Valve Announces Thanksgiving DLC Just in Time for the Holidays

Bellevue, WA – Just a week after the release of their zombie-survival sequel, Left 4 Dead 2, Valve Software has announced the first in what no doubt will be a series of themed Downloadable Content (DLC) packs for the game. The Thanksgiving Pack bridges the original title and its sequel by having all eight survivors meet to celebrate the holiday and give thanks that they survived the zombie apocalypse. The campaign, entitled “Pass The Stuffing”, starts the players among the zombie-infested floats of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and follows them as they fight through hordes of the infected, hoping to make it to the safe house in time for supper. Press release follows:

Bill, Louis, Francis, Zoey, Coach, Ellis, Nick, and Rochelle have waded through wave after wave of zombie hordes, fighting for their very survival in a world where a massive outbreak has doomed most of the population. Having been rescued close to a dozen times, the plucky band of survivors finally get a well-deserved respite, just in time for Thanksgiving! They decided to get together and celebrate their good fortune, but wait, whose turn was it to buy the turkey? The survivors are dropped right in the middle of a zombie-run Macy’s Parade and once again have to fight for lives–watch out for the giant Zombie Snoopy float!–in the hopes of making their way to a grocery store that’s still open, not overrun by zombies, and stocked with enough turkey, stuffing mix, and cranberry sauce to satisfy Coach! And then, when it seems like they’ve finally made it to the safe house to enjoy their meal, they have to work out how they are going to fit everyone around the table (no one wants to sit next to the Boomer) and who gets stuck at the kiddie table with The Witch.

Along the way they’ll encounter a host of new special infected, including the Drunken Zombie Relative who gets grabby when they’ve had a few and doesn’t know what’s considered appropriate conversation at the dinner table. There’s also the Zombie Neighbor who just stops by to say “Brainssss” but stays long enough to help himself to a drumstick and two slices of pie. And of course there’s the dreaded Reanimated Zombie Turkeys which assail players with a stream of desiccated stuffing from their flavor-holes, causing the survivors to slow and get incredibly sleepy. Rounding it out is Zombie Dad asleep on the couch. Don’t turn off the TV or you’ll awaken him and his ire!

Of course the survivors will get a batch of new weapons and packs to combat the restless and hungry hordes. Don a Pilgrim hat and take on zombies the colonial way: with an antique blunderbuss! Or grab a baster to moisten up those terrifyingly dry Zombie Turkeys. Guzzle down a quart of eggnog–it’ll slow you down, but it’ll numb the pain. Unwrap a can of those Pillsbury Crescent Rolls and toss it into the fray and watch it explode in a doughy mess! And finally, there’s the dreaded Cornucopia. No one knows exactly what it is, or how you use it, but it’s there. Find it, equip it, and tell us what it does. Even we don’t know. Maybe it shoots decorative gourds. Yea, that sounds about right.

This holiday season the streets will be filled with blood and cranberry sauce. On Thanksgiving don’t forget to… Pass The Stuffing.

Shortly after the announcement, Valve added that players purchasing the DLC will also be eligible for the Left 4 Dead 4 demo, the full version of which they announced was canceled to make way for Left 4 Dead 5 (whose box art, incidentally, just features a bloody stump).

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D&D: Don’t Split the Party… Unless One Of Them Is A Video Gamer

Outside the sky is dark and gray, and thunderclouds loom as if portends of doom, lightning momentarily illuminating the eerie landscape.  But no one can tell here in the dark, foreboding dungeon.  Only the flickering of torchlight and the wizard’s light spell dares pierce the inky blackness; only the occasional drip of water and the party’s heartbeats pounding in their ears can penetrate the silence.  The brave adventurers battled their way through the Crypt of Blood and stand now before the tomb of the powerful Under Lich.  The Heroes of Nerrath assemble: the brave dwarf fighter Stonebrow, master of the axe; the powerful elven wizard Varis, skilled in the arcane arts; the wily halfling rogue Finian Underfoot, pickpocket extraordinaire; and the pious human cleric Redgar, servant of Bahamut.

“Oh my god, you guys are SO GAY,” interrupts the uncouth half-orc.

“Shut up, Eric, the Dungeon Master is setting up the adventure!” shoots back Redgar in hushed tones.

