The Wired blog reports that Telltale Games is reprinting Surfin’ The Highway: The Collected Sam & Max. The book includes both the priceless originals and more recent bonus material.

The original printing is super-rare these days, fetching between $150-200 through Amazon used book sellers. Pretty pricey for a trade paperback!

Telltale is also prepping a two-disc Sam and Max Episode 1 soundtrack release, which of course everyone is excited about. Everyone.

Telltale has been producing Sam & Max videogames of late, and you can see a whole line of fine products at their website, which promise, “The Summer of Sam & Max.”

If you’ve ever read Purcell’s unique madness, you know how good this is. If you haven’t, well you’re in for a treat. Or you can read the Eisner-nominated webcomic here, but be forwarned it’s in some kind of lofi animation so you have to hold your cursor over the panels to read the dialog.

More info.

§ Over at his MySpace blog, director Jon Favreau reports on the completion of photography for Iron Man:

Principal photography ended with a huge bang as we filmed the final scenes of Iron Man in Caesar’s Palace. As many of you already know, gambling is a casino’s top priority. A production can not interfere with their cash cow. As a result, movies must shoot during the dead hours, no matter if it’s Swingers or Rain Man. We were given a window of midnight to one the next afternoon to do all of our work. Part of our strategy to prepare for these ungodly hours was to stay up as late as possible the night before and sleep as late as possible. I did half the plan. The wrong half. I stayed out until 7AM and then woke up four hours later. After motoring through the delerium of a sleepless shooting marathon, I am proud to report that we have handily completed our movie on time and on budget. What a great way to end.

Above is a cast photo: Terence Howard, Gwyneth Paltrow, Robert Downey Jr. and Jeff Bridges.

§ Paramount has optioned FOUNDATION by John Rozum and Kody Chamberlain, which is published by BOOM Studios:

Andrew Cosby and Ross Richie, founders and owners of Boom, are producing the adaptation for Par. Boom publishes comicbooks and graphic novels.

“Foundation,” a five-issue miniseries created by Kody Chamberlain, revolves around efforts to stop the unpublished prophecies of Nostradamus from coming to pass.

Boom title is the third to which Cosby and Richie have sold the film rights; rights to “Talent” and “Tag” went to Universal. Boom was launched 18 months ago.

Cosby also co-created the series “Eureka” on the Sci Fi Channel.

Is Boom winning the comics-are-cheap-IP derby in Hollywood?

§ Meanwhile, Rogue Pictures is prepping LOST SQUAD, based on Chris Kirby’s comic for Devil’s Due.

Rogue Pictures’ “Lost Squad” has found its writer and director in Stephen St. Leger and James Mather.

The Irish duo, best known for directing commercials as the team of Saint and Mather, will tackle the bigscreen adaptation of Chris Kirby’s comicbook, published by Devil’s Due.

Project revolves around the adventures of a ragtag unit of Allied soldiers who fight Hitler’s occult agents and other supernatural threats during World War II.

Idea is to overstylize the action in the vein of Warner’s recent graphic novel-based hit “300.”

Danial Alter and josh Blaylock also have production credits of various types.

§ The Darkness Video Game is out for Xbox 360 and Playstation 3

Set in the dark and seedy underbelly of New York City and the ethereal realm of The Darkness, players assume the role of mafia hitman Jackie Estacado, heir to “The Darkness,” an ancient power that awakens within him on his 21st birthday.

Jackie must use traditional weapons as well as learn to command his terrible new powers to seek revenge on his own crime family. The Darkness is based on the best-selling comic book series of the same name, published by Top Cow Productions and created by Marc Silvestri, Garth Ennis, and David Wohl. “The Darkness” comic book launched in 1996 and is currently published in 19 different languages around the world.

Into the Pixel is a display of concept art for video games. The other day we were railing against work for hire, but as many people pointed out, there is a time and place for it, such as paying very talented people decent sums of money to sit down and imagine. The result is sometimes what you see here, some very evocative and impressive art. Click on the link for the complete gallery of the jury selections.

