Journal-World, Lawrence, Kan., Dave Toplikar Column: Blue Battle
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By Dave Toplikar, Journal-World, Lawrence, Kan.  Dec. 10--I was reading up on the difference between the next generation of DVD formats when Katy brought in her tiny new dog.  "This is Kinsey," my oldest daughter told me, cradling it in her arms.   It sure was small.
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Friday's St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports on a controversial decision by Missouri's Secretary of State: the state of Missouri will be allowing soldiers stationed overseas to cast ballots via e-mail. Their absentee ballots will be scanned and converted to PDF files, which will be emailed to the Defense Department, printed out, and then faxed to Missouri.  I'm in favor of helping soldiers vote; this is a democracy, everyone should be able to vote. Yet I'm deeply skeptical of this proposal, for two reasons:  The plan depends on e-mailed ballots being printed out and faxed by the Defense Department but does not provide any safeguards against soldiers being sanctioned for how they have voted;  The transmission method is inherently technically insecure
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Amazing, but even in this time of goodwill and cheer, some folks are always looking for a fight. A recent exchange with a regular reader got me thinking how divisive things can get.
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By Marv Balousek, The Wisconsin State Journal  Sep.
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Tycho:  I purchased twenty fluid ounces of Halo 3 "Limited Edition Mountain Dew Game Fuel" in the hopes that it would taste so horrible that we'd get a strip out of it. Â Before I read the ingredients in preparation for this post, I often found myself desirous of this strange liquid - a liquid the precise color of tubercular sputum.  I would trip over to Seven Eleven to obtain it, tipping a small portion onto the concrete for the Spartans we lost at Reach.  Once I discovered that the soda contained a compound called "Brominated Vegetable Oil," my ardor was diminished for some reason.  The flavor of the beverage is not unpleasant, especially if you like bromide.  The almost oppressive campaign that surrounds the product is, perhaps, more bitter.   It's one slice (or, perhaps, sip) of a ten hojillion dollar marketing campaign designed to project one of gaming's biggest brands to people who already know about it.  There is no way to escape the Goddamn thing.  Over ninety percent of the surveyed crustaceans were "aware of the launch" and held a "strong desire to purchase," even though their massive claws and aquatic habitat make using the product impossible.  Lemurs are less bullish, but then lemurs are a notoriously tough demo.    It took a third night of playing the Call of Duty 4 Beta for everything to sink in, but it's pretty much official: they know what the fuck they're doing.  A shooter can't merely be great to come out this holiday, and even amazing might be insufficient.  To go against the previously described fucking unstoppable media phalanx - to say nothing of Halo 3 itself, whose multiplayer offering is so broad on every axis that it must be called round - you need to drop something that be off the cheazy.       There are shooters that play with progression to varying degrees.  Battlefield 2142 does, but the infantry experience is one part of a whole.  Rainbow Six: Vegas does, but its reward scheme is largely cosmetic in nature, and takes place outside of the game proper - between rounds, in austere menus.  CoD4's leveling has the sharp inhalation of a WoW ding.  It takes place right there at the moment you earn the XP from a kill, with an onscreen celebration of the fact.  The reward structure earns you new playmodes, new weapons,  new slottable abilities, the right to build custom classes, the right to wear a clan tag.  You don't need to wait long to earn them, the schedule is not cruel, but you need to put in your dues.  It's not an onerous process:  in order to level up, you must simply play Call of Duty 4.  Trust me when I say this is something you will want to do.    I feel as though my knowledge of the game should be richer, so let me crack a few more levels and get back to you.  Hopefully a beta code will have dripped out to you by then, and you will know what I mean with visceral certainty.    Oh, and also: Â if you want to tumble down some fissure in the earth and wake up in the Japanese Madness Caverns, take a look at this video for Puzzle de Harvest Moon.  I watched it hours ago, and I am still haunted.
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By Mary Hopkin, Tri-City Herald, Kennewick, Wash.  Sep.
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MARK COLVIN: To our correspondent Leigh Sales who&#39;s been following progress at the Kerry headquarters in Boston. LEIGH SALES: No, they&#39;re not conceding, Mark, although it&#39;s just started raining here in Copley Square, which is maybe an omen.
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Big Blue has brought the title of the worldâs fastest supercomputer back to the US for the first time in three years. IBMs still incomplete Blue Gene/L system has been officially named the fastest in the
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Gabe: The Penny Arcade Battle Academy Will be meeting next Tuesday the 8th at the Comic Stop. We're an official Pokemon TCG league now. Those of you in the Academy who haven't done so already, should register with Go Pokemon.com. Once you have a POP ID you can post it in this thread and Joe will get you added to the roster. As always, new players are welcome. Just grab a starter deck and be at the Comic Stop around 6.PM. There will be plenty of people willing to walk you through the game if it's your first time. For our regulars, if you're looking for a place up north to get cards and boosters I highly recommend the Cardhaus in Lynnwood. He's got some singles in stock but he also has the best price on boosters I've been able to find. Also, Kiko and I picked up some great tips and a few interesting rules that we did not know about while at the tournament. We'll share our "key learnings" with you all on Tuesday. It should be a fun night, hope to see some new faces. -Gabe out
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By Pam Kowalik, The Buffalo News, N.Y.  Feb.
