I generally don't get into fantasy games, much less point and click style RPG ones. Somehow though, Dungeon Siege managed to get a grip on me. Killing monsters is fun but for me the real thrill comes from finding new items and a little something I like to call transmuting. To say that my ranger looks good would be an understatement. His silver chain mail is accented with a bright red flame thrower and matching hat. This ensemble tells monsters that this is a marksman who is serious about killing them with liquid fire and looking good while he does it. He's ready for summer but still holding on to spring with his +3 to strength leather boots. Watch out Krug Dogs, this flame throwing ranger is H-O-T hot!

Today's strip concerns a game you may be spending the weekend with, Gas Powered's inaugural release Dungeon Siege. DS is such a streamlined hack und slash experience that it virtually plays itself - which will probably be one of the main complaints leveraged against it. It won't keep people from buying it, oh, goodness no - they'll tell you this while they're playing. We've rather enjoyed it, ourselves. Spanning the gap between the Action RPG and an RTS, you can specify default behaviours for your characters which can obviate your presence altogether, provided you have someone to follow through the game. Gabe has actually gone and done chores while his lethal automaton and I plundered dungeons he might never see.

Wow, lots of talk in the forum about today's comic strip. I had no idea that furies see them selves as being so unfairly persecuted. I guess they get this kind of shit from people all the time. I can't imagine why. *cough*nakedanimalporn*cough* I did get some nice mails from people pointing me towards what they called "tasteful" furry art. It turned out to be a rabbit woman in a bikini, soaking wet. I guess she had just gone swimming or something. It's totally okay for you guys to draw that stuff. It's also totally okay for me to say I don't like it. I mean come on. When you draw a picture of a unicorn man screwing a gazelle chick on a rainbow in outer space you have to expect some people to be a bit turned off by it.

We are - collectively - in a miserable mood. Maybe someday we'll be able to discuss this year's problem in detail - but until then, please enjoy/endure our misanthropy. If you are wondering whether or not I'm speaking about you, ask yourself: Do I draw husky fox men with massive wing-wongs? Gabe may cast a wider net, but for me, that about covers it. TMNT falls under the documented "ninja" exception, as does Sanguine Productions' superlative Jadeclaw. Wishbone, on the other hand, is just disturbing.

Ya, so I guess the Marvel vs. Capcom 3 news story at the cafe today is a joke. I honestly don't think I will ever understand the whole April Fools day thing. Like Tycho said, most people are assholes most of the time. I see no reason to encourage them.

Holy hot damn there has been a lot of exciting news recently. I hardly know where to start.

It's one of the enduring mysteries of our age, today's comic only scratches the surface. And though broaching the subject publicly is probably going to bring the gravy train to a halt, it's a bizarre enough tale to warrant the telling.

Well I guess now we know what Microsoft employees do while they are at work. Apparently they surf the web for obscure Star Wars material. Monkey’s point here I think is that all this other weird shit is considered canon so I should accept JK2’s multiplayer. The problem is that, as usual Monkey has no fucking clue what he is talking about. I didn’t bring up canon because that is a slippery slope but since Monkey want's to talk about it lets do it right. There are many different levels of canon, from First level canon all the way down to what Monkey is speaking about here which would be considered apocrypha. First level canon would be items that fall directly under George’s vision for the Star Wars universe. This would include the movies and their respective special editions. Next you would have second, third and fourth levels. These include things like the original screen plays and the radio dramas of the films. After that you get into “official”. This is where the books, comics and some of the games come in. The original Dark Forces games and Jedi Knight when beaten with the light side of the force are considered “official”. After official we get all the shit licensed by Lucas Arts but not actually a part of official continuity. This is called apocrypha or just plain unofficial. It is easiest to think of this stuff as an alternate reality or existing in it’s own timeline. This is where you get crap like the cereal and the other junk Monkey brought up. Finally at the bottom of the list you have fan fiction. I am not certain but I assume the single player portion of the game is considered “official” canon. It would have been nice if the same care that was put into the SP game to make it fit in with the Star Wars universe had also been given to the MP. But instead we get a pretty standard multiplayer experience that only pays lip service to the license. I guess I was just hoping for more.

Here is a thought for you. I know Safety Monkey is a fan of Lord of the Rings as I’m sure many of you are. Here is another license with absolutely unlimited multiplayer possibilities. Let’s say though that a game comes out and all you get is DM and capture the flag. Not only that but you can play as any character you want and they all have rings of power. Just imagine an Elvin ranger named “LeGAYlos” firing arrows at a hobbit called “Frodo-Sexual” while an Orc uses his ring to turn invisible and sneak up behind both of them. Would you not feel just a tiny bit disappointed?

Thank you to everyone who mailed me in response to my little rant above. I was surprised at just how many of you agree with me. Of the hundred or so e-mails I got, only two of you felt like I was in the wrong. Since it seems like so many of us are in agreement on this subject I'll just do what we all do in real life. Ignore what Safety Monkey said and continue our conversation as if he'd never spoken at all.

And I contain hypertext references. What am I?

(Editor's Note: The new strip can be found here.)

So, today's comic strip is a big one I know. See I thought it would be cool to color the comic strip to make it look like and old comic book. Once I get one of these bright ideas in my head there is no getting it out. I spent the better part of the day trying to figure out how to do it. Now that I think back there is probably some built in "old comic book" filter if I had just looked in the fucking manual. Anyway, I devised a system of layers, selections and channels that seemed to do the trick. Take a look at this image and you will see what I mean. Needless to say I was feeling pretty fucking smart at that point and I continued to create the panels for the strip using my special technique. Then as I began to assemble the panels together into the page I noticed that I was going to have to shrink them down quite a bit. Once I had shrunk it and saved it out I realized that all my hours of work creating those tiny dots was now lost to the Gods of 256 color optimization. I still think it looks okay, just not like what I had originally intended. I'll always have this image though to look back on and remember what could have been.

After dabbling in a bit of Freedom Force - which I would follow up later with rather a lot of Freedom Force - we wanted to do something along these lines. The game has these great backstories for each character, like proper comics should - you can check out the one for the melancholy "Man-Bot" on the official FF downloads page. When I've played more of it, I'll have more to tell you - but at the moment, I'm completely infatuated with it. And hey, the EB website was wrong - the Bonus CD I got for pre-ordering came with three new models, not just skins. Max Sneddon (from Irrational Games Australia) intimated that new meshes and skins may be available soon, which is cause for celebration. I think of the models I have currently as a palette for inventing new personalities, so anything that broadens that gradient is welcome indeed.

I have a list of things I wanted to talk about in my little update here. I have some games on there and some Penny Arcade related stuff. I'll get to all that stuff in a minute though. Right now I have something more important to discuss.

There's a piece of "hatemail" over at Monkey's site, at least, that's what he calls it.