British game developers have launched an all-out war against illegal file-sharers. They're not about to take piracy in the industry sitting down. But the music industry, another victim of the pirates, aren't backing them up on this cause. It's an apparent disagreement in approach and disposition.

The Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association (ELSPA) and some of its partners recently conducted a raid which yielded illegally copied Nintendo DS games stored on discs. Meanwhile, ELSPA's crime unit head, John Hillier, wants to remind gamers (whatever console you may own) the detestable effects of piracy on the whole industry. For more on this raid, head on over to the full article for more information.

A recent study shows that violent video games threaten even Saudi Arabia's society, with piracy allowing children to get a hold of these interactive forms of entertainment that contain evil scenarios of combating security forces, destroying state property, and violating people in various ways. More on this at the full article.

Taking a look at the games from both the east and the west, there's no denying both have their own charm in wooing their respective crowds. However, some gamers enjoy crossing the lines and end up playing games, despite the fact they don't understand a word of what the characters say.

Read more about import gamers in the full article!

(Editors Note: Welcome to our 9th ish! I won't be spoiling anything here, dig on all the news below. One request though: Quickjump QuickPeek is here to stay, and we would appreciate any kind of ideas you have on improving it. Are four articles per blog enough? How should we select top stories? Do we need polls for the comment of the week? Do tell us!)

New week, new breakthroughs, new issue. The last week was one of the most monumental so far, so if you've missed checking our sites, you're a goner. Nah, we're just messing with you. That's what QuickJump QuickPeek is for, to provide you guys with the week's top events. Sure, nothing beats being among the first to read about newsbreakers once they hit our pages, but the QuickPeek experience is close enough. On to this week's issue!

The full issue awaits after the jump!

According to a report by market intelligence firm Niko Partners, China's video game industry has surged an impressive two-thirds last year. The fifth annual report stated that the local industry has jumped a stunning 68% in 2006, in cohesion with an even larger 74% rise (since 2005) in the MMO segment of the industry.

Online gaming profits has risen to approximately US$ 995 million, which Niko Partners has attributed to the growing popularity of the free-to-play MMO business model.

According to the analysts, players have been spending more on free-to-play Asian MMO games than on Western subscription-based online games.

Also impressive is the fact that in a country fraught with piracy, legitimate offline PC title sales also rose by 28%. Analysts say that this is due to the fact that the most popular of gaming platforms there is the PC, allowing the public full use of over 20 million of them over 225,000 computer cafes nationwide.

Players who cannot afford to buy their own computer drop by at a local cafe nearest them and play networked LAN games or popular MMO titles - in a daily basis. Lisa Cosmas Hanson, managing partner of Niko Partners, also added, "The intertwined nature of China's Internet cafes, social gaming culture, and few entertainment alternatives at a low price point, will continue to be the basis for strong growth through 2011."

Even with the government restriction on consoles, some hardcore gamers have been able to grab their own console unit for gaming at home. According to Niko Partners, the console industry there (though mostly through piracy) has also seen an improvement last year.

The report, entitled "The 2007 Chinese Video Game Market Annual Review & Forecast Report," collected and reviewed 75,000 points of data from 10 major cities in China, and forecasts market trends for several segments of the gaming market: PC online, PC offline, console, handheld games and the hardware market.

Joel Durnham of extremetech.com informs that in a panel discussion at the Game Developer's Conference 2007, the idea of PC game viability was discussed by a quintet of industry folks that include: Xbox Live Arcade's David Edery, Electronic Arts' Richard Hilleman, Firaxis' Soren Johnson, Epic Games' Michael Capps, and Obsidian Entertainment's Chris Avallone.

As well as the usual PC gaming competing with console gaming debate that's been ongoing for years now, the effect of piracy on the PC gaming market was discussed. Capps in particular notes that PC Gaming is really falling apart and even though it "killed" them to make Unreal Tournament 3 cross-platform, Epic had to do it.

The reason for going multiplatform, of course, is piracy. Big AAA titles usually get stolen and, as Capps says, the market that would buy a US$ 600 video card also knows how BitTorrent works.

The future of gaming on the PC so far looks like it is set to be dominated by "casual" games and MMOs. Of course there's nothing casual about most casual games since the average Chuzzle/Zuma addict plays for 24 hours a week. MMOs are notable since they can't be pirated - unless of course you steal the source code and run your own illegal server. However, those things are easier to monitor than burned CDs.

They also covered the fact that user-generated game content could be big for the PC since console manufacturers try to wield more control over their products.

They end the discussion by noting that even though things look grim, AAA titles might never die on the PC, and that trends are ultimately hard to predict.

