There are two things I must mention.

First, Gabriel liked the cover for book four (entitled "Birds Are Weird") so much that he wanted to make a poster of it, and it's not worth arguing with him when he gets like that so we let him do it.  It is, even now, awailable!

Also:  PAX preregistration opens today, and since we've had a couple of these now you probably know if it's something you'd like to attend.  You save ten dollars over the door price, which is, like, ten bucks.  This is money you could put toward some other purpose!

(CW)TB

I uploaded the comic early, as many of you noticed. I entered the wrong number in the update field. You may also have noticed that the spelling in these posts has really gone to hell. So, that's numbers and letters. I hope to one day discover a set of pictograms with which I can manage some baseline fucking proficiency.

I mentioned the Nerdcore Rising documentary a few weeks ago and I know a lot of you were interested in it. Well the girls doing it have decided to help build interest in the film by highlighting one of the many nerds they met on their journey each week. They call it the Nerd of the Week and the first Nerd is actually PAX. I'll go ahead and plug the Youtube version in right here so you all can check it out. I think they did a fucking incredible job cutting this together.

Gabe keeps coming into the Goddamn office with his Goddamn tales of high adventure, telling me about how there's tokens or some shit in Burning Crusade now, or maybe tiers, and other words I had scoured from my consciousness. He also says there is hot new five-man content, which initially sounded like pornography. The comic is correct - I purchased it in a moment of weakness. As I must often approach you, the cherished reader, to apologize for this or that indiscretion, it may be more appropriate to say that I have moments of strength which are suspended in cowardice and moral decay.

I know Child’s Play is over but we had a few items here at the office that we didn’t get auctioned off earlier. So if you’re still feeling generous here are a couple cool auctions to check out.

Well I’m back from Hawaii and feeling pretty damn good. Kara and I realized a few months ago that we’d never really taken a proper vacation. We go down to the Oregon coast every summer but that’s just a few hours away and even in the summer the beach there can be pretty cold. Other than that the only time we travel anyplace is for a convention and those can hardly be considered vacations. So we decided it was time to go someplace warm and relaxing for a change and so we spent five days on Maui.

And so, our own pilgrimage comes to a close. Thank you! I think we all had fun. I should stress that "we" refers to your cruel hosts, Gabriel and myself, who over the last eight years have tormented you thus with such dedication and enthusiasm.

The third chapter in our saga of dismay and dismemberment is now available.

Imagine that there exists a great machine.

And so it begins: The Pilgrimage, Part One. There are (as intimated earlier) The Pilgrimages parts one through four. I will grant you that this is an odd genesis, but if you just strap yourself in and sign this sheaf of carefully crafted legal waivers, we will expose you to comic rays of unknown and perhaps unknowable power.

Gabriel will be gone for the week, having earned given a brief respite from his toils here at the Arcade. In addition to truly massive amounts of storyboarding and character design for Precipice, he just did the cover for the new MC Frontalot album, and then wrestled a bison. Immediately afterward! He's exhausted.

Despite the savageries I have borne for purchasing a Zune, I did buy it for a reason, and I held this reason tight in my palm like a mystic amulet.  The strip focuses on Gabriel's growing zealotry, its dark seeds bursting into clutching vines. The credit card was out, he was ready to buy, and I'll be God damned if I wasn't right there with him.

MC Frontalot just sent me a mail and let me know that a trailer is now avaliable for the Nerdcore Rising Documentary. There’s a lot of footage from PAX in the trailer so you may see yourself. Tycho and I make a very brief appearance as well.

It's been made abundantly clear that Ten O'Clock is time for Rainbow Six. It is not time for other games! You might think that it is, but it isn't. Don't show up at 10:05! That's not when it is.

Tech writer Dean Takahashi - that would be Dean "Opening The Xbox/The Xbox 360 Uncloaked" Takahashi - mentioned an upcoming documentary on his blog. Entitled "Moral Kombat," the trailer for it is mostly a sensationalist sort of hook whose urgent piano strains to convey the unrelenting danger of the coming Cyber Game War. I sincerely doubt the tone of the piece matches this trailer, given some of the participants - for example, I don't think that Henry Jenkins would be party to a hysterical dialogue, even in an attempt to tame it.

Sorry - I sort of have Zune on the brain at the moment. Also, we (and apparently Bill Gates) are addicted to that Cascada song. For some reason science cannot explain.