That's right. If you're going to Greece any time soon, be sure you leave that GBA at home.

Discuss it in Talkback!

In an attempt to stop "illegal gambling", the government of Greece has passed a law that simply makes all video games illegal.

Greek Law Number 3037, enacted at the end of July, explicitly forbids electronic games with "electronic mechanisms and software" from public and private places, and people have already been fined tens of thousands of dollars for playing or owning games.

The law applies equally to visitors from abroad: "If you know these things are banned, you should not bring them in," said a commercial attaché at the Greek Embassy in London, who declined to give her name.

Internet cafes will be allowed to continue to operate, providing no games-playing takes place. If a customer is found to be running any sort of game, including online chess, the cafe owner will be fined and the place closed.

The Greek government introduced the law in an attempt to prevent illegal gambling. According to a report in the Greek newspaper Kathimerini, Greek police will be responsible for catching offenders, who will face fines of 5,000 to 75,000 euros (about $4,980 to $74,650) and imprisonment of one to 12 months. "The blanket ban was decided in February after the government admitted it was incapable of distinguishing innocuous video games from illegal gambling machines," the report said.

Apparently, the law is being enforced primarily in public places (such as the chess example in an Internet Café). It seems that the police are not raiding people's homes or anything like that yet. The law will likely be modified (fixed) before it comes to that.

An accused man will be facing trial next week, and if he is convicted, the case will likely be appealed to the "European Court".