Hawk from Applegeeks.com was cool enough to color the Ninja Gaiden drawing I posted yesterday. He’s got a real nice high res version of it available over on his site for anyone interested in using it as a wallpaper. Hawk does awesome work and it was a real treat to have him color one of my drawings.

Jesus, so what do I talk about today? UT2004 retail? Battlefield Vietnam? Pandora Tomorrow? I know a shit ton about Pandora Tomorrow, I could probably go on all day. The comic's about Battlefield, though - I suppose that's as good as anything.

I may not respond to all the mail I get, but I do read it all. I’ve gotten quite a few requests for a Ninja Gaiden drawing. Since I happen to be totally hooked on the game myself I am more than happy to deliver a little Ryu Hyabusa drawing.

I mean, they fight using extrasensory perception. Just because he can't read the back of a cereal box doesn't make him any less dangerous.

I just wanted to mention that Tycho and I will be taking part in a panel this Monday evening at Digipen. We will be discussing online games along with Geoff Zatkin from Monolith Productions. It costs ten bucks if you aren’t a WSA member, and you can register to attend right here. There isn’t a lot of space, so if listening to us yap about games for a couple hours sounds like fun to you, I recommend signing up ASAP.

You can check it out, if you want - look for it in the downloads section, along with the two alternate covers(!!!). Making a Splinter Cell story, even a side story like the one we're doing, is something I honestly consider a priviledge. We chose to dramatize a round of the multiplayer mode, and there's more than enough material there to work with.

I was amazed to find that Charles was the most requested sketch at the Ubercon. Why does the East love him so? I have no idea. At any rate, after our recent experience at the Apple Store it seemed like a good opportunity to utilize the character and (potentially) bring pleasure to an entire coast.

I just got a mail from Jason Gavin, one of the guys behind the new show Game Over. He asked if I could pass along some info to you guys since tonight is the big premier of their show on UPN. Here is what he had to say:

If the internal browser is any indication, they've really struck a chord with Unreal Tournament 2004's Onslaught. It certainly struck a chord with me.

Okay, about fourty-five minutes and seven hundred emails later I think I have a pretty clear idea of what you guys think about more “news” posts. It’s actually pretty cool how much alike all your answers were. I’d say about 99% of the emails I got sounded pretty much like this one:

I am kind of curious if you guys find stuff like the above post valuable. There are so many sites out there that post news, I just never figured it was something we needed to do. I mean, we are on all the same lists that these other sites are on. I get the same press releases they do. Would you guys like it if we posted this sort of thing more often?

Digital Extremes just sent me a press release about their new title, Pariah. Generally I don’t post this sort of thing here but they attached some really cool screen shots. Here is a snippet from the release:

But I have found them! Apparently the site I linked to for information about the MPx removed the photos, which strips away the reason for linking that page in the first place. Never fear, you may see the three modes here, here, and here.

Shit damn Ninja Gaiden is hard, it's so hard that your friends will die. It's also completely great - once you've gone a few levels, just start a new game real quick and take a look at the guys you thought were bad-asses before. Those guys are feather pillows compared to the beasts and murderers you rub up against later.

I just wanted to let you all know that page 2 of our four page Painkiller comic is now available(click on downloads).

Picked up Phantasy Star Online 3 Wednesday, and it ain't bad. Humans seemed surprised when I claimed enthusiasm regarding the card-oriented gameplay shift, heresy of heresies, but by now it's probably clear that I could replace anything, everything in the world with a card that represents it and feel nothing but pleasure. Conceptually, yes, I do like the idea that the events of even the prior PSO games could be described by the card metaphor - that the structures and definitions retain meaning across a mechanical shift. As all this poetry here might imply, I was ready and waiting for a new interpretation of the game.