Wow!  That was an overwhelming number of people who wanted a copy of DeathSpank!  Many thanks to the hundreds of people that painstakingly read every one of those reviews looking for the quotes and typos and entered the contest.

And now...Congratulations to David Or on his stunning victory!

David's name was chosen randomly using a scientifically proven random number from random.org.

Making games is hard, don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Long hours deep in the game mines, chiseling nuggets of game design from crusty black walls, sucking in death at every breath.  And who does this dangerous work? Games designers like myself?  Don't be crazy, we get children and puppies to do that part.  I work out of a nice air-conditioned office with an espresso machine.

But in the end, it's not about who lived or died to bring you an awesome game like DeathSpank, so let's not trifle over small details like "laws" and "morality" because much like that delicious tofu you're eating, you don't really want to know where it came from.

Instead, let's enjoy a massive DeathSpank review round-up:

Rejected Gamer
California Literary Review
Onion's AV Club
IGN
Games Radar
MTV
GamersHell
Jeux Video
Aggro Gamer
Game Pro
Gammabit
3D Juegos
Eurogamer
Gamer Revolution
Kataku
1up
Video Gamer
Nu's Views
Ars Technica
RPGFan
Wired
Game Focus
Crispy Gamer
Geek-Span
GameSetWatch
XBoxUser.de

I know what you're thinking: "Damn, I really want to play DeathSpank, but I need to feed my family".  Now, I know how I'd choose (and I won't judge), but I might have a solution to your recession woes, and that's a free copy of DeathSpank for XBLA.

Read the rest...

You didn't think there was actually a game did you?  Oh, no, no, all this hype was about re-releasing these two DeathSpank Grumpy Gamer comics.

Is it snowing in Hell?  Are pigs flying?  Are the Republicans admitting to global warming?  No, it's actually the 25th seldom mentioned sign of the apocalypse: DeathSpank is poised to hit PSN, XBLA and [REDACTED] on July 13th, July 14th and [REDACTED] [REDACTED]th.

You've got a few weeks to come up excuses for not showing up to work for a few days.  Might I suggest: "Go to hell, I'm staying home to play DeathSpank".  Tell'em Ron said it was OK.

So in celebration, please enjoy some early concept art by Clayton Kauzlaric.  I'd show you some of my concept art, but then you'd go blind and the healthcare in America sucks.

Read the rest...

I'll be honest, I used the + signs in the title because I know they screw up some RSS feed readers and I'm just that kind of person.  My next post will have lots of & and ? symbols and then we'll move into utf-32.  The Internet is a house of cards ready to come down with one seldom used chinese character.

But onward we march, content in our ignorance...

So, my question is: would you rather be a game designer that is also an artist, or a game designer that is also a programmer?

For the sake of this brain twisting exercise, let's assume that you can't be a game designer+artist+programmer, because that combination just goes against god.  And also, for the sake of argument (and because I like to argue), let's assume if you're an artist or programmer, you have no talent in the other profession, and by no talent I really mean no talent.

Read the rest...

Sorry for this update being late, I've been busy prepping for my possible Supreme Court nomination by re-watching The Wire and then just this morning I wake up and hear that Obama has nominated some "lawyer" to fill the opening.  When will this kind of preferential treatment end?  It's the legal elite trying to keep the common man from the highest court in the land.  What are they so afraid of?  DeathSpank maybe?

Oh, speaking of DeathSpank, here is a round-up of the mega press tour I did a couple of weeks ago:

IGN!

GameSpot

Read the rest...

Roger Ebert is at it again, claiming that not only are games not art, but that they can never be art.

Read the rest...