While exploring the dangerous crypt, the adventurers rescued a half-orc barbarian who had been taken prisoner by the priests of the great Lich…

“Taken prisoner?” asks the half-orc, incredulously. “More like kicked-their-asses.”  He flexes a bit in a display of irrelevant machismo.  “I probably let them think I was their prisoner so I could get all up behind them and be like ‘pap pap pap!’ no more evil cult dudes!”  The last bit he punctuates with an anachronistic two-fingered gesture.

Whatever. Fine.  The adventurers were joined by a half-orc barbarian from the Stolian Wastes, a loner with a troubled past, who calls himself Skullcrusher.

“That’s not my name,” insists the half-orc.

Ugh. Fine.  Skullfucker.

“Heh, yea!” he chuckles, looking around at his companions who stare back at him with a mixture of disdain and unease.

The heroes find themselves at the entrance to the tomb of the powerful Under Lich.

“I sense eldritch magic and powerful evil!” exclaims Varis, excitedly.

“Fag,” coughs the half-orc.

“Why did we invite him again?” asks Varis, impatiently.

“Cause he’s my brother, and none of his buddies are online so he was bored,” explains Redgar, embarrassed.  “C’mon, Eric, don’t be a dick.”

Ahem.  The Tomb of the Lich awaits the adventurers.

“I’ll say a prayer to Bahamut, asking for his blessings in battle,” responds Redgar, placing his hands together in the universal symbol of prayer.

“I’ll sneak up to the door to have a look,” says Finian Underfoot, inching along the wall.

“I will cast silence so that he can’t hear our approach,” says Varis, waving his arms about, and punctuating the word “silence” while staring daggers at the half-orc.

“This is a crypt?” asks the half-orc, gesturing about.  “It’s just a bunch of squares.  Why are the walls blue? And what’s that supposed to be, a pillow?”

“The black pen stains the battlemat, so we have to use blue,” explains Stonebrow, readying his axe.

“And that’s not a pillow, that’s supposed to be the Lich’s sarcophagus, but the ink smeared a bit,” adds Finian, with a hint of disappointment.

“Okay, whatever,” says the half-orc impatiently. “I’m gonna go fuck this guy up.”

“Wait, don’t!” exclaims Varis the elf, reaching out to stop the burly barbarian.

The half-orc raises his fearsome double axe (“Of awesomeness!”) and rushes across the doorway. Unfortunately, he is oblivious to the Glyph of Warding trap just beyond the threshold.

“Gods dammit,” sighs Redgar, hanging his head.

The trap is sprung and magical flames issue forth from the mystical runes on the floor.  The fireball engulfs the half-orc, and he is badly hurt–bloodied, in fact.  The Under Lich is distracted from its evil ritual and howls at the adventurers.  The heroes hope to gain initiative…

“I’m quick!” says Finian the halfling.  “Yes! I got an 18! I think I’ll be first!”

“I’ll probably be last,” a disappointed Stonebrow adds.  “I got a 6.”

“15″, “13″, the others chime in.

“Whatever, I’ve got like a 40,” the half-orc declares.

“You can’t have a 40, you’re just a stupid barbarian,” whines Varis.  “Finian Underfoot is clearly first.”

“No way, I’m way faster than that stupid Hobbit,” says the half-orc, beginning to stand.

Whatever.  He can go first. He’s new. It’s fine.  The barbarian charges through the doorway, emerging from the other side of a wall of magical fire.  And?

“Like I said, I’m all up in his business,” the half-orc answers, impatiently.

He swings his mighty double axe and…

“What are you looking at me for?  Am I supposed to roll something?  Like all these dice?” He looks confused. “Okay… I’m awesome.”  Somewhere the sound of many small polyhedrons dancing across a table is heard.  “I got like 30. I wasted him.”

“No, just the 20-sider, Eric,” says Redgar, impatiently.

The barbarian swings his mighty axe but is unable to hit the wicked undead lord before him.

“What?  No way, I totally fucked him up!” The half-orc pretends to stand over the Uber Lich, repeatedly crouching and standing.

The Lich’s dead eyes glow with an unholy light.  He levels his bony hands at Skullcrusher (“Skullfucker!”) and a blast of necrotic energy hits him squarely in the chest.  The half-orc yells in pain and falls to the ground… dead!

“Oh my gods,” exclaims Finian, a look of horror on his face.