The Into the Pixel exhibit will feature 16 exemplary works of video game art, selected by a panel of jurors from a field of submissions gleaned from artists around the world. The exhibition offers an opportunity for published video and computer game artists to be reviewed and recognized by the public and by their peers in both the art and video game milieu.

[snip] The 2007 Into the Pixel Art Exhibition will premiere at Creative Artists Agency in June. The framed art will be unveiled in July at the E3 Media & Business Summit in Santa Monica, California. The Exhibition will open to the public at the new E for All Expo at the LA Convention Center, October 18-21, 2007.

[Above, part of “City 17″ by Jeremy Bennett for Half-Life 2 Episode 2]

Speaking of Todd McFarlane, he has designed Halo 3-themed controllers for GamStop:

Halo 3 is poised as potentially the biggest Xbox 360 game of 2007, and Microsoft is making sure that everyone will join in on the craze once the game hits on September 25. Currently, the Xbox 360 controllers come in the conservative shades of black and white, but the peripheral will be getting an extreme makeover a few weeks before Halo 3’s release.

Spotted on GameStop’s online store for preorder are two wireless controllers and a headset in Halo 3 motif. The two wireless controllers come in either MasterChief or Covenant themes with artwork by Spawn comic book master Todd McFarlane (pictured above). The controllers will also come with an exclusive Halo 3 figurine from McFarlane Toys. To Halo 3 wireless controllers are priced at $59.99, representing a $10 premium over the more pedestrian black and white controllers.

Red Mile Entertainment, Inc. (OTCBB: RDML), a worldwide developer and publisher of interactive entertainment software, today announced it has entered into a multi-year, worldwide license agreement to develop and to publish video games based on the Sin City series of graphic novels by writer/artist and film director Frank Miller. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The winner of multiple awards in its original comic-book and graphic-novel forms, the Sin City property achieved even greater public awareness with the 2005 release of the successful Frank Miller’s Sin City live-action theatrical feature film.

“Sin City enjoys a broad and devoted following. Its crime noir settings, richly detailed characters, hyper-real action sequences, and engaging stories provide an outstanding groundwork for video games,” said Chester Aldridge, CEO of Red Mile Entertainment. “Red Mile is enthusiastic about working with Frank Miller to create a franchise that is worthy of this great property.”

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Go to the jump for the names of all the coics folk who are re-envisioning Lara.

GameTap, the first-of-its-kind broadband entertainment network from Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. (TBS, Inc.), announced today the launch of a new GameTap Retrospective series and a new original animated series, “Re\Visioned,” that pays homage to one of the game industry’s top franchises of all time – Tomb Raider.

“10 Years of Tomb Raider – A GameTap Retrospective” profiles the creators, the games, the live-action models, and the fans who have collectively made Tomb Raider a pop culture phenomenon. The documentary will be available for free for all fans to view at www.gametap.com/tombraider and new segments will be added each week through June 7th.

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Did you ever want to be a Japanese schoolgirl? Well now you can in a new RPG called Panty Explosion!

In Atarashi Games’ Panty Explosion ($20) players take on the roles of psychic Japanese schoolgirls and battle nightmarish demons, ghosts, government agents and even each other. Like the typical “magical girl” manga or anime, Panty Explosion mixes the mundane and the macabre, the petty trials and tribulations of high school life and the life or death struggle against supernatural monsters. The rules encourage teamwork and creativity while focusing on friendship and storytelling. Anime and manga fans with an interest in immersive role-playing will be able to bring the experiences they have gained watching and reading their favorite magical girl sagas to this game.

Atarashi’s second gave is called Classroom Death Match, and ICv2 reports they also have a yaoi RPG in the works. You can go here and download a DEMO of Panty Explosion, which seemingly contains magic and monsters instead of crying in the bathroom, worries over monthly bloat, and shopping for knee high white socks.