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Gabe: ***STAR WARS NERD CRAP!***I've been meaning to mention Karen's new book in the Republic Commando series for a while but I wanted to wait until I finished it. I'm a ridiculously slow reader so I didn't actually wrap it up until a few weeks ago. If you're reading the series "True Colors" is out in stores and it's great. If you're not reading the series you should start at the beginning. Karen is essentially covering the Clone Wars like a real war correspondent would. Seeing as that was her previous job it makes sense. She's looking at the war and asking the questions a real journalist would ask. "Why do we all of a sudden have a clone army? Don't they take ten years to grow?" "How are we paying for this?" "Why doesn't anyone ever see veterans or wounded clone troopers returning home?" She is cutting through the Galactic/imperial propaganda and showing the war from the point of view of the soldiers. Star Wars fiction tends to be about Jedi. All the movies are about Jedi and almost all of the books tend to revolve around Jedi and their lives. Republic Commando is refreshing because it's not about Jedi. It's about soldiers fighting a war that the government will never let them win. The newest book also happens to introduce my new favorite Star Wars characters. Gaib and the Tk-0 droid are data bounty hunters. Essentially hackers for hire. So fucking awesome.  *** END OF STAR WARS NERD CRAP***  I also have some Child's Play updates for you. If you couldn't make it to the dinner last week or you just want to remember how rad it was, you can hit Kiko's Flickr for his pictures. As of last Friday we're up to $850,000 for the year. It looks like we'll have no problem breaking a million before we wrap things up in January.This is the last day for a very cool Heroes auction over on eBay. The auction was assembled by our friend Ollie who works on the show. He managed to get a pilot scrip signed by a bunch of the cast members as well as a bunch of other great Heroes collectibles.-Gabe out
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New Silicon Graphics machine has a chance at giving Big Blue a run for the title.
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WASHINGTON Of all the images I saw on a short visit to Iraq last week, two stand out in my mind. One was a display that the 24th Marine Expeditionary Unit, in the Sunni Triangle, prepared for the visiting
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YOGI BERRA said, &quot;It ain&#39;t over till it&#39;s over.&quot; John Kerry slumped with voters and political cognoscenti. In usually blue New Jersey, John Kerry&#39;s lead fell from 20 points to 4. Media focused on shakeup in Kerry lineup.
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Though both the red and blue groups at the ATP Masters Cup this week have the best players in the world, there is no question that the blue group is the weaker of the two -- if there is such a thing.
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By John Moritz, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Texas  Feb.
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Gabe: I just have some random stuff to share here.***UPDATE***Looks like we got bumped to 2/12 because of a Magic tournament.Pokemon League night is next Tuesday at the Comic Stop. Matches start at six pm, but you can show up a little early if you'd like to trade cards. As always new players are welcome, just bring a starter deck. It's also a good idea to register at Go-Pokemon.com and bring your POP ID. A reader wrote in today to tell me that he was doing the New York Sun crossword puzzle for January 30th and noticed this clue for 12 down:  "Tycho's pal in the webcomic 'Penny Arcade' (4 letters)." That's totally awesome. I'm sure the Force Unleashed will be fine. The time period around the original trilogy is just getting so crowded. Now Vader has a secret apprentice? I mean, it makes sense canonically to me. The Emperor had Mara Jade out there doing his dirty work. It's not unreasonable to think Vader had a similar arrangement. Also the very nature of Sith rule makes covering your ass a necessity. The hook for the game is fine and I don't mind the 3rd person action stuff. There are a few games I'd much rather see them make though. The fact that they have not made a sequel to Republic Commando is fucking criminal. That's not a joke either. I mean that someone over there should be put in jail for the rest of their life. RepCom was an incredible squad based shooter, and unlike most games in that genre it was packed with awesome characters. This games deserves a next gen sequel. The other game that needs a next gen installment is Tie Fighter. Seriously that game came out in 1994 and it's one of the best space shooters ever. And for fucks sake stop setting things during the movies. There's nearly sixty years worth of incredible content (minus the dark nest series) extending out past Return of the Jedi. You don't have to keep trying to cram stories into the same 20 year period. They're milking so much content out of that period that eventually we'll be playing a game as Luke where the goal is to repair vaporators on the south ridge. Hurry up you've only got 'till mid day!Rez is available on Xbox Live now. It's one of the best games ever made.   The most popular piece of clothing we've ever made, AKA The Black Mantle is back in stock. It's joined by its polar opposite, the Luminous Vestments. I have a feeling both will be sold out before I finish typing this.   -Gabe out