“The Under Lich has felled the barbarian!” adds Varis. “He’s too powerful!”

“Whatever, what’s my respawn, like ten seconds?” asks the dead half-orc.

“What’s a respawn?” asks Stonebrow, genuinely confused.

“No, Eric, you’re dead,” says Redgar flatly. “That’s it.”

“What? That’s queer!” scoffs the dead barbarian, still hissing with necrotic energy.  “Whatever, I’m getting something to drink.”  He stands and walks away, the scent of burnt half-orc hanging in the air.

The evil undead lord turns his gaze now upon the remaining companions, who stand in awe, having just watched their comrade smote by his powerful magic. What will they do now?

“I’m going to ‘Do The Dew’,” says a disembodied voice. “Taking one from the fridge, brah.”

“I never run away from a fight, but this undead abomination may be too much for us lads,” admits Stonebrow the dwarf, in an unconvincing and muddled Scottish/Irish accent.

“I concur, we should flee with great haste,” agrees Varis the elf quickly, turning to leave.

Redgar the cleric looks around at his companions and sighs, pleading with them, “Guys, we gotta go grab Skull… effer.  We need to take him to town and see if someone can resurrect him.”

The Under Lich utters words of unholy power and skeletons begin to claw their way up from under the crypt floor.

“And I heard something about Cool Ranch Doritos,” calls the disembodied voice again, amidst the a strange cacophony of sound, not unlike cabinets roughly opening and closing and pots and pans rattling.  “I wanna crush a bag, where they at?”

If the half-orc had been paying attention earlier, he would have heard that rations are available on the table in the kitchen.  Not that he put any gold toward their purchase or anything.

“But, we’ve got all this treasure,” interjects Finian the rogue.  “We can’t carry him and the loot!”

“I know guys, I’m sorry.” Redgar braces himself and wades into the sea of skeletons to grab the body of his fallen comrade. “Maybe we can come back for it.”

“But the door to Temple of Blood only opens during the Blood Moon, once every three fortnights!” complains Varis the elf, watching as his companions quickly shed the various treasures they had fought so hard for and follow Redgar into the crypt.

“God, you’re such a pussy,” calls the disembodied voice again, between crunching sounds. “You should have been called Vulva!”

“You’re a vulva,” mutters the wizard, reluctantly joining the fray and aiding his comrades in rescuing the body of the fallen half-orc, for reasons he can’t quite comprehend.  The battle is pitched and the heroes themselves barely make it out alive, expending the last of their resources to escape in one piece, chased through the catacombs of the Temple of Blood by an army of skeletal warriors.  But they do escape, managing to seal the doors behind them, collapsing in a heap.

“You guys still dorking around with that Udder Lick that I fucked up?” The crunching had stopped and the disembodied voice was now coming from the half-orc’s corpse.

“C’mon, let’s get this over with,” sighs Redgar the cleric, saying a few prayers to keep the body of his comrade from stinking too much as they drag him back to town many miles away.  The road is long, arduous, and slow going.  The scenery slowly crawls by and the effort of dragging a couple hundred pounds of dead weight exhausts the companions.  Finally, the town of Glennhallow appears over a rise like a shining beacon to the downtrodden adventurers.  The guards at the gate see their predicament and usher them in without hassle, knowing that if they tarry long it could be too late.  The four companions make their way to the temple of Avandra, hoping that the acolytes there will know a ritual that might bring the fallen barbarian back from the realm of the Raven Queen.  As they approach, a sister of the order of Avandra rushes out to meet them.  “My dear heroes,” she exclaims.  “What evil hast befallen you?  Come inside, we must…”

“Oh. My. God.” says the half-orc’s slowly bloating corpse. “I hate cutscenes.  Skip please.  SKIP!”

Redgar sighs yet again. “We can move this along, I guess.”

The party meets with the woman and she says she can resurrect him. They perform a ritual.  He springs to life.

From somewhere, a strange ringing is heard.

“Hello?” says the formerly dead barbarian. “Yo, this is Eric.”

“The ritual was a lengthy one, and used most of what little resources our order has,” says the sister, ignoring the annoying ringing that, again, had someone been paying attention, would have been set to vibrate.  “I must ask for compensation in exchange.”

“Of course,” Redgar says, “How much must we donate to repay this boon?”