You can also sing “Let’s play Panty Explosion” to the tune of “Master and Servant” by DMode!

Sega and Marvel have signed a big pact (although Marvel has been working closely with Activision recently) and GameDaily BIZ talks to Sega about the deal:

BIZ: Did you have to compete with other publishers to get the rights to these other Marvel characters? Obviously Activision has produced a number of games for Marvel, so I would think they would have been interested as well.

SS: Yeah, that’s a great question. If you look back these past couple years, EA’s had a few dances with DC [Comics] with Batman and Superman, and Activision definitely did well with Spidey, and they’ve done X-Men and Fantastic Four, and Vivendi had Hulk, so there’s no doubt that these are competitive negotiations. I can’t speak to who else was at the table; oftentimes, in most cases we have no idea.

We don’t really know who they’re talking to, don’t really know whether Activision says, “Hey we’ve got two already; we’re not really sure if we want more,” or if THQ wants to get into it. I can’t really speak to that with authority, but I do know that these [deals] are always competitive because we’ve been in negotiations with other studios and have not come up with the goods on occasion. Clearly, the industry continues to look at big movies and big licenses, and comic books in particular, as a high target category, but in this instance Sega came out on top.

MEANWHILE< Telltale Games talks about more Bone games:

Developer Telltale Games has been in the press a lot for its revival of the Sam & Max series, but before that it developed an episodic adventure series based on the hugely successful Bone comic books by Jeff Smith. However, with all efforts focussing on Sam & Max you’d be forgiven for thinking Telltale had given up on Bone - but that’s not the case. “We’ve been really focused on Sam & Max and nailing the episodic model. This has helped the company better understand digital distribution, and we’re in a great position to take advantage of the Bone license, but our teams are very busy right now. As the company grows we will revisit Bone”, the developer told 1UP.

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It seems that Grant Morrison is taking more steps in his transition to Hollywood script-guy with a story Variety likes to call Comicbook author to write ‘Area 51′:

Paramount Pictures has hired comicbook author Grant Morrison to pen the feature adaptation of vidgame franchise “Area 51.”Christine Peters will produce through her Par-based CFP Prods. with Penn Station’s Dean Georgaris and Michael Aguilar, along with Stan Winston.

[snip] Set in the U.S. government’s most top-secret military facility, storyline revolves around a hazardous materials specialist who is called in to investigate a viral outbreak that could be extra-terrestrial in nature.

Yep, sounds like that’s in Morrison’s comfort zone. the story notes that Morrison’s Arkham Asylum has sold more than 500,000 copies worldwide, and mentions that his WE3 screenplay is still in development at New Line.

Via press release:

TOMY Corporation and D3Publisher of America, Inc. (D3PA) today announced that NARUTO™: Clash of Ninja 2 for Nintendo GameCube™ has qualified as a Player’s Choice title, which is reserved for the best-selling games available for the Nintendo GameCube. Based on VIZ Media’s hit anime series SHONEN JUMP™ NARUTO and first released in September 2006, NARUTO: Clash of Ninja 2 is now available at a new low price of $19.95 MSRP. According to the NPD Group, NARUTO: Clash of Ninja 2 has been in the top 5 best-selling Nintendo GameCube games by month five out of six months since its release.

“The NARUTO brand has been a hit in North America since the TV series first debuted in September of 2005 and with the momentum increasing, our expectation is that 2007 will be a banner year for NARUTO on Nintendo platforms,” said Laura Yoshioka, senior marketing manager, TOMY Corporation. “Not only will NARUTO: Ninja Council 3 be the first NARUTO game for the Nintendo DS™, but in the fall of 2007 TOMY and D3PA will be releasing the first ever NARUTO game for Nintendo’s Wii video game system – NARUTO: Clash of Ninja MVZ.”

“We have been very pleased with the continued success of NARUTO on the Nintendo GameCube,” said Kim Motika, vice president of worldwide sales and operations, D3PA. “With the new pricing at $19.95, NARUTO: Clash of Ninja 2 for Nintendo GameCube™ will find an even larger audience.”

