Penny Arcade

This newspost delay was brought to you by AT&T’s sterling Cable Internet service.

We were not especially struck by any of the news out there, at least, not in a comic way, so we took advantage of that fact and decided to do whatever we wanted.  Technically we do whatever we want whether or not we have an excuse to, but it rarely reaches this threshold of elaboration when we’re just messing around.  Also, apparently the Japanese stuff at the top actually says what it is supposed to - so obviously, we had nothing to do with it.  The strange characters that make up Japanese fill me with a vague unease.  No, that’s all Kiko, who apparently has some faculty with it.  And he’s not Japanese, either, that’s the thing.  In fact, if there is a name less Japanese than Francisco Villasenor I would be surprised to see it.

One piece of news did have a certain flavor, but at this point we were already done with the comic so it didn’t have a chance to germinate.  Courtesy of The Magicbox (compulsory daily reading) we have shots of the console specific characters for each version of Soul Calibur II.  If you didn’t already know, just go look and be overcome with emotion.  By all available information, it sounds like we’re in for the same luxurious treatment Namco has always given home conversions of this series.  Soul Calibur for the DC remains a top contender in virtually every scoreable category, even categories you make up on the spot, like “Best, uh… Spelunking.”  The only thing you could fault it for, really, was that it did not include the exhilarating weapon collection of its prior iteration - and it’s back for Soul Calibur II.  Come to think of it, I’ve never even seen Soul Calibur II at a Seattle arcade, or anywhere else for that matter, so it seems likely that my first experience will be with the lavish home version on the console of my choice. 

I started using ICQ again for some reason, I hadn’t used it in maybe two years, and all these people I used to talk to apparently never pruned me from their lists.  It’s like opening a time capsule every time I connect to it, I don’t know who half these people are, and I don’t have the logs from back then but apparently I logged off in the middle of a conversation.  I was talking to Soup last night, I guess he’s made a dark pact with continuity of all things.  People change, you know?  I had a friend back in the day named Brad who ran a humor site called Lowpass.net, he was written up in Wired for promoting it via spoofed Eminem tracks.  It turns out he’s still alive, and when he’s not maintaining his sites Strip Creator or In4mador he puts out some really catchy songs.  You see, he’s kind of a renaissance dork. 

I wanted to thank Nexon for sponsoring Penny Arcade this month, they just moved from the front page to the strip page.  Shattered Galaxy 1.5 has a really interesting take on Real-Time Strategy, and it’s been doing things since version 1.0 that other games in the genre would do well to learn from.  It has a free trial, and it only costs ten bucks to upgrade the demo to retail status if you find yourself hooked.  Give it a try, see if it does it for you.

(CW)TB out.

all twisted up in wires

Something we could have touched on but didn’t (because we wanted to actually play it) was, of course, Panzer Dragoon Orta.  Maybe for Friday’s strip?  It launches today, we’re going to hit the mizall and snatch a couple copies, and then it’s off to either Golden Chopsticks or the Regent Chinese Bakery.  I don’t know which.

It’s a dilemma.

(CW)TB

http://www.musiccdsettlement.com/english/default.htm

It looks genuine, but is it really?

You bet your bippy, it is.  There is indeed a settlement, for which claimants will receive a cash award, merely for having purchased an album in the last few years.  Feel free to head to the link for more info.  Sometimes I get mad when I talk about things on this site, but I have never gotten as angry here as I am over the facts of this settlement.  My face is hot and my jaw is tight.  I don’t think it’s something I can discuss with any decorum, which isn’t ordinarily a problem, and I’m sure at this point you don’t expect it from me.  But I don’t even want to show anyone what that looks like.

(CW)TB

First off, thank you all for the great letters about today’s strip. My mail is working again which means there is no way on God’s green earth I could ever respond to all these. I want you all to know though that I did read them all and your kind words are very much appreciated. I agree with many of you that the new style is a perfect fit for Gabe’s fantasy world. Anyway thanks a bunch, you guys rock.

Well we picked up Panzer Dragoon Orta this afternoon and I’ve put a few hours into it. It’s just as good if not better than I had hoped. The visuals are superb, the controls are spot on and the story is engaging. You can’t really ask for much more. They have seriously jacked up the difficulty compared to the demo that came out a few months ago. You will really need to master the art of switching back and forth between forms quickly. The game is actually very reminiscent of Ikaruga in that way. Each form is better in different situations. If the screen is full of swarming missiles the seeking lasers on the light mode are where it’s at. Gotta beat the shit out of a huge worm? Then you want the powerful lock on beam that comes standard with the heavy form. Bosses will have you switching constantly between forms in an effort to maximize the damage you deal.

I can’t really speak to the replay value as I have only put a few hours into it. You are graded on your performance in each level so there is the incentive to go back and get a better score. Many levels also have multiple routes that you can take and after you beat a level it will tell you which of the routs you took and which ones remain unexplored. Not to shabby for what is essentially a shooter.

I think that the news about Soul Calibur 2 having different characters for different machines is really interesting. I know for me the choice is obvious. I mean if you have all three systems you will need to pick one version. First of all you are going to want it to look good, so that rules out the PS2. Second, Spawn is retarded so that rules out the Xbox. Third, Link rocks so that means you need the GC version.

I honestly can’t understand how they came up with Spawn for the Xbox. I mean. SPAWN? Of all the other characters you could put into a fighting game they chose Spawn? I guess Tycho told me that Todd McFarlane designed one of the characters in Soul Calibur 2. So I guess there is a connection however tenuous.  They could have stayed with comic book characters and used He-Man or a transformer or fucking Liono. Yeah now Liono would have been bad ass! THUNDER CATS HO!

-Gabe out

I can’t tell you how glad I am that everyone seems to dig the CBT Samurai. We are looking forward to doing a lot more with him in the future.

Anyway, I got this mail a few minutes ago about the Soul Calibur 2 thing and I thought is was funny:

Perhaps if requested, we loyal readers could get Cardboard Tube Samurai into Soul Calibur 2 via a mass petition…

Somehow I don’t see it happening, but it would sure be cool as fuck.

**UPDATE**

Here it is in case you want to sign it.

-Gabe out

I completely forgot to thank Blambot for the great fonts in today’s comic strip. They make some bad ass fonts over there. I always fantasize about how cool it would be to get a custom made font just for PA. Maybe some day.

-Gabe out

Actually, I met Blambot guy (Nate Piekos) at ComicCon last year.  I got really shy, and I might have made him uncomfortable.  Only in the geek world is this possible, to swoon over a man who makes typefaces.

(CW)TB