Oh well, so much for the good old days.

 Yeah, you all probably know already that the l2extreme Lineage 2 "service" got shut down by the feds. Well, here's the story behind it according to the Feds. Really, we got this from their official website.

In 2003, a computer user in China was able to obtain the Lineage 2 source code from an unprotected website. The code was then bought by a Texan, among others in 2004. The code was then passed on to a business partner in California, who set-up a website, www.l2extreme.com, to offer Lineage 2 at a discount.

The cheaper service gathered around 50,000 users by 2006 - which of course drained on the legitimate game's bottom line.

Despite warnings from the owners of Lineage 2, NCSoft, and despite having promised to shut down the service, the California man rented more powerful servers and solicited donations from users to help defray the costs and collected more than US$ 25,000 in less than two days.

Last November, the FBI raided the California man's home, shut down the game, seized the l2extreme domain and posted an anti-piracy warning on the site.

What's odd about this news post on the FBI's Official Website is that it has this creepy reality-TV feel to it. We say creepy because the thing uses language that reminds you of those reality law-enforcement shows. What's worse is that it just forces you to imagine William Shatner's voice reading it out to you.

Not only was the article itself reeking of reality-TV law-enforcement drama, so were the statements from the FBI personnel involved. Agent Thompson - the FBI agent responsible for the raid - actually said that several other servers running pirated games "ran for the hills."

Hear that, you evil pirate scum! Run! Run for the hills!

But yeah, the FBI will go after you if you run private servers using leaked code. So be good people, ok? If you want to check the FBI story yourself, feel free to check our read-link below.

A couple of weeks ago, several developers and publishers of MMOs did their job of crushing the emerging practice of website hacking. In our reports, we mentioned that there are actually different ways to pull this act. Most common of all is third party sites offering in-game items for a hefty sum of money. Final Fantasy XI Online and Hero Online are just some of the games that encountered this modus operandi.

Then you have the much more blatant style, hackers attacking the very domain registry of a gaming site. IGG is a classic example of this, when its site for free MMO Voyage Century Online was hijacked not too long ago. The company had to look for a temporary host just to continue their operations.

Usually, this is the part when we would say "Fortunately, it's all over now." Sorry to burst your bubble, but things got a little worse. The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation came up with a warning today, saying a "handful" of Web sites were hacked and then defaced with a fake FBI seal. The report then went on by stating that the seal was accompanied by "an anti-piracy warning claiming that the site had been seized by the law enforcement organization."

FBI spokesman Paul Bresson tried to appease the gaming public by saying that the matter is not yet widespread. However, he expressed his concerns regarding the misuse and abuse of FBI's name. When asked about the possible reasons for such attacks, Bresson commented, "I'm not sure if it's financially motivated. I'm not sure what their motive would be."

That's the hint Second Life blogger Wagner James Au drops in his post regarding the CopyBot crisis. It's a historical reference to the pivotal battle between Old Napster (you know, "when it was free") and the music industry, the one where Napster didn't become free, but a host of P2P sharing networks mushroomed in its wake, and a new word was introduced into the tech lexicon: DIGITAL RIGHTS MANAGEMENT.

Or the lack of, which is at the center of the CopyBot controversy. Users were complaining that people with CopyBot could copy their info, their data, any object in the world - including the products of SL entrepreneurs. They claim it's piracy. You know, just like someone could copy a CD and send it off to a friend via Napster, or Kazaa, or Limewire, only to have the RIAA knocking on his door in three shakes of a lamb's tail.

You know what's funny? This entire episode which Wagner documented recalls a lot about the debate between "digital rights" and "digital freedom". Initially, Linden Lab didn't really respond to complaints about CopyBot, saying, "Copying does not always mean theft. There can be legitimate uses for copying, just as there are on the web." Same thing with music from a CD or iTunes?

Then there's a comment to one of Wagner's other coverage posts on the same controversy. The commenter replies:

I find it amusing but perhaps educational to see how freely people rip off MP3 or movies or applications or games, without thinking twice that they are effectively violating other people's copyrights... but in SL, they suddenly understand what "content piracy" is all about!

When they said Second Life, they meant it. Now the same DRM battles being fought with Apple, Microsoft, the music industry, and elsewhere are also being fought, albeit on different terms and in a SL flavor of its own, in the virtual world. Next thing we know, those anti-DRM protesters may start picketing Second Life too, if Linden Lab or someone else in the game decides to impose some sort of DRM for SL properties (they recently decreed that the use of CopyBot constitutes a "violation of the Terms of Service," backtracking from their earlier atitude).

But then, as we always say, turnabout is such sweet sorrow - as well as being fair play.