Press Button B to Jump (In Line)

So let me get this straight – all across the country there were people standing in parking lots for days to buy the season’s must-have gift item: the Sony PlayStation 3. Seems fights frequently broke out between consumers trying to butt in line or push and shove their way to the front. In one particularly ugly incident, a shooting occurred while armed gunmen robbed those waiting to buy the gadget. Gosh, aren’t those all skills you learn while playing violent video games? Jumping? Stealing treasure? Shooting? Killing?

From the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette:

Two Indiana men fought off armed robbers early Friday after waiting in line for about 36 hours to buy the unit, police said.

Andrew Templeton, 20, and David Wiggins, 28, both of Sullivan, each bought
a console at a Wal-Mart about 30 miles north in Terre Haute. They were followed
home by two teenagers and assaulted when they began to unpack the car, Sullivan
Police Chief David Story said.

Police say Dylan Moss, 19, of West Terre Haute, and Dustin Fagg, 19, of
Terre Haute, were carrying a chain and tire iron as they approached Templeton
and Wiggins. Moss and Fagg told the pair to give them the consoles, Story
said.

“The whole purpose of the robbery was to get the PlayStations,” Story
said.

A fight broke out. Wiggins’ nose was broken, and Moss was stabbed, police
said. Moss was listed in critical condition after undergoing surgery at Union
Hospital in Terre Haute, officials said.

In Putnam, Conn., two gunmen tried to rob people lined up for the console
and shot one who refused to surrender his money. Michael Penkala, 21, of
Webster, Mass., was wounded in the chest and shoulder. He was in stable
condition Friday with injuries not believed to be life-threatening, according to
Connecticut State Police.

In Fresno, Calif., police arrested two people and threatened to use Tasers
to break up a crowd that rushed a store and trampled people in the parking
lot.

To get the attention of an unruly crowd of about 350, police fired a paint
ball at the ground outside a Target store in Henrico, Va.

I think they should just make a game called Grand Theft GameBoy and get it over with. Why be subtle?

Perhaps they could sign OJ to promote it: “IF I Had Cut In Line”.

Are there any video games that feature Tasers? Quite popular nowadays. I'm sure the right to bear Tasers was envisioned by our founding forefathers. "Give me Liberty or give me repeated shocks with a stun gun", has quite the ring to it.

Very few line-waiters were planning on using the toy themselves. Most planned to make a profit on eBay. Hard to believe gaming geeks can come up with the average resale price of $2,921 as reported by eBay Market Research. Must have hefty trust funds. Or perhaps be a former state senator? Seems John Edwards, a vocal critic of Wal-Mart (I’ll march to that tune), had asked his local store for a little extra help in getting one. This version of events was refuted by Edwards, who quickly said:

"My wife, Elizabeth, wanted to get a PlayStation 3 for my young children.
She mentioned it in front of one of my staff people," said Edwards. "That staff
person mentioned it in front of a volunteer who said he would make an effort to
get one. He was making an effort to go get one for himself."

Yeah. Right. Do we need to comb through some Cabbage Patch Doll adoption certificates and Trivial Pursuit Genesis edition receipts to see how many were delivered to the Edwards household? Where the laughter of Tickle Me Elmo rings through the halls?

Sorry, but I’d much rather have something practical. Like a robo vacuum.

Amazingly enough, despite fostering this mania, it seems Sony is losing money on the whole deal:

Meanwhile, technology research company iSuppli Corp. reported taking apart
a $600 console, and finding that it probably costs Sony $840 to make.

ISuppli notes that it's common for manufacturers to take a loss on the
hardware, calculating that they'll make it up with game sales. Also, component
costs should come down in the future. "Still, the size of Sony's loss per unit
is remarkable, even for the video-game console business," iSuppli said.

The company called the console "an engineering masterpiece," more akin to
expensive corporate hardware than a consumer-level computer.

You put it in my trunk? Great, great.