Mainstream news has gone so far down the toilet that it typically doesn't even register on my radar as something worth paying attention to.

But today, I ran across something that just makes me furious at how lazy, inept, and agenda-driven mainstream news has become.

Most people don't have a clue about the presence of videogames in American culture. No clue that the average age of gamers is 33 years of age. No clue that the process of buying a videogame at many 'big box' stores is more difficult than buying alcohol. No clue that the artistry and storytelling many of these games achieve has reached the level of classic literature.

Having played a recent game called Mass Effect - a game consistently nominated for every Game of the Year award across the globe - for XBox 360, I was well aware of what a masterpiece this game is. Everyone should be so lucky to have a chance to play this game and bear witness to what a showpiece of technology fused with an incredible story that it is.

Well, Fox News typically doesn't let facts get in the way of a good story. I almost couldn't bear to finish watching this mindblowingly ignorant piece of "news":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L13Ct40cFIU


Note how the subtitle reads "(SE)XBox" ... nice one, Fox.

Let me set this record straight: there is NO NUDITY IN THE GAME.

Let me repeat that again: THERE IS ABSOLUTELY NO NUDITY IN THE GAME.

Let me state something else now: THERE IS NO GRAPHIC SEX IN THE GAME EITHER.

What IS in the game is a shot of a woman's bare backside (mainly just her back) for about 2 seconds.

The sex scene that this news article refers to comes sometime after 20-30 hours into the game, and lasts all of five seconds, and is on par with something you'd see on prime time television. And that's only if you take certain paths through the game - many players will take paths that result in no relationships like this occurring within the storyline.

Naturally, Electronic Arts (new owner of the Mass Effect intellectual property since its acquisition of BioWare, the game's creator) has written a letter to Fox News asking them to correct the many inaccuracies of their "reporting."

Fox News' producer then promptly blew EA off, directing them to the Fox PR department. Laughable.

Hopefully pushing some sort of anti-videogame agenda in a completely unresearched, totally biased piece of "news" will end up worth it for Fox News after EA gets done with them in court.

If Fox considers inaccurate pieces of non-news to be "news," then I guess it's a good thing I'm not a regular viewer...but I've never seen something so unbelievably unresearched and so unabashly ignorant. In fact, the news anchor talks about how she "got online to view some trailers" like she's Bob Woodward uncovering some Pulitzer Prize-winning scoop.

Garbage. Total garbage. Let the lawsuits begin.