But will it be as good as…Hide The Fart?

As long rumored, Lego is following up its highly successful Star Wars Lego video game franchise with the Caped LegoBrick Crusader himself!

Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and TT Games will bring LEGO® BATMAN™: THE VIDEOGAME to next-generation and current generation platforms and the PC in 2008 with Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment serving as the game’s North American publisher, including all sales and distribution functions.

In LEGO BATMAN: THE VIDEOGAME, TT Games brings the world of DC Comics’ Caped Crusader to life in an entirely new way. Players can explore a richly interactive LEGO Gotham City as Batman and Robin, capturing infamous villains – and even take control of the villains themselves.

“Batman spans several generations as one of the most popular DC Super Heroes, and LEGO BATMAN will appeal to several generations of gamers who grew up idolizing the Dark Knight and playing with LEGO toys,” said Samantha Ryan, Senior Vice President, Development and Production, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. “Working with TT Games, we are confident they will continue their LEGO games’ success with this title, and we will expand our publishing endeavors with the introduction of the LEGO BATMAN franchise.”

“We’re sure our fans will be excited to know that we have the same fantastic team at Traveller’s Tales responsible for LEGO Star Wars and LEGO Star Wars II working on LEGO BATMAN,” said Tom Stone, Director of TT Games Publishing.

“There’s a special magic to the LEGO incarnation of Batman that makes him accessible to a younger generation of his fans,” said Paul Levitz, President, DC Comics. “We look forward to the videogame version extending this fantasy.”

The LEGO BATMAN: THE VIDEOGAME story unfolds with Batman’s greatest foes escaping from Arkham Asylum and creating mayhem throughout Gotham City. Tracking criminals, including The Joker and The Penguin, players will utilize Batman’s gadgets as well as build and operate fantastic vehicles in one or two player cooperative gameplay.

§ BAD GIRL leads China down Japan’s ‘toon path:

Time was when Chinese cartoons were childish retellings of traditional tales or propaganda images peopled by rosy-cheeked peasant women, muscle-bound ironworkers and strong-jawed soldiers celebrating the Communist ethos.

Little P, the hero of Song Yang’s Bad Girl comic book, is more likely to be celebrating her new low-slung jeans, complaining about her tough mother, or her latest mobile phone.

Reflecting China’s changing social realities, particularly in cities, Little P wants to be China’s first successful cartoon icon. Bad Girl is playing a lead role in transforming Chinese cartoons from poor-quality kids’ stuff or dull propaganda to something far hipper, as the country competes with Japanese manga and Korean manhwa.

§ Meanwhile, in America, mailboxes shaped like R2-D2 are on their way:

Post boxes across the US are to be dressed up as Star Wars robot R2-D2 to celebrate 30 years since the release of the sci-fi series’ first outing. Some 400 boxes will get the new look, including outside Hollywood’s Grauman Chinese Theatre, one of first cinemas to screen the film in 1977. The makeover is part of a post office campaign for the announcement of a surprise stamp on 28 March. The public have been urged not to tamper with the droid mail collectors.

§ This story is a kind of confusing following up to the story of the Red Sox pitcher whostarted his own video game development company with Todd McFarlane and others. The main idea is that by changing the name of his company from GREEN MONSTER GAMES to 38 STUDIOS, pitching ace Curt Schilling might be indicating that he someday won’t be a Red Sox, which would probably be quite upsetting if you were a Boston fan. We don’t know, we just think the idea of a pro athlete starting a video game development company is funny.

Green Monster Games looked at one time to be the perfect name for Schilling’s game development firm. But Close said Schilling and company hope to be much more than a game development company. So, for a name, “we needed something that reflects a larger vision as an entertainment company. We reserve the right to be more than just a game company.” Indeed, Schilling’s endeavor has attracted some big names. R.A. Salvatore, a Leominster native and science fiction novelist, is the company’s “creator of worlds,” or creative director. Todd McFarlane, the creator of the Spawn comic book series, also works for 38 Studios.

