contribute towards differentiating this submission from the original Manhunt game.”

Paul Jackson, director general of the Entertainment Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSP), which represents the computer and video games industry, said: “A decision from the BBFC such as this demonstrates that we have a games ratings system in the UK that is effective.”

Leicester MP Keith Vaz, who campaigned with Mrs Pakeerah against the sale of the game, said: “This is an excellent decision by the BBFC, showing that game publishers cannot expect to get interactive games where players take the part of killers engaged in ‘casual sadism’ and murder.”

Last week, Prime Minster Tony Blair spoke out against another violent video game (on the PlayStation 3), Resistance: Fall of Man, which features a shoot-out in Manchester cathedral.

He said of the video game industry: “It’s important that people understand there is a wider social responsibility as well as simply responsibility for profit.”

The last game to be refused classification was Carmageddon in 1997 but the BBFC’s decision was later overturned on appeal.

Rockstar Games now has six weeks to submit an appeal.

These are the first pictures of the new Fender Stratocaster guitar controller for Rock Band. It looks great compared to the Fisher Price-controller currently available on PlayStation 2 and Xbox 360 (for Guitar Hero).

The Fender Stratocaster will feature ten fret buttons (five at the top of the neck with five smaller buttons near the body). The colours can only be viewed from the side which doesn’t clutter the overall look of the guitar.

In addition, this new Fender Stratocaster will allow wannabe guitarists to manipulate sounds through “reverb, flange, wah, delay and more.” No details on the price just yet but this exciting game from EA/MTV/Harmonix will indeed rock!

Anime fansubber’s that have have worked on the hugely popular animé franchise “Death Note” would have woken up to some rather nice letters. VIZ Media, the company that has bought the licensing rights to Death Note has sent out cease and desist letters informing that the said fansubbers are infringing copyright regulations. You can look at one of the official letters that have been sent here.

For supporters of fansubbers this is a large blow but many will see this as a morale victory for the industry. However it is yet to be known how the fansubbers will react, if they will indeed cancel subbing the animé and terminate distribution or some like others have in the past, simply ignored it. What is your stance on fansubbers in general?

It seems Microsoft has secured a nice deal between RockStar to put all episodic downloadable content only on the XBOX360. How did Microsoft manage to secure such a deal? Easy. Throw $50 MILLION into Rockstar’s hands for the full rights.

Could that be the reason for the delays in the game? I know Microsoft have been pretty aggressive in trying to make the XBOX360 the number 1 platform to have and by securing exclusive rights for such content is seen as one way. Microsoft knows that Grand Theft Auto IV will be a massive game and that by gaining any sort of exclusivity gives them the advantage over their rivals - Sony.

Even if we agree or not that this is the best way to do business, it has happened. Now it lies with Rockstar to produce the goods as Microsoft hope to grab a much larger piece of the videogame pie.

Lewis Hamilton took his second consecutive Grand Prix victory at Indianapolis after a race-long duel with his McLaren-Mercedes team-mate Fernando Alonso. Hamilton’s second win follows last weekend’s fantastic performance in which the young rookie scored his dream result after only six races.

Lewis led from pole position and despite constant pressure from Fernando in the 73-lap race; the championship leader drove a commending race from the front.

The only situation for Lewis came on lap 38, in which the Toro Rosso of Vitantonio Liuzzi held him up. The backmarker heading into the pits, but the lost of momentum gave Alonso the slipstream as they headed onto the pit straight. The two silver cars were wheel-to-wheel but Lewis held his line into the first corner – defended his track position – and that frustrated Alonso.

In the end, McLaren achieved another perfect one-two result that pleases Ron Dennis, the team’s manager. The Vodafone-sponsored team are on a roll after dominating the Monaco Grand Prix.

Ferrari’s Felipe Massa finished in a lonely third, ahead of his team-mate Kimi Raikkonen – who recovered after losing two places at the start. The Finn spent his opening stint trapped behind the BMW-Sauber of Nick Heidfeld and Heikki Kovalainen’s Renault. Kimi eventually went passed both after switching to the soft Bridgestone tyres at his first stop, which gave him the opportunity to set the fastest lap as he gained on his team-mate near the final stages of the race.

Kovalainen followed up with his recent performance in Canada with a strong fifth place finish, having led for several laps thanks to his long opening stint. The late retirement of Nico Rosberg with engine failure in his Williams, made life a little easier for the Finn.