“We brought your friend back from the brink.  We’d need at least 1,000 gold pieces as ‘payment’ for our services.’

The adventurers look around the table at each other.

The dwarf shrugs. “I’m wearing most of my loot.”

The rogue nods, “Yea, and I bought the last round of healing potions and this cloak I’m wearing.”

They both turn to the cleric.  “Look, I know he’s my brother but… I spent most of my gold on rituals and components. I’m tapped.”  The three look to the wizard who has been strangely silent. “You know, Varis, I haven’t seen you buy any gear in a while.  You must have a few gold tucked away.”

Varis the Elf feigns ignorance, looking at his nails, before snapping at his companions.  “C’mon guys, I was going to buy a +1 Staff of Storms and rain down thunder and lightning. It was going to be so cool!”

Redgar slaps his wizard friend on the shoulder, “C’mon, man, you’re the only one with the coin.”

“Fine!” shoots Varis. “This sucks.  Here, take it, take all of it.” He throws a sack of coins at the Sister of Avandra’s feet.

The half-orc stands up.  “My clan’s online,” he says, furnishing a coat from seemingly nowhere and slipping it on.  “I’m outta here, gotta go do some real gaming.  Modern Warfare 2, baby! Peace!”  And with that the half-orc barbarian, known to his friends as Skullfucker, strodes from the Temple of Avandra in the town of Glennhallow and disappeared, perhaps forever.

“Modern Warfare, psh,” dismisses Stonebrow the dwarf, as the wizard Varis walks away mumbling about his precious staff. “I’d rather a sharp axe, a strong shield, and a party of true adventurers any day, right laddies?” His accent is somehow less muddled, and almost convincing.

“God dammit,” cries the voice of Varis, a beacon of sorrow. “He ate all the Doritos!”

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Gamer Travels Back In Time To Warn Herself Not To Play Darkest of Days

Gamer Angela Boseman had just returned home from her local big box retailer with a copy of 8monkey Lab’s Darkest of Days with the hopes of enjoying a little first-person shooter fun.  Normally she would check the reviews or play the demo, but this time she just picked up the title on a whim.  She had gotten a message from a random stranger on Xbox Live telling her to check it out since it was “the closest thing to ‘Quantum Leap: The Video Game’ she’d ever get to play”.  Her purchasing decision was clouded by a need for a good FPS fix and an amorous desire dating back to her teen years for Scott Bakula.

As she pulled the jewel case from the shopping bag and prepared to rip away its plastic wrapping with her teeth, the hair on the back of her neck suddenly stood on end.  The air felt unusually dry and electrified, like the moment before a lightning strike.  She became aware of a snapping, tearing sound, growing ever louder, seemingly coming from nowhere and everywhere at once.  The smell of ozone hung in the air.  Suddenly, with a flash of light and low resounding boom that she felt more than actually heard, a shimmering sphere appeared in the middle of her living room.  It was glassy and perfect, like the impossibly still surface of a cold, clear lake.  She was frozen in awe and shock, and totally unprepared for what came next.  A figure emerged from the sphere.

“Angela!” it called to her, in a voice that was strangely familiar.  “I have come from the future with a grave warning:  Do not, under any circumstances, play Darkest of Days!”

Angela was barely able to compose herself, her mind at a loss to explain what she was experiencing.  “Who… who are you?” she managed to squeak out.

“I am you,” said the stranger, “and you are about to make a very big mistake.”  The woman did indeed bear a strong resemblance to Angela, though the years had clearly not been kind to her.  Her once supple, youthful face had been ravaged by time and hard living, wrinkles furrowing across a mournful expression that had long ago forgotten joy.  Her hair was thin and gray now, with little sign of its former luster.  “Do not play that game,” she said forcefully.

“What, this?” Angela asked incredulously, “Why, is it going to red-ring my Xbox or something?”

“Worse!” exclaimed Future Angela, “The consequences are even more dire than having to wait on a repair from Microsoft.  The game will ruin you.  I am a living testament of that.”  Future Angela made a sweeping gesture over her body to accent her point.  “It commits the gravest sin a game can commit against a gamer…”

“It charges you for Avatar clothing?” quipped Angela.

“No!” Future Angela bellowed angrily.  “It’s a complete and total waste of your time!“

Angela looked again at the game in her hands.  It couldn’t be that bad, she thought to herself.  The whole situation was crazy.  Maybe she was hallucinating.  Maybe it was bad beans in her Chipotle burrito.

