As happens so often at a PAX, a game gets lodged in Gabriel's mind like a seed in a pavement crack and then all hell breaks loose.

I did not win my Gears of War 4 match, even though I should have, and the stars were right and there was a grand conjunction etcetera. So now I'm on the prowl for a game that leverages the substantial delta in our relative physical strength. And while I might not have won in the traditional sense, I did win in another sense and maybe that's the most important thing.

This was a huge show for fans of the Eyrewood. The first thing we announced was the Thornwatch Kickstarter. I'd like to thank everyone who has supported the Kickstarter. If you are on the fence about the game I would encourage you to grab the print and play. It's a great introduction to the mechanics and the setting. I do want to make it clear that while the game plays great I still of a lot of work to do on the art side of it. The process of taking the sketches and rough paintings you're seeing now, to what I would consider final art is something I plan on sharing through the Kickstarter. When all is said and done, I want you to feel like you're playing through a massive, lavishly painted Thornwatch graphic novel.

I don't know. Occasionally, when I garb myself as Ominifis Dran, war cleric of Tymora, I can't orient the events of my life in a linear fashion.

Well it finally happened. We launched the Thornwatch Kickstarter just a couple hours ago. The number one question I’ve gotten over the years is “when can I buy it”. Well now you can!

There is a lot of stuff going on this weekend, holy shit.

There's only one way this ends:

You never know one hundred percent what's gonna happen when you sit down to play whatever Josh has installed for the First 15; sometimes it is a game where you move a ball around. We have been surprised to learn just how omnipresent these balls are. You might also be exposed to Captain Forever Remix, which we seized with our pedipalps and palpably enjoyed.

Hey there! Another PAX looms and we've been hard at work creating a colorful array of products for you. We'll have two locations again. Merch Main will be in its usual spot in the Atrium Lobby. And Merch Lite will have a new, browsable format in the secret caves accessed via the Sheraton lobby. We'll have signs. And probably a line. Come see us.

Tycho and I will battle at Gears of War 4 in just a few days. Let me introduce you to the team that will win.

It occurred to me later that we could have gone with Gears Of War: 4 The Watch. I like that a lot. But I can't think about all that, now. I can only think about how I'm going to saw Gabriel and his misfit army into CORDWOOD. Here are the tools I will use to bring about that scenario:

Networks are one of the new features in Titanfall 2; like an IRC channel that has become frighteningly aware, it's something I can see coloring a lot of my experience with the game. Naming conventions have historically been a source of raw comicium in the past, and it's no different today.

PAX Dev still has tickets available, so come get 'em. August 31st and September 1st, come learn from and with industry peers at the Westin. Learn what, you may ask? We have a full schedule available for your perusal. Suffice it to say: good stuff.

There's more story in the Tutorial of Titanfall 2 than there was in Titanfall, and I love the personality they've brought to the bots themselves. I really liked the Titanfall 2 test as a generality; I also liked Tribes 2, and Gabriel and I were the only ones. I suspect that it was a pretty rough weekend over at Respawn.

Thornwatch is so close to finally becoming a real thing. It’s coming together so fast now that it has literally been improving every day for the last couple weeks. We took a prototype to Gencon a few weeks ago and while we were there we sat down and played the game with folks from BoardGameGeek. If you have not had the chance to see Thornwatch at a PAX, this is a really good look at the game:

PAX is just around the corner and the folks over at Rocket League have added some cool Penny Arcade/PAX items to their game!