Rosberg’s sad demise was a bonus for Toyota’s Jarno Trulli, who finished in sixth after fighting off the challenge of Mark Webber in the Red Bull. As for Sebastian Vettel, the 19-year-old driving for BMW-Sauber, scored a point on his debut with eighth.

But that was a small reward for the team as Nick Heidfeld had been heading for a possible fourth until power steering and gearbox problems intervened to drop him to fifth, and then to prompt his retirement with hydraulics failure on lap 59.

As ever Lewis Hamilton was the star of the weekend and after winning his first Formula One race in Montreal a week ago, the Briton is overwhelmed with emotion in how well it has gone so far.

“What a dream,” said a delighted Hamilton. “To come into two circuits that I didn’t know, first time, to really come out with such pace and see the team moving forward and being competitive.

“They have done a fantastic job. This wouldn’t have been possible without them, and the guys here did a fantastic job.

“It is a perfect team and I am glad I put the icing on the cake.

“Really I am just extremely pleased and proud of the team. I never thought in a million years I would be here against these drivers here. It is a great leap in my career and my life, I am thankful to my family and the guardians of the team.”

Hamilton admitted it was tough to keep Alonso behind him, especially during the second stint, when Alonso was right behind.

“The first couple of laps were close and then I managed to pull a slight gap and maintain it, and in the middle stint my tyres started to grain so Fernando was right up my tail,” Hamilton added.

“It was extremely difficult, he was in my slipstream, it was very tough but he fought very well, very professional but in the end I was able to pull a gap, maintain it and win the race.”

Hamilton has now scored 58 points in seven races, ten more than Alonso and 19 more than Ferrari’s Felipe Massa. In the constructors’ standings McLaren are now 35 points clear of Ferrari in the constructors’ title chase.

The Formula One circus heads back into Europe in July with another back-to-back racing weekend in France and Britain. Can Lewis continue his winning form and scored that home victory in Silverstone? Or will Alonso strike back in his bid to defend his title?

US Grand Prix result – 73 laps

1. HAMILTON McLaren 1h39:09.065
2. ALONSO McLaren +1.5s
3. MASSA Ferrari +12.8s
4. RAIKKONEN Ferrari +15.4s
5. KOVALAINEN Renault +41.4s
6. TRULLI Toyota +66.7s
7. WEBBER Red Bull +67.3s
8. VETTEL BMW +67.7s
9. FISICHELLA Renault +1 lap
10. WURZ Williams +1 lap
11. DAVIDSON Super Aguri +1 lap
12. BUTTON Honda +1 lap
13. SPEED Toro Rosso +2 laps
14. SUTIL Spyker +2 laps
15. ALBERS Spyker +3 laps
16. ROSBERG Williams +5 laps
17. LIUZZI Toro Rosso +5 laps
R. HEIDFELD BMW +18 laps
R. SATO Super Aguri +60 laps
R. COULTHARD Red Bull +73 laps
R. BARRICHELLO Honda +73 laps
R. SCHUMACHER Toyota +73 laps

Fastest lap: RAIKKONEN – lap 49 1min. 13.117secs.

Canadian Grand Prix winner Lewis Hamilton takes his second successive pole position for Team McLaren Mercedes, with his world champion team-mate Fernando Alonso in second.

It was another fantastic performance from Lewis, as Fernando was the fastest driver throughout the practice sessions leading up to qualifying.

But in the final moments in session three – the top ten shootout – Hamilton hooked up two perfect laps to seal pole position in the United States Grand Prix.

His lap time of one minute, 12.331 seconds was only a few tenths quicker over team-mate Alonso. Both drivers lock out the front row for the third consecutive time and it will be a fascinating contest between them for overall race victory.

Behind the two silver cars came the Ferraris of Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen (third and fourth respectively). The red cars seem to be struggling and at one point, were behind the BMW-Saubers. It was a great recovery by the Italian team but extra performance is needed in order to get back on terms with McLaren.

Nick Heidfeld qualified his BMW-Sauber in P5, ahead of Heikki Kovalainen – who qualified his best-ever position for Renault. This follows on his recent result in Montreal in which Heikki finished fourth in an incident-packed race.

Making his Grand Prix debut is Sebastian Vettel, who is racing for BMW-Sauber this weekend as the team’s regular driver – Robert Kubica – was denied to take part by doctor orders. The 19-year-old German has done a remarkable job to qualify in seventh ahead of Jarno Trulli (Toyota), Mark Webber (Red Bull Racing) and Giancarlo Fisichella (Renault).

