The King of Kings does know my heart, sir - my black heart, and the oily blood squeezed through it.  As regards holiday "meats" of mysterious origin, he is not wrong.

The news about Strategy First warmed my heart - you might have heard it, too.  I hope that delivering their (in some cases) ultraniche product direct instead of wrestling EB Games for shelf "inches" ends up making sense for them.  Watching Steam move from The Thing You Get Half-Life 2 From to a more complete content channel has been real relief.

I don't know that I've mentioned it, but I probably think about Sin Episodes - as delivered by Steam - probably every day.  People who have endured me over the years have seen me agitate for just this sort of thing.  Add to the fact that I think Ritual has this shit, probably been talking internally about where the series would go for years, and add to this the idea that I'm ready, ready sir, to play a game whose cost is not onerous and can be completed in a humane four to six hours. 

Valve has their own episodic flavor en route, sadly pushed back, but utilizing the unremittingly potent Half-Life franchise one hopes that they could communicate the value of digital delivery to the leery throng.  I'm excited about the manifestations of Steam obviously, in the form of individual products, but the platform itself, with the power to remake the retail software industry, fairly resounds.  I want it to have more delicious, exclusive items - the sort of thing you'd install the client for even if you had no interest in Half-Life.  I like to imagine Steam spreading thus, from host to host, latching by a series of devious hooks and flooding the chest cavity with its genetic material. 

I honestly have no idea where that image came from.

It took longer to do my Child's Play shopping than I expected, because as some of you might have seen there weren't any DS systems available for a while.  I've always lamented the fact that we've been instructed to keep stuffed animals off our Wish Lists, but their adorablity index is diminished somewhat by their potential as disease vectors.  Clearly, Nintendogs is a loophole if I've ever heard one:  fully scratchable, portable pups that pant in a bright, perpetually sterile realm.  So, I snatched up a system and an ersatz hound dog to reside thereon.

I feel like I did this one right.

(CW)TB out.

holding his daughter

A couple CP things:

Joel Johnson - the man behind the controversial Wired article on the Elemenstor Saga - is hosting an event in Brooklyn called "FÜNDE RAZOR."  After a few reveletory experiences with Guitar Hero by Red Octane/Harmonix, it ocurred to him that he could do an altogether unorthodox charity evening - the dark twin of our own swank affair.  Taking place at Barcade, and without a cover charge, raffle tickets for a variety of quote fabulous prizes will be on offer, including a 360.  I would imagine the core of the evening will revolve around Big Screen Guitar Hero, which is an experience that may well change your life.

Also:  Phil Kahn of Just Saying is putting up an essay for auction, topic of your choosing - check out his offer here.

(CW)TB

If you aren't too busy, you need to go check out this Day of Defeat: Source feature over at Bit-Tech - grab a few of those movies and savor them.  DOD has apparently become a kind of playground for them internally, simulating the operation of the human eye and invoking the power of the cinematic tradition.  Hot damn.

Also, the comic is finally up.  Sorry about that.

(CW)TB