We had a chance to see The Witcher in an early form in Bioware's tiny, cubicle wall shanty on the fringe of the electronic entertainment expo. It was tucked into Bioware's presence because the game uses a tricked-out version of the Aurora engine, not because it's an internal Bioware project you've simply never heard of. What we saw there was, in my view, too early to produce substantive comment on outside of the most rudimentary sort of reflex. That's one of the things I hate about E3, and the sensation has only intensified the more I attend it. It's situated out there at some coordinate in time and space, and the pressure to show something unbelievable there is so intense that you see things which are

Michael Firman, winner of the Pikmin 2 contest in the "Image" division, you are a pimp. I will do as you have requested, and send your copy of Pikmin 2 over to Seattle Children's Hospital.

So a few nights ago I was up with the baby and he was sort of wheezing and breathing really fast. Obviously this concerned me so I turned to the internet for answers. First of all let me say that there is no place online for young/new fathers to discuss the rigors of parenthood and share advice. If I got off on sticking my dick in sour cream while watching the History channel, I could find a hundred different forums full of like minded individuals. There are plenty of forums for dads but they are either empty or full of old men who dish out advice like "put in more time at work." and "Start drinking."

People getting seriously into PC games in the last few years might not have any idea why I speak the name Peter Molyneux with reverence. You might have picked up Black and White, accidentally touched your animal's genitals and then uninstalled it in shame, not really feeling its flavor. It would take a very long time to go over with you the Bullfrog era of computer gaming, when having access to an Amiga meant having access to some of the most inventive games ever stored on physical media. These days, the things I play associated with his name rarely feel like complete games anymore - they're more like half-finished models he used to be really enamored with until he caught the glint of some new fascination. I got a little of the old feeling watching an extended preview of The Movies at E3, but I don't know if I can let myself be hurt again by that man. He's secured quite a bit of new money recently, though God only knows what he'll do with it.

Like every other Goddamn person bristling out from the Earth, we have our own theories about the events transpiring on Lost. I think he really might be on to something!

The issue with buying things from anyone by Imaginarium, Toys 'r' us, and Amazon itself appears to have been resolved by our "Hail Mary" e-mail directly to Jeff Bezos. That was basically the last of the obstacles. Feel free to go completely nuts on those lists.

I just wanted to make a quick note about the wish lists. It looks like the "show purchased" option isn't working correctly. You can however look at each individual item and see how many were requested and how many have been purchased. Also you should know that all the videogame stuff is going to be on the last few pages of each list. I know a lot of you specifically want to buy games and stuff.

Please feel free to visit the official site and take a look at the wish lists we've set up for Seattle, Oakland, San Diego, Houston, and our nation's capitol. The Tax ID's for charitable giving are listed to the right of each wish list.

We did go play Halo 2, and they did make us sign something, but it was a while ago - the build we played is the same one all the most recent press was based on. Talking about Halo is always really complex for me - partly because of my mind, which is a deranged knot of neurotic impulses. The rest of it is just because we were mean to the first one, for reasons I still maintain, but can't be explained without a certain amount of nuance.

We've got five times as many wish lists this year - ones for Seattle, Oakland, San Diego, Houston, and Washington D.C. - and we're having an issue with some of the items on each of them that will require some fairly heavy editing and maybe more than that. We'll work on it over the weekend, and then open the floodgates.

Literally the only thing I find unpleasant about Steam is the fact that now, even as we speak, there is a copy of Half-Life 2 on my machine that I can't fondle with vigor. I actually watched the completion bar on the pre-load last night, and it was a pain like being branded. I played plenty of Counter-Strike: Source last night to take the edge off, you know, because it uses the same engine, but it's hard to escape the notion that your game is locked up in the hoosegow and that heroics may be required.

As regards today's strip, Gabe waltzes in with startling revelations about Shadow Hearts nearly every day. He found the Giurnan metablade, which reaps a harvest of flesh. Oh look, it's the Steel Womb, which renders the wearer impervious to damage. Time was you could rely on a man not to load the save between sessions. Nowadays, every time we load it up there's some complete stranger in the party and everyone's pimped out with legendary artifacts.

I apologize for the lack of sketch dumps lately. Things have been pretty crazy since the baby. I do have something new to show you though. We had originally planned on doing a story called Sand for a future edition of Flight. It was essentially a techno western. Then we read Kazu’s totally fucking incredible Daisy Kutter and realized the techno western was already in much more competent hands. So we sat down and tried to come up with something new. What we came up with is Automata.

There's a lot to read in these Pikmin 2 entries! I started this weekend, but it's taking some time to get through. I'll keep on keeping on, winners announced Friday at the latest.

It's almost midnight, so if I want even a passing chance at not being a liar I'd better crack out that Third Age thing.

Jesus Christ, sometimes I get the hiccups. I don't get them on purpose.