Lounge for gamers opening on Strip

Well, it's about time. A hotel is finally installing a video game lounge for those of us who crave to play "Tiger Woods PGA Tour" while we're on the Strip.

At 6 p.m. Saturday, The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas will open an EA Sports Bar, catering to up to 125 video gamers from 11 a.m. to midnight Sundays through Thursdays and 11 a.m. to 1 a.m. Fridays and Saturdays.

Some of you nongamers may think this is crazy. But we gamers have the disposable income to buy $60 games routinely.

The video game industry often grosses more money in a year ($25 billion in 2010) than movie box office receipts ($11 billion domestic in 2010). The median age of a gamer is 37, and he or she has gamed for 12 years; and the average salary of a game employee is $90,000, according to the Entertainment Software Association.

If you want to gauge the interest of video gaming in public, check out Insert Coins bar and game lounge downtown. It's often packed with adult drinkers playing Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, old Sega and Nintendo games, plus stand-up arcade classics.

The Cosmopolitan is taking a more proprietary approach by contracting with only one game maker ( Electronic Arts), one TV maker (Sharp) and one system (Sony PlayStation).

So this lounge will have only PlayStation 3 versions of EA's E-rated (G-rated) sports games -- "Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13," "Madden NFL" and the like.

In other words: No bloody killing games yet. But EA may add more mature games in conjunction with promotions.

The lounge replaces the pop-up wedding chapel at the front of the hotel. It's sort of a test. It's scheduled to stay open through June. If it sells well, it could stay, as EA lounges have in the Charlotte, N.C., airport and on cruise ships.

Video games could never take the place of video poker, of course. This game lounge is an interactive retail space.

The Cosmopolitan is a video game leader on the Strip. A few months ago, it hosted EA's launch of new games for reviewers. It was rad.

And from April 6-8, the hotel's Chelsea Ballroom (yes, the concert venue) hosts the IGN Pro League tournaments -- a $100,000 "StarCraft II" tourney and a $50,000 "League of Legends." Ticket sales ($25-$175) are brisk, I'm told. The tourneys will be streamed online. Last year's IGN tourneys notched 12 million views online.

Paul rodgers on copying

Paul Rodgers of Bad Company tells me he once refused to take legal action against Steve Miller for making a hit song that sounded like one of his own.

Rodgers says Miller's "Rock 'n Me" ("keep on rockin' me, baby") is "such a lift" of the song "All Right Now," which Rodgers sang in his band Free.

"I don't really hold it against him," Rodgers says. "I remember years ago, (music manager) Peter Grant said, 'Do you want to take court action?' I said, 'I don't know if we should be suing each other' -- musicians -- so I didn't."

Why is Rodgers bringing this up? It's my doing. We talked about it after I told him I think Bon Jovi's "Living on a Prayer" sounds strikingly similar to Free's song "Wishing Well."

"Wow, you think I should sue him?" Rodgers joked. "Yeah, but he (Jon Bon Jovi) is on record (saying), 'If you're gonna copy anybody, copy the best, so I copied Bad Company.' He actually said that. So I don't know."

Rodgers performs Saturday at Eastside Cannery. Look for my full interview with him in Thursday's Review-Journal. He and his wife have been rescuing racehorses, cows, dogs, cats and deer in British Columbia.

Doug Elfman's column appears Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays. Email him at delfman@reviewjournal.com. He blogs at reviewjournal.com/elfman.