A few months ago, we suggested that a revitalized Rare - purged of ancient baggage like Perfect Dark Zero they've had to haul from platform to platform - might train their weaponry on a proper sequel to Killer Instinct.  You might have seen what we got instead.

I should just tell you it's a game where you raise Pinatas.  If you click on the link I just made, you need to understand that the odds of getting a seizure are really very high.   Also, you might turn down your speakers.  I realize this is all stuff I should have told you earlier.  Maybe this link would be better, or at any rate safer:  Gamespot had a chance to check it out already, but the 1up preview talks about things like "chocolate coins" I haven't heard anywhere else. 

The look is pretty irresistible.  From the sounds of it, we're talking about Animal Crossing plus Pokemon, a blend whose addictive potential I'm not willing to dismiss outright.  Moves to personify Pinatas make me uneasy.  It is their destiny to be hung from trees and beaten to death.  And when I swing a broom handle, I can't afford to have some creeping sympathy stay my hand. 

It's not really for us, of course - being launched simultaneously with toys and cartoons, clearly the intent is to snare the young and harness the tremendous brandwidth inherent in the concept.  I feel a pressure in my mind to call this a transparent, despicable, mercenary act, but my own childhood was fabulously enriched by shit like this.  I don't want to make baseless assertions, but the odds are good that - as a person who visits Penny Arcade - you hold Optimus Prime in high regard.  Optimus Prime was not spontaneously generated by the pure wish of a child.   These supposedly "valid" market expressions are differentiated from the grasping, sordid toys of modernity by our vast personal investments.

It's hard to imagine that Yu-Gi-Oh occupies a similar conceptual space as, say, The Thundercats - its lure is so brazen as to be almost pornographic.  It may be that one day a young man will adore a Pinata.  Stranger things have occurred on the planet Earth.     

(CW)TB out.

We couldn't let this slide, I'm afraid. I'm aware that StarForce has supposedly apologized, but that and a cracker will get you a cracker. Already a deeply despised company, one of their employees openly provided links to pirated materials - confirming every suspicion about their debased operation. Of course they made some show of contrition.  

I'm sorry that updates haven't been hitting the site when they should have the last couple times.  The new site generates static pages automatically, so it can look like we're still up even if the tools we use to manage posts and strips aren't available.

The machine just gets pulverized every update.  Minus forum traffic, we can usually expect two million or more pageviews a day.  I would have thought that we had reached some kind of saturation point long ago, but that hasn't been borne out.  Where are these new readers coming from?  Are they Apple enthusiasts, heartened by our move toward fruit?  Are they recently manufactured androids?  Are they phantom pings - the first wave of a Denial of Service phalanx?

Who knows.  Anyway, it shouldn't matter who it is.  Our stuff should be available when you want to read it, and I'm sorry.

(CW)TB   

I have an incredible opportunity to discuss with you!

Saturday was my six year wedding anniversary. We decided to have the grandparents come over and watch Gabe for the weekend while we relaxed at a fancy five star hotel in downtown Seattle. We made sure to find a place with wireless internet and we both took our laptops so we could play WOW all weekend. Normally at home we only play after Gabe goes to sleep so this was going to be a real treat.

The Gambler exeunt.

Enter The Gambler.

We'll be getting our copies of the stuff that came out today when we leave "work," here in a couple hours or so. I suggested that it was the darkness of my predicament that kept me from previewing those games earlier, when the reality is more that I had a very brief time with each one, so brief that I can't tell you anything you won't learn in the first twenty minutes with either title.

Guitar Heroism has in no way abated around here, so Eurogamer's revelation of genre specific songpacks was felt with almost kinetic force. If a person my be crushed beneath pleasure and anticipation, I am not long for this world.

We are going to be at various places at various times over the next couple months.

I'd never used one of the new iMacs before I bought it, and though we've added dialogue here to grease the wheels I thought Apple Enthusiasts might be amused to know that I spent almost five entire minutes trying to turn it on.

There has always been something illicit about playing for the other team.

Just an update on the 1,200 donuts situation. We were able to give all the donuts away. We gave some to the other businesses here in our office building. We also sent a few hundred over to the Seattle Children’s hospital for the staff there. Then we let our PAX enforcers come by and dig in.

I’ve had a couple people mail me and tell me that the word among the Austin dev community is that the DCO team is hemorrhaging people. I’ve heard a few stories but they all seem to agree that people are jumping ship in frustration. I don’t know how true it is but Gamasutra has a job posting from SOE looking for a creative director for DCO.