“Okay, just wait a minute,” she rebuked.  “How can I believe you? This is all a little too much to process.”

“Just trust me,” insisted Future Angela. “I am you.  We’re the same person.”

“So you said, and yea you look a little like me, if I had been ridden hard and put away wet. But there’s no way for me to be sure.”

“Fine,” said Future Angela, “I’ll prove it to you.”  She thought for a moment.  “In addition to that game, you bought a bunch of batteries.  You already have rechargeable battery packs for your game controllers, so you intended those for…”

“Okay, so maybe you are me”, interrupted Angela quickly.  “But c’mon, even if it’s not great, I can at least get some easy achievements.”

“Really?  You think so?”  Future Angela walked over to her younger self and clapped her firmly on the shoulders.  “You don’t.  You’ll play for over an hour and a half and get nothing.”

“Nothing?” Angela was incredulous.

“Nothing. Zero. Zilch.  Not a single damn achievement in over an hour of play.  For Halo’s sake, you can get 10 Gamerscore just for going into a menu in Madden, and The Beatles: Rock Band will hook you up with a fiver just calibrating!”

Angela was starting to regret her purchase.  But she really didn’t feel like hopping in the car and going back to the store to return it.  So maybe she’d have to work a bit for her Gamerscore, at least she’d get to shoot stuff.

“You still aren’t convinced, are you?”  Future Angela rolled her eyes.  “You fight in the Civil War using a machine gun and no one notices.  Not even your enemies.  You can shoot them, and they’ll stand there and do nothing. ‘Why does my stomach suddenly hurt? Must be this awful hardtack we Rebel soldiers have to eat. I couldn’t possibly have been shot while twiddling my thumbs here on a battlefield!’”

Angela made a face. “Well, at least you get to shoot stuff.”

“Ugh!” Future Angel was losing patience. “Yea, sometimes.  But then there’s the glowing guys that aren’t supposed to die.  You have to throw green balls at them.”

“Green balls?”

“Look, I don’t fucking know.  What I do know is that throwing balls at people is weird and isn’t fun.  Unless it’s dodgeball, which even in the context of the American Civil War would still have made more sense than this anachronistic nightmare of a title.  And don’t get me started on the turrets.”  Future Angela pantomimes putting a gun to her head and pulling the trigger.

Angela was quickly running out of reasons to doubt her supposed future self.

“Is the voice acting any good?” she asked, grasping at straws.

“If English is your second language… sure.”

Angela resigned herself to the truth.  She had bought a bad game.  But other than wasting some money, how could it be that much of a calamity?

“Suppose I believe you that it’s a horrible game,” she started. “What’s the big deal?  I mean, clearly you lived to a ripe old age and even saw the invention of time travel.”

“Did I?” asked Future Angela, narrowing her eyes.  “I don’t think you understand.  I don’t come from decades into your future. I came here to warn you when I couldn’t take it any more.  I came here after my will to live had diminished and my spirit was nearly broke.  I came here after only playing the game for four hours.”

Angela’s mouth fell open and her copy of Darkest of Days dropped to the floor, not clattering about but simply coming to rest, as if weighing far more than a simple game should.  Before her stood the vision of herself utterly wrecked by a truly awful game.

“The receipt is still in the bag!” she exclaimed, running over to where she had set it on a counter. “It’s not too late, I can return it tonight!”  Angela’s future self smiled at her.

“I knew you’d make the right decision,” she beamed.  “I must go now so as to not alter your timeline any further.  But with any luck, I will soon cease to exist.”

As Future Angela stepped backward toward the spherical portal from whence she had appeared, her younger self stopped her.  “Thank you,” said Angela. “For everything.  But I’m confused, if you only come from a few hours in the future, how did you manage to travel through time?”

“Someone from my future decided to pay me a visit,” she explained.  “I wanged him on the head and stole his time travel dealy.”

“But why were you visited, then?” asked Angela over the ever growing noise of the time portal, which had begun to crackle and hiss as Future Angela approached it.

“Because,” answered her future self, slipping into the portal, her voice fading as if being heard from a great distance.  “He didn’t want me to give you this.”  Her arm trailed her as she disappeared into the glassy surface, and in her outstretched hand she bore a familiar shape.  With a great noise like the gears of the cosmos grinding together followed by an almost comical “pop!”, the time portal and Angela of the future disappeared.  But she had left behind a gift for her present self.