§ Jerry Beck didn’t much care for the AQUA TEEN HUNGER FORCE movie:

AQUA TEEN HUNGER FORCE (COLON): MOVIE FILM FOR THEATRES is, without question, the worst animated film of the year. It may be the worst film (of any type) I’ve ever seen. A text book example of an unfunny comedy, with poor production values; no craft, no art, no laughs, period. I’ve only seen one episode of the TV series, so I’m clearly not the intended audience for this. But who is? High School drop-outs on pot? I suspect there may be 7 year old out there who may think this is the funniest film they’ve ever seen. If so, I’d be worried about that 7-year-old.

AAAAAAAND, one last 300 note: At last week’s Second Life 300 press conference, we managed to ask star Gerard Butler if he would ever get into the kind of shape he did for 300 again. The answer was not unexpected, but saddening all the same:

“I wasn’t in that kind of shape in the first place. I hate to say this, I’d love to say something inspiring, but I actually don’t think I could get into that kind of shape again. It was great for that moment, but I actually over did it and was in a lot of pain for a few months.”

Women all over the world may mourn this news, but at least we go on with the certain knowledge that for one shining moment, one man rose to the highest level his body could achieve, and even if this man truly gave his all, through the miracles of slo-mo, pause buttons and screen captures, the legend of dear, dear Gerard Butler and his 300 muscle groups will live on forever.

Speaking of Second Life, you can visit the 300 area at Silverscreen and look at books, see photos or kick peopleinto a pit while shouting “This is SPARTA!” Internet marketing man Neville Hobson talks about the event here and via comments, you can see how the custom avatars were made by Adam’n'Eve here.

§ The AP is running a nice profile of the webcomics collective Act-i-vate:

Artists in the year-old, invitation-only collective upload a new comic or installment to their graphic novels each week, making the content on the daily anthology highly diverse. ACT-I-VATE members draw upon a host of influences including Japanese comic book artists, music, film, literature and their own psyches.

The elaborately rendered comics cover a broad swath of genres ranging from horror and post-punk, to cliffhanging romance and extreme adventure. The stories are irreverent and hysterical, a blend of the tragic and pathological. They range from dark (take Nikki Cook’s “Sack of Puppies,” which is about “pretty nasty evil things and mean little kids”) to surrealistic (there’s Pedro Camargo’s “Glam,” which chronicles a “grungy cyberpunk trash universe that’s almost like Candyland with little stuffed animals running around.”)

§ An elite gang of academics have justified their time spent with Gameboys by naming “The Ten Most Important Video Games” :

“Creating this list is an assertion that digital games have a cultural significance and a historical significance,” Mr. Lowood said in an interview. And if that is acknowledged, he said, “maybe we should do something about preserving them.”

Mr. Lowood and the four members of his committee — the game designers Warren Spector and Steve Meretzky; Matteo Bittanti, an academic researcher; and Christopher Grant, a game journalist — announced their list of the 10 most important video games of all time: Spacewar! (1962), Star Raiders (1979), Zork (1980), Tetris (1985), SimCity (1989), Super Mario Bros. 3 (1990), Civilization I/II (1991), Doom (1993), Warcraft series (beginning 1994) and Sensible World of Soccer (1994).

Click on the link to find out which game is “one of the most important art works of the 20th century”!

§ The New York Comic-Con site is putting up various Audio Podcasts of panels, including “Review and Outlook 2007 for Comics Publishing”. Virtual confab!