Back to the man of the action Lewis Hamilton, who has admitted that he was surprised to be on pole position. The Formula One rookie is driving at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway for the very first time and yet, has managed to be beat his team-mate even though he wasn’t expect to!

“I’m quite surprised to be honest,” he said. “Going into qualifying we had not found the optimal set-up and I knew Fernando would be quick here, but it’s great to see the team are so quick and ahead of Ferrari.

“Going into it I had to pull it all out, and my two last laps in Q3 were spot on, and I just beat my last lap at the end. I couldn’t be happier, I didn’t expect pole as I thought Fernando would be quicker.”

Hamilton added that he was happier with his second pole than he was with the first one.

“I am ecstatic, didn’t expect to get pole. I am happy for the team. Getting my second pole is even better than last week, but when I came across the line and they said I had P1 I was screaming in the helmet for the whole lap, I was ecstatic.

“The crowd were fantastic, and across from the garage there is a flag with ‘Lewis on’ it, there is lots of support so I am happy.”

But will he on Sunday night? As world champion Fernando Alonso says he is full of confidence in the Grand Prix. The Spaniard may be nearly two tenths down on Lewis but he feels upbeat for the race ahead.

“It has been a good weekend for me no doubt,” said Alonso. “I was fastest in practice but not in the important one, Q3, but being fastest all weekend gives me confidence for tomorrow.

“There are many factors at play in Q3, so many things can happen tomorrow and I am full of confidence.”

He added: “I didn’t improve much in the second lap, I had quite good grip in the car and was quite happy with the laps. I think tomorrow we can do very well.”

So it will be another Hamilton versus Alonso showdown. Can the Spaniard resist the urge to pass his young team-mate in a desperate bid to take the lead at the first corner? Will Lewis score another race victory – making it a double in North America? What about Massa and Raikkonen can the Ferraris fight back? And just how fast will the BMW-Saubers be? If anything, the 2007 US Grand Prix should be a thrilling contest.

United States Grand Prix starting grid

1. HAMILTON McLaren 1:12.331
2. ALONSO McLaren 1:12.500
3. MASSA Ferrari 1:12.703
4. RAIKKONEN Ferrari 1:12.839
5. HEIDFELD BMW 1:12.847
6. KOVALAINEN Renault 1:13.308
7. VETTEL BMW 1:13.513
8. TRULLI Toyota 1:13.789
9. WEBBER Red Bull 1:13.871
10. FISICHELLA Renault 1:13.953
11. COULTHARD Red Bull 1:12.873
12. SCHUMACHER Toyota 1:12.920
13. BUTTON Honda 1:12.998
14. ROSBERG Williams 1:13.060
15. BARRICHELLO Honda 1:13.201
16. DAVIDSON Super Aguri 1:13.259
17. WURZ Williams 1:13.441
18. SATO Super Aguri 1:13.477
19. LIUZZI Toro Rosso 1:13.484
20. SPEED Toro Rosso 1:13.712
21. SUTIL Spyker 1:14.122
22. ALBERS Spyker 1:14.597

As reported back in April on eMagi, new details have emerged on Harmonix’s stimulating Rock Band game.

According to a member on the NeoGAF forums, Rock Band will provide a unique and interactive experience of playing in a virtual band with four instrument controllers. These include the two guitars (bass and lead), microphone and drums.

For the guitars, Rock Band will feature ten fret buttons – five at the top of the neck and five smaller near the body. The new buttons will be used during designated solo sections using only hammer-ons and pull-offs (for example, when you don’t need to strum).

The microphone is said to work as a tambourine for parts of a song where no vocals are present, with a “phoneme detector” to judge whether or not you’re singing close to the right words (so individual vowels and consonants are picked up – similar to Sony’s SingStar series).

As for the drums, there will be a set of four coloured pads with a stand and a kick pedal. It is said if you can play the drums set on Hard or Expert mode, then you can play the real deal!

Also listed in the NeoGAF post are details on how the four-player co-op might work and descriptions of the in-progress visuals. You can even design your own band logo for use online!

So it all sounds great, but what kind of tracks would you like to see in the final game of Rock Band? Personally, I would like to play Muse or Red Hot Chili Peppers, though the post did mention ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’ by the legendary The Who. Whether the outcome on the final track list, the ability to jam will be sensational!

American rock band The White Stripes treated twenty lucky Chelsea pensioners with a special live performance at the Royal College Hospital in West London.

