The self-help book author who criticised Mass Effect in the now notorious Fox News Channel 'sex' slamming of the RPG has finally admitted she didn't know what she was talking about in the first place.

"I recognise that I misspoke," Cooper Lawrence, who appeared in the news segment in question on The Live Desk with Martha MacCallum, has now told The New York Times (check Kotaku for the story).

Lawrence, who admitted during the segment she'd never actually played Mass Effect, added, "Before the show I had asked somebody about what they had heard, and they had said it's like pornography. But it's not like pornography.

"I really regret saying that, and now that I've seen the game and seen the sex scenes it's kind of a joke," she continued. "I've seen episodes of [the ABC television show] Lost that are more sexually explicit."

Fox News Channel leapt on its high horse attacking the RPG over non-existent scenes of explicit sex, Lawrence in particular taking issue with the non-existent misrepresentation of women in the game.

The segment moved EA's vice president of communications Jeff Brown to send a letter to Fox in which he called out the news channel and asked for an apology over its "reckless" and error-heavy coverage of Mass Effect.

In response, Fox News Channel has claimed it "has extended several invitations to EA through a company representative to appear on Live Desk With Martha MacCallum to discuss Mass Effect and the segment which aired on Monday. We have received no response."

Mass Effect developer BioWare has said it's "hurt" that anyone would misrepresent the game without actually playing it.

Courtesy of CVG.

Jan 28, 2008