Angela knelt down and picked up the jewel case laying there on the floor.  Upon it was a title as if from a dream.

“Halo: Reach.”

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Pandora Tourism Bureau Enlists Madonna To Attract Settlers

New Haven – In an attempt to spark interest in the desolate, barren world of Pandora, the local Tourism Bureau has enlisted pop diva Madonna as the spokeswoman for a new series of advertisements.  The campaign, which goes by the tagline: “The Borderlands: Come For The Vault, Stay For The Sniper Rifles That Shoot Acid”, was overseen by the mayor of New Haven, Helena Pierce, and features a reimagining of the classic Madonna hit “Borderline”.

“We really needed some star power behind us,” said Pierce.  “Someone who could help us show that Pandora is more than just a wretched Hell-hole full of dangerous creatures and disturbed social outcasts.” Scoring a celebrity as big as Madonna would seem nearly impossible for a small and disorganized settlement like Pandora but Pierce says it was no problem booking the Queen of Pop.  “We just promised her she could adopt one of our ‘adorable’ Midget Psychos and she was on board.”

The ad, which began airing a few weeks ago, features Madonna caught between two worlds and two loves.  She is seen cavorting with Bandits and their leader Nine Toes but is swept away from her “roots” by the promise of fame and fortune with the help of entrepreneur Marcus Kincaid.  She also breakdances with some Claptraps.  A transcript of the lyrics follows:

Something on this planet seems to be a mystery
There’s a vault that’s full of weapons, so hey, why don’t you take a peak?

If you wanna play the part, Fyrestone’s a start,
You can take the bus to town
There’s a Claptrap who will show where you need to go
Maybe bring some extra rounds.

Please, try to bring some friends (bring some friends), we’ll give them lots to spend:
Open anything that’s green.

Borderlands, shoot up the place–we don’t really mind
So just keep on killing those Skags out in the Borderlands
Borderlands, watch out for Psychos–they’ve lost their minds
And just keep on killing those Rakks out in the Borderlands (Borderlands)

[Claptrap Breakdown]

People might not understand just what it is you see
So let’s keep this Angel Guardian stuff between you and me

So wander out of town, take a look around
Never know what might be found
You can drive a little ways, maybe meet T.K.
And he’ll ask, do you Got Grenades?

Please, try to bring some friends (lots of friends), we’ll give them all we can:
Extra weapon drops for free.

Borderlands, shoot up the place–we don’t really mind
So just keep on killing those Skags out in the Borderlands
Borderlands, watch out for Psychos–they’ve lost their minds
And just keep on killing those Rakks out in the Borderlands (Borderlands)

Not everyone likes the new campaign, however.  A radical activist group known as PETS (Pandorans for the Ethical Treatment of Skags) has protested, claiming that it encourages violence against the native residents of the planet.

“This type of propaganda is unacceptable and promotes blind capitalism over the rights of native fauna,” yelled a PETS spokesperson at a rally outside the gates of Fyrestone.  “PETS is outraged and cannot condone anything that characterizes these beautiful, majestic animals as killers and beasts.  We love Skags, as we love all of Pandora’s creatures.  And we won’t stop protesting until this disgusting ad campaign is shut down.”

Moments later a pack of Skags surrounded the spokesman, belched acid and fire upon him, and then tore him to shreds, devouring his body parts whole.  The protest quickly dispersed.

Madonna plans to release the song as a single, donating the money to a Pandoran charity devoted to find a cure for P.T.A.S: Psycho Tiny Arm Syndrome.

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Neversoft Reveals Revolutionary New Motion Capture Technology

Woodland Hills, CA – Video game developer Neversoft, heir to the Guitar Hero franchise, recently invited journalists to learn about the latest technology being used to develop the popular music game series.  Journos were given a sneak peak at just what goes into pumping out title after successful title. Parts of the tour were focused on the technical aspect of bringing a game to light, such as the User Interface Lab where their lead GUI developer, a colorblind intern whose impressive credentials include two semesters of Criminal Justice at the local junior college, appeared to be testing his designs with an Atari Pong paddle.  Other portions were devoted to the design stages, such as the never-before-revealed selection process that determines what appears and doesn’t appear in a Guitar Hero title.  One couldn’t help but be impressed watching that room full of chimps alternate between tossing poo and CDs across their pen toward a basket marked “Next Guitar Hero Game”.