The award-winning duo, made up of 31-year-old singer and guitarist Jack White and 32-year-old singer and drummer Meg White, performed five acoustic tracks. The unusual gig took place in the same State Apartments where Mozart once played!

Jack and Meg White opened their set with Apple Blossom and Hotel Yorba before playing You Belong To Me and St James Infirmary Blues.

You might think that the OAPs might not enjoy these modern-sounding rock ‘n’ roll, but surprisingly they did!

One Chelsea pensioner said: “I thought it was excellent. It’s not my scene really because it’s a different type of music altogether but I thought they were very, very good.”

Another admitted: “It was nice but I wouldn’t go out of my way to listen to them.” Whoops… still at least they have the privilege to experience the wonderful music live.

No matter, the band will be return to more conventional gigging with a show in Hyde Park tomorrow (June 14th), for more fans approval.

Pensioners’ playlist - what The White Stripes played:

Apple Blossom – The White Stripes
Hotel Yorba – The White Stripes
I Can Tell That We Are Going To Be Friends – The White Stripes
St James Infirmiary Blues – Blues traditional
You Belong To Me – Jo Stafford
Bollweevil Song – Blues traditional

There has been long standing rumours about a new revised version of the PlaystationPortable and it seems things are developing, perhaps in time for the new E3 event coming up? Sony have been known to improve manufacturing processes over time and have released revised hardware such as the PSone, PStwo and it looks very likely that the PSP will be getting the same treatment.

So what have we heard thus far about the proposed move? Well for starters the UMD tray will be banished and replaced with a simple slot instead. The revised PSP will also have 4gig of onboard (flash?) memory however this is subject to change. The new onboard memory will then allow users to directly download PSone games and demo’s directly to the PSP via the Playstation Network, without the need of additional memory sticks.

The main hardware will remain the same in terms of specs but perhaps using a smaller die and a more efficient manufacturing process which will allow it to be in a smaller enclosure as well as improving battery life. The screen will be identical in size and technology too, being LCD and not LED. Also Sony are toying around with the idea of including Bluetooth into the device, making it more compatible with other devices as well as their own PS3.

Even with revised hardware though Sony must still address the most fundamental thing that is preventing it from selling units in the first place - The games. The Nintendo DS is currently running away with things and has secured some big name franchises like the latest Dragon Quest. Hopefully though with this new edition of PSP things will pick up and I’m sure Sony has plenty more juicy news for us to feed on soon!

Today (June 11th) at the Worldwide Developers Conference in San Francisco, Apple’s CEO Steve Jobs announces to the world press the latest features for the Apple Macintosh, PC and iPhone.

The first of which is details regarding the new operating system for the Macintosh, the eagerly anticipated Mac OS 10.5 a.k.a. Leopard. The OS will feature 300 new features including a stylish way of viewing files similar to iTunes’ Cover Flow. In addition, a new and powerful organisational system for the desktop called Stacks.

Leopard is due to release in October and will cost $129. There is only one version of the new Mac OS X, unlike Windows Vista…

Steve Jobs also gave details regarding a new web browser for PC users with Safari – Apple’s web browser. Steve believes that it can compete against Microsoft’s Internet Explorer and Mozilla’s Firefox.

He said Safari was “the fastest browser on Windows”, saying it was twice as fast as Internet Explorer.

A Beta version of Safari 3 for Windows XP, Vista and Apple Macs running OS X, is available for download immediately from the Apple website. Apple is hoping to replicate the overwhelming success of iTunes, which is available on both Macs and Windows platform.

“We think Windows users are going to be really impressed when they see how fast and intuitive web browsing can be with Safari,” said Steve Jobs.

Furthermore, Apple took the opportunity to announced details over third-party development for the iPhone. But in a u-turn from a previously stated policy, Steve Jobs said developers would be able to build web applications for the device that “extend the capabilities of iPhone… but keep the iPhone secure”.

Instead of having to test each and every new application themselves, Apple will allow developers to build web applications for the phone which run inside the mobile device’s web browser and which were built on existing web standards.

Games giant Electronic Arts were also on stage at the WWDC to announce a series of titles that would be released for the Mac.

The latest Harry Potter game, Battlefield 2142, Tiger Woods, Need for Speed Carbon and Madden Football are all to be released for the plaform, in major boost to gaming on Macs (which has been severely lacking).

Gaming legend John Carmack (Id software) made the announced that the firm was working on an un-named project for Apple Macs, as well as other major platforms (including the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3). Details on the new title will be revealed during this year’s E3.