Here is a little Half-Life 2 comic for you. I'm writing this post at 11:30pm on Sunday, wondering idly to myself whether the game I have purchased on Steam (as well as the one some readers purchased in stores) will become available at midnight tonight, on the 15th, which is technically the "ship" date. Since it has already been "shipped" in a sense, and since most stores have the fucking thing and are just being told not to sell it, the term is absolutely incoherent anyhow. Basically, I'm wondering if I'll be up doing the same thing tomorrow night.

Midnight just hit. So, I guess that's a yes.

I've been jumping online for Halo 2 whenever Gabe gives me the signal, and we've been sticking mostly to custom games as I suggested we might do. We'll usually start out in something matchmade, but the reality is that at this point you don't really know how long you're going to be sitting there waiting to get joined. The first few times we used it, it popped right up - which leads me to believe it's similar to the load related issues Burnout 3 had initially, the ones that disappeared shortly after launch. As a result, it's not something that worries me overmuch. I would like a way to do a rematch in games the service sets up, but like I said that's not typically where I spend my time.

Between Team Oddball and Territories, we played several rounds of a gametype Gabe has cooked up on his box called "Grab Bag," which comes highly recommended. Essentially, it's a round of Team Slayer with random weapons and vehicles. I'm used to seeking out specific weapons that I have succeeded with in the past and maintaining a fairly strict circuit in team games, but when each of your two weapon slots has some new alien doodad you don't usually grab, you find yourself changing roles every time you spawn.

Anytime I have not been summoned by the Gabe Signal, I'm either botching some home maintenance task or playing Metroid Prime 2. It "ships" today as well, and it pleases me to speak well of the game as I'm fairly obsessed with it. Retro shocked us when they were able to make a first-person Metroid game that was not only excellent on its own merits but could genuinely adopt the mantle of that much loved series. To a certain extent, they're not shocking us this time. All they've done is make another completely excellent first-person platformer with solid shooting gameplay, a unique aesthetic, and a satisfying, traditional progression. I typically play it until the lack of sleep causes vivid, terrifying hallucinations to enter my visual field.

Gabe mentioned the EA_Spouse Livejournal last week, and here's the sequel: a man named "Joe Straitiff" has been let go from the company and would like to tell you why. The people I know who work in the industry essentially destroy themselves creating the games you play, nothing in this document will come as a surprise to them, they fully expect to be smashed against rocks over the course of a project. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that what Joe is talking about isn't terribly uncommon.

(CW)TB out.

even your friends look worried

I'm thinking there must be some kind of Noon embargo on them, because Gamespot's got a timer going. It looks like their server is getting the shit beat out of it, but the review should be here when the huns let up a bit. If it's an emargo thing, and not an exclusivity thing, there should be more scattered about as well.

(CW)TB

If you attend NYU and you are a fan of the webcomics, you might want to stop by the Kimmel Center at 7:00pm on November 17. There will be a webcomics panel with the lord of all hipsters, Mr. R. Stevens as well as Jeph Jacques and Squidi. Man I really wish I could see this shit. If anyone goes and can take a little video or something I’d be forever in your debt.

Here’s all the info:

November 17 @ 7:00 pm

Kimmel Center room 802 60 Washington Square South New York, NY 10003

150 seats available. It's open to the public, but 75 tickets are reserved for students. Tickets will be free.

- Valid NYU ID is required for entry by the NYU community.

- Valid government-issued ID (driver's license, passport, etc) is required for entry by the general public (non-NYU).

- No one under the age of 18 admitted.

-Gabe out

I was supposed to be working on a bunch of crap today but instead I drew this picture of Samus. Click on the thumbnail for a high res version.

I like to start off the day by sort of warming up in my sketchbook. This little doodle came out and I liked it so much I just had to take it all the way. I hope you guys like it.

-Gabe out

I was going to ask him to draw a picture of Samus actually, because as I said before it really has latched on to me, much as the creatures themselves might.

Also, I fixed the images referenced in his links. I'm sure that "smaus.jpg" would have been a very nice file indeed, had it existed.

(CW)TB

***** SUPER UPDATE!!!*****

WORD FROM AMAZON IS THAT THEY ARE TESTING A FIX NOW. THE PROBLEM SHOULD BE FIXED SOON. I'M TURNING OFF THE LASER AT THIS POINT.

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*****UPDATE!!!*****

I CHANGED THE EMAIL ADDRESS FOR AMAZON AT THE BOTTOM OF THE POST. SO IF YOU MAILED THEM USING THE OLD ONE, AND IT BOUNCED USE THIS NEW ONE.

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It is time again for me to call upon the awesome might of our combined readership. Today we need to focus the PA laser directly on Amazon. Let me explain to you the problem we’re having with the hospital wish lists this year.

Here's the issue: Amazon sells Amazon inventory, Merchant partner inventory, and Market (user/small business) inventory. Some Merchant inventory (like Toys R Us) is shipped out of Amazon-owned warehouses. Some Merchant inventory (like GameStop and Office Depot) is shipped out of Merchant-owned warehouses. *All* Market inventory is shipped out of the user's home/warehouse. The Merchant's system is supposed to be a good thing because the Merchant with the lowest price "wins" the buy box--basically the lowest price floats to the top. Too bad this system perfectly wrecks Amazon's Wish list system.

The problem is that Amazon's privacy policy doesn't allow it to give out Amazon customer addresses to third parties without the address-owner's consent. So if you order a game, and GameStop wins the buy box on Amazon, and you want to ship it to yourself--that's no problem since you're giving consent to Amazon to pass your info to GameStop. But if you try to order that game off of a buddy's wish list (or a hospital's wish list), and GameStop has the lowest price and wins the buy box--Amazon balks because Amazon doesn't know if your buddy wanted GameStop to have his address. So the order just shuts down and cannot be completed.

It's fucked up because there's no work-around. The wish list creator can't specify that only Amazon-owned inventory be made available through the wish list. And the creator can't give explicit permission that his address be allowed to be shared. That's the really messed up part: we state the hospital's address right there on every single page of the (public) wish list yet Amazon doesn't recognize that fact at all.

What this all means is that if you put a game on your wish list, most likely no one will ever be able to buy it for you since 1/2 the games on Amazon are sold by GameStop, J&R, and other Merchants that ship out of non-Amazon warehouses. Everyone knows that games are the most-wanted items on any kid's, and most adult's, wish list. Amazon is helpfully preventing Santa from getting this message.

If everyone writes in and tells Amazon that their system is jacked, then maybe they'll get a clue, fix their broken system, and stop losing what must by hundreds of millions of dollars in game sales.

Purchasing games for sick kids is a huge part of Child’s Play. This wasn’t a problem last year and so probably 80% of our donations last year were games. This year it’s really hurting Child’s Play and we need to get this problem solved quick. So with that said I need all of you to hit this address

resolution@amazon.com

and tell them to fix their broken wish list system. Feel free to cut and paste my post here or just provide a link. I suggest we all use the same subject line. Let’s go with “Fix your busted Wish Lists!”

Get everyone you know to hit them up on this. We really need to resolve this so that we can make this year’s Child’s Play a huge success.

-Gabe out