It's been a long time, but we weren't completely absent from the Internetz -- instead we were raising money for charity and holding our very first video podcast! Dana Jongewaard and Nicole Tanner talk about their special celeb guest from that adventure, discuss the week's (and last week's) new releases, and exult in the joys of Lego Harry Potter.

Questions? Feedback? Stories or delicious recipes to share? Well, please send them to djongewaard@ign.com. If you like what you hear, please leave us a positive review on our iTunes page. If you just want to download the MP3 file directly, you can do that by clicking here. For those of you that want the RSS feed for your Zune/PSP/PS3/other, you can find that right here.

If you want to follow us on Twitter, you can follow the "official" What They Play feed here (for news and feature updates,) and Dana here, and Nicole here.

At the start of the month, EB Games in Australia began a major push to bring an R 18+ classification for adult games sold at Australian retail outlets. The Australian Government has opened up a discussion paper and called for public opinion on the possibility of creating an 18+ rating for computer games.

EB Games Managing Director Steve Wilson told IGN that demand for an adult rating has been high. "Our customers have sent us a message loud and clear that this is an issue that needs to be addressed and we only get one shot at this. Once this Government paper is closed, it could be many years before we get another chance to voice our opinion on this issue. The time to be heard is now.

"This is not a call for violent video games, but rather a call for a better classification system that brings Australia in line with the rest of the world and other Australian entertainment industries, such as films."

EB Game set up a form that makes it easy for Australian citizens to voice their opinions on the matter.

Currently, there is no M-equivalent rating for games in Australia.

Source: IGN

ESRB ratings are supposed to inform you about in-game content in an objective voice. But earlier this morning, game news outlets Kotaku and Joystiq reported a supposed shift in tone the ESRB took with its online database summary for Tecmo's PSP minigame collection, Dead or Alive: Paradise. Far from the neutral tone usually employed by the ESRB, the summary made note of the game's "creepy" and "cheesy" exploitation of women in "dental floss thongs."

GamePro.com asked ESRB spokesman Eliot Mizarachi about the sudden shift in the ESRB's voice. Mizarachi said the subjective summary was posted in error:

"The rating summary for Dead or Alive: Paradise was posted to our website in error. We have since replaced that version with the corrected one. We recognize that the initial version improperly contained subjective language and that issue has been addressed. Our intention with rating summaries is to provide useful, detailed descriptions of game content that are as objective and informative as possible. However they are ultimately written by people and, in this case, we mistakenly posted a rating summary that included what some could rightfully take to be subjective statements. We sincerely regret the error and will work to prevent this from happening again in the future.”

The first summary for Dead or Alive: Paradise read:

This is a video game in which users watch grown women dressed in G-string bikinis jiggle their breasts while on a two-week vacation. Women's breasts and butts will sway while playing volleyball, while hopping across cushions, while pole dancing, while posing on the ground, by the pool, on the beach, in front of the camera. There are other activities: Users can gamble inside a casino to win credits for shopping; they can purchase bathing suits, sunglasses, hats, clothing at an island shop; they can "gift" these items to eight other women in hopes of winning their friendship, in hopes of playing more volleyball. And as relationships blossom from the gift-giving and volleyball, users may get closer to the women, having earned their trust and confidence: users will then be prompted to zoom-in on their friends' nearly-naked bodies, snap dozens of photos, and view them in the hotel later that night. Parents and consumers should know that the game contains a fair amount of "cheesy," and at times, creepy voyeurism—especially when users have complete rotate-pan-zoom control; but the game also contains bizarre, misguided notions of what women really want (if given two weeks, paid vacation, island resort)—Paradise cannot mean straddling felled tree trunks in dental-floss thongs.

The new summary now reads:

This is a collection of mini-games, based on the Dead or Alive game series, in which players assume the role of a bikini-clad female character on vacation on a tropical island. Players engage in daily activities that can include hopping across floating pads on a pool and beach volleyball. Players earn credits after each activity that can be used to purchase new outfits, accessories, and gifts to give other female characters on the island. Players can earn additional credits at the island casino as they wager credit in slot machines and in games of poker and black jack. Some purchasable outfits include string bikinis, one-piece thongs, and sling bikinis. Sling bikinis and thongs often provide very little coverage of breast and bare buttocks. Throughout the game players can view characters engaging in variety of activities—pole dancing, stretching, gyrating to music, and climbing trees. Characters are frequently displayed in compromising position (e.g., buttocks up in the air, legs splayed open, straddling tree trucks, etc.) during these activities. These scenes can often feel voyeuristic as players control the camera to rotate, pan, and zoom in on various body parts as they photograph the characters in different poses.

Source: GamePro

Last week, Game Informer revealed that game publisher MumboJumbo won a $4.6 million settlement against PopCap, the publisher of casual favorites Bejeweled, Peggle, and Plants vs. Zombies.

The charges against PopCap include fraud, breach of contract, and interfering with MumboJumbo's business relationship with a "key retailer." In 2006 the companies formed a contract which gave MumboJumbo permission to manufacture and distribute select PopCap titles in the United States. However, this deal went sour and MumboJumbo has since sued PopCap for damaging their relationship with a retailer by delivering "false and misleading statements," only to use the opportunity to distribute the game themselves.

Today it was announced that with the addition of MumboJumbo's legal fees, PopCap now owes the publisher a total of $7.6 million.