Nothing compared, however, to the final stop on the tour: a visit to Neversoft’s secret motion capture facility.  Partially for secrecy, but mostly for theatrics, a select group of journalists was blindfolded and driven on a circuitous route through town until finally arriving at their destination.  We were lead into a facility that smelled vaguely of old pizza and change.  A few moments passed when the still silence was broken by a collection of whirring noises growing ever louder, like a great machine coming to life.  With no small amount of theatrical flair, a voice announced, “Behold, the future of motion capture technology!” and our blindfolds were suddenly removed.  An array of lights and sounds assaulted us and when our eyes had finally adjusted we were astonished at what we saw.

Before us, bedecked with dozens of motion-capture “ping pong balls”, were the likes of Jasper T. Jowls, Helen Henny, Mr. Munch, and Pasqually–the Pizza Time Players–and front and center was the one-and-only mozzarella-loving mascot: Chuck-E-Cheese himself.

“Your eyes do not deceive you,” said the Neversoft rep.  “The future is here today.  The future is animatronics.”

After a short stage show detailing the importance of consuming massive amounts of pizza and soda on our birthday, the Neversoft representatives explained the technology and the reasons behind adopting it.

“We’ve struggled for a long time with how to present a truly authentic experience to gamers,” said a rep.  “Computer animation by hand is too difficult and time-consuming, and traditional motion-capture techniques deliver a result that is too real.  Gamers don’t want real.  They aren’t interested in seeing a realistic representation of actual rock stars.  Have you seen [competitor Harmonix's] Beatles: Rock Band?  What a piece of shit.  Just take one quick glance at any of their characters and you can actually distinguish which Beatle they are.  Where are the stilted movements?  Where are the awkward instrument animations?  No one wants their rhythm game to look like it could have come from one of their favorite band’s videos or live performances.  Gamers today are sophisticated: they want to imagine themselves as a general approximation of a stereotyped character generally approximating the real-life activity that they are themselves simulating on superficially similar controllers approximating real-world instruments.”

“We decided to go back to the drawing board,” said another rep, “and really think about how we could bring our games to life.  When we sat down and really thought hard about what truly captured Rock and Roll, we all came to the same conclusion: Chuck-E-Cheese’s Pizza Time Band.  It had been there in front of us all along, wrapped in a memory from our childhood.”

A programmer and animator from Neversoft explained that once they had realized how they were going to revolutionize motion capture in video games, the rest was as easy as sticking some reflective markers on a bunch of twenty-five year old felt and rubber animatronic puppets.  At the moment, Pasqually, the Italian-offending stereotype robot came to life and joked that “It’s-a no wonder I don’t-a put da meat-a-balls-a on-a da pizza!  Dey just-a roll-a right off-a!”

“The fruits of our exciting technological leap can already be seen in some of our new titles,” noted a Neversoft rep., showing a few clips from the upcoming Guitar Hero: Van Halen.  “Do you see the pained grin that never seems to leave virtual Eddie Van Halen’s face?  You can’t do that with a real motion capture actor–there’s no way they can contort their face for that long.  And just look into Wolfgang’s soulless eyes.  You can only get that shallow, lifeless look by studying the cold stare of a robotic mannequin.”

The art team admits that, in addition to animations, they took a lot of their cues from the puppets.  “You see how shiny our virtual characters are? Looks like they’re made of rubber, doesn’t it?  No one’s that shiny in real life, not even David Lee Roth, not even in his heyday.”

“We’ve revolutionized the way characters are rendered,” concluded the Neversoft rep. “And it’s all thanks to this guy.  Right, Chuck-E-Cheese?”  The animatronic rodent whirred to life, his head shaking from side to side, his plastic eyelids flapping, and his mouth clacking open and closed as a chip inside him blurted out, “Did somebody say cheeeeese?”  The crew from Neversoft laughed long and hard at this, well after the assembled journalists had ceased chuckling.

The tour ended with a birthday song by the Pizza Time Band and a press-release, the surprise announcement that Neversoft’s next title would be the Muppet-themed Guitar Hero: Electric Mayhem.

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