When I was a kid, I played a game called Super Mario Bros. In this game, the objective was to save a princess using carefully timed jumps, a few helpful power-ups, and the occasional warp pipe.

What I remember most about Super Mario Bros is the fire flower. Once you picked that thing up, the rest of the game was a breeze. You could storm through castles without a care in the world, vomiting flames all over helpless opponents all the while. Hell, fighting Bowser at the end of every castle was downgraded from “Oh shit” to “LAWL” if you still had the fire flower on you when you got there.

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If you haven’t been following MMO news, you may have missed a minor story a few weeks ago in which Mythic Entertainment suffered a small hiccup with their billing system – causing many players to be billed several times in rapid succession. I say the hiccup was small simply because that is the nature of code and computers, and whatever it was that caused the problem likely was some tiny detail as opposed to a multi-tiered conspiracy to cash in on unwary subscribers.

That being said, the issues this little hiccup created were far more concerning than its origin. Reports of bank accounts cleaned out, overdraft fees stacking up, and general financial chaos swarmed the boards over at Mythic’s customer service forum, and those seem to be the lucky folks. Other users reported more dire consequences: interest hikes thanks to bounced mortgage checks, insurance being cancelled when auto-withdraw was denied, or being stranded with no available balance and an empty tank of gas.

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In the last couple of months, one story has reigned supreme in the world of video game news – the rancorous battle of words and legal hearsay between Activision and former employees of its subsidiary studio, Infinity Ward.  What began as rumors of a hostile-takeover-like ousting of two top employees has escalated into a full-on media blitz of stories involving unpaid royalties, secret trips to other studios, and enough lawyer-speak to write the next three seasons of Law and Order.

As with any public argument involving an incredibly successful piece of creative property, the blogs and ‘news’ sites of the world have been quick to jump in on who they think is in the right.  But the real question here is simple:  How can anyone really be sure?

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Mythic Entertainment, the company behind Warhammer Online (you know, that other MMO that you’ve heard of), may be in a bit of hot water with its players.  It would appear that a virtual crap-ton of Warhammer subscribers have fallen victim to a billing error in which monthly subscription fees were charged to their credit cards more than once.

Well, a lot more than once.  20-30 times more.  Needless to say, this is causing some major issues with the playerbase.  Subscribers are reporting being charged as much as $500 for one month, and stories are rolling in about overdraft fees and all the other problems that can be caused when you think you have money, but actually don’t.

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This Infinity Ward thing has definitely been the story to watch over the last month or so, and it looks like it might continue to be the one to watch in the near future.  According to MTV Multiplayer, lead designer Todd Alderman and lead software engineer Francesco Gigliotti have both tendered their resignations and are no longer working with the studio.

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Ubisoft piqued the curiosity of quite a few gaming sites when it announced that Splinter Cell Conviction would be arriving on PC April 27, two full weeks after the game’s Xbox 360 launch.  The gaming community was quick to assume that the delay could only be related to Ubisoft’s now-legendarily terrible DRM system, which requires players to maintain a constant internet connection in order to access the games they buy, however the company is trying to squash these rumors and explains the delay was caused by the game needing extra “polish.”

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In an effort to prove my belief that the only good thing about having children is making them do things that entertain you, some choir teacher taught a bunch of kids to perform the ending song from Portal.

It’s pretty decently arranged, but I really want to know what the non-nerd parents thought of the whole thing; as I remember it doesn’t really end on a positive note.

Check out the video after the jump.

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Blizzard seems to be always working on some sort of neat thing to keep people involved in their ridiculously successful World of Warcraft, and this last patch is no exception.  While they’ve made a ton of tweaks in terms of classes, bugs, and items (as usual), the biggest change this patch is the addition of the Random Battleground system.

Similar to their Random Dungeon system, which was a pretty big success (one I’ve enjoyed from time to time), Random Battleground allows players to queue up to participate in randomly selected PvP Battlegrounds with a group of cross-server players.

Check out the full explanation of Random Battlegrounds in the complete 3.3.3 patch notes after the break.

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I don’t know where companies are getting the idea that putting a number in the place of a letter is a good idea for sequels, but let me go ahead and clear it up in case any industry heavyweights are reading this – No.  It’s not.  Stop it.

Anyway, a user over at Neogaf has posted a scan of an ad from a Spanish-language magazine that supposedly confirms the existence of a third game in the F.E.A.R. franchise, and promises more details in next month’s issue.

Let’s hope one of those details is a better title.  Check out the full scan after the jump.

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Things got pretty ugly at an internet café in China.  A bunch of kids were playing Counter-Strike, and then apparently noticed one of their opponents was using wall hacks.  They argued a bit, and then one of the group stabbed him in the head with a knife.

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