Laser Squad Nemesis is a play by mail tactical game that isn't just like X-Com, it's made by the actual X-Com guys. Used to be that I couldn't go a day without Porkfry sending me the first round - you can play a few free games if a subscriber challenges you, though you are limited in what armies you can select - and we would while away the afternoons in frenzied bids for galactic supremacy. I never knew they were planning on a retail release, as everyone is just downloading it now and that seems to work fine. But there you have it. We have produced a comic to commemorate the release of this game, or perhaps some other game.

"Shin Tokubetsu fears no man, and his bow One-Claw has no equal."

Jumpgate ads were okayed for the site because the game has been recommended to me by readers for almost two years. If we'd been home more at the end of last month, we would have just made them an ad ourselves - one that didn't talk about Joysticks, for example, or what you might do with them. Believe me, you should have seen the one they sent us first - it had a science fiction looking temptress on them. All in all, things could have been worse.

We have a lot of ground to cover today, so we'd best get started.

I have been getting a bit of email regarding the latest Movie Comics “controversy” and I figured I should comment on it here just to clear some things up.

There's a demo out for Empire Interactive's upcoming "Fright Sim" Ghost Master, and nobody told me?

I was hoping to check this Gamelords place out when I was down for the San Diego Comic-Con, but alas, it was not meant to be. Anyhow, they've got a tournament going on tomorrow, if you're down. First prize is a copy of Steel Battalion, that mech sim with the bad-ass controller and such. Other shit too, of course. But let's be serious: you want to drive robots.

I'm grabbing this file mainly to see the game in motion, but Fileplanet apparently has a clip showing the Rag Doll physics in the upcoming Tribes sequel. Prequel. Whatever the fuck it is.

I know that many people have been keeping an eye on Galactic Conquest, a Star Wars themed modification for Battlefield 1942. There's a version of it out there for you to grab. I've got about two hundred megs (!!!) left on it.

I haven't gotten to this part yet, so reading about this bug did reveal a name and a situation that I was not aware of in the game - but that's probably better than the game pausing itself for four hours because I didn't know about this issue. If you're playing it, you might want to know about this issue before it's too late - spoiler or no.

I’m not dead. Kara and I are pretty much all moved in now. We still have a lot of stuff in boxes but the important stuff like the video games and the computers are all set up and running. I understand I haven’t posted in a while and I do apologize for that. Here is what I have been up to.

Until Max Abernethy sent me this link, I must admit that I was unaware of the rich shared tradition of chickens and aviation.

I did this on Wednesday, too - I will type up a post, it will be all done, and then I'll go play videogames until I pass out without uploading it. I'm surprised that I remember to wear clothes.

You might be surprised to hear some of the bizarre theories I receive regarding Gabriel's whereabouts. Clearly, it's not me drawing the strip - regular readers know what that looks like, the poor dears. It's just that the temporary dial-up he is using is immensely distasteful to him, and strips out all the joy of using the Internet. He's also been subjected to a jaunty parade of lies regarding the date of his installation, which made its way into today's comic. That's not even factoring in Kotor. If I like it as much as I do, and I think that Star Wars is alright, I can only imagine the violent seizures he must be having over there.

I got a lot of mail from people requesting I scan and post the pictures I got from Stephen Silver and Stan Sakai. They are actually being shipped back up from SDCC and should be here in a few days. Once I have them both I’ll scan them for you guys.

Aside from the inability to pause the game and queue up commands, absolutely every e-mail I've received about Lionheart - referring to either the demo or the full version - has been saturated with high praise. I've even heard on boards that this demo was stuck together with gum glue and tape, and doesn't represent shit as far as the final is concerned. So I have uninstalled it and made the decision to wait for the retail.