We’re not quite sure if this is news or not. You may recall that when Acclaim went under, they eft a few games in nearly finished stage, including one based on Christian Gossett’s THE RED STAR. Now it appears that it is coming out from Take-Two:

Based on the same-tilted graphic novels, which serve as a retelling of Russian history in a science fiction and fantasy world, The Red Star video game was originally intended to release on a number of consoles when the project suddenly fell off the map, due to the bankruptcy of the original Acclaim. However, it seems the project has not been entirely forgotten, and the part beat-‘em-up, part shooter has finally found a home on the PlayStation 2 courtesy of Grand Theft Auto publisher Take-Two. At this time, the press release (which we’ve included below, as always) only specifically states a European release – set for April 6th – but we can’t imagine a North American release of The Red Star would be too far behind. However, we will continue to follow this story

Well we had this link all set to go about how the Bone game is being ported to the DS, but Wired reportsIT IS NOT TRUE.

UPDATE: Wired News followed up on this release with Telltale, who says that GamesIndustry has their facts mixed up, and Bone is not coming to DS. Xider will, however, release the formerly download-only game in a retail box in Europe.

[Link via Blog@Newsarama]

As many suspected yesterday, DC Unlimited will be the new brand for DC’s launch of a line of WoW collectibles:

DC Unlimited, the new brand launched by DC Comics to license and promote the world ‘ s greatest pop culture characters and stories, is proud to announce the release of a line of action figures based on World of Warcraft, the popular Blizzard Entertainment Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG). The collectibles will be unveiled this month at New York ‘ s American International Toy Fair and will be distributed worldwide in both mass market and specialty channels.

The Warcraft franchise has been a pillar of gaming culture for over a decade and remains the world ‘ s largest-selling strategy video game with over 19 million copies sold. With over 7.5 million subscribers worldwide, the game creates a unique and interactive environment, allowing for thousands of simultaneous player adventures. World of Warcraft has also been America ‘ s top-selling PC game since its release in November of 2004.

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Kotaku reports on The World of Whorecraft a series of porn movies that feature people in armor getting it on, a feat which involves quite a bit of endurance, apparently. Reading this article kind of made us throw-up a little, but if you like this kind of thing, we supposed it’s the kind of thing you’ll like:

“People play these games and see these sexy elves, but they don’t ever get to see the elves have sex,” he said. “A lot of people try to roleplay in the game, but I decided to bring it out into the real world and do it right.”

[snip]And while the films are still most certainly hardcore porn, they do include some nice touches, like weapons and armor crafted just for the films, choreographed fight scenes, and in one of the episodes, a bear.

“That was two days of shooting, just to get the bear comfortable around everybody and it was a nightmare to do,” Dez said, laughing. “The guy we rented the bear from, he did the tigers in the movie Gladiator. He’s the body double for Russell Crowe, he’s actually in episode four.”

[Thanks to James K. for the link.]

§ Comics artist Tomm Coker turns out to have done the cinematics for the new 300: MARCH TO GLORY video game:

On the technical and artistic front, 300 is a decent-looking PSP game. Despite the movie tie-in, this is a PSP original, so the artists weren’t constrained by the necessity of porting to other platforms. The characters are fairly detailed and there are a lot running around and hurting each other at any given time. The comic-style cinematics are the work of Tomm Coker, and their style definitely evokes the original Frank Miller artwork and the uniquely stunning visuals of the upcoming film — see the trailer if you haven’t.

§ Meanwhile, manga-ka Shinji Mizushima, famedfor a long career producing sports manga, has become a real life commish, by backing a bew independent pro baseball league:

Mizushima has pulled some strings among his extensive personal network to select managers for the Hokushinetsu Baseball Challenge League, which consists of four teams from Niigata, Nagano, Toyama and Ishikawa prefectures.

Mizushima also has been helping to promote the new venture by drawing posters and will even feature the league–the second independent pro league in the nation after the Shikoku Island League, which began playing ball in 2005–in his serial comics.

§ Handsome Olivier Martinez DESPERATE to play comics character!

Q: Do you like comic books (I guess this was asked because Hugh Dancy’s character in the film writes and draws graphic novels)?

Olivier: Oh yeah. I love them. The Marvel ones I know by heart. I don’t know why nobody has offered me a superhero [role]. Maybe it’s because I don’t speak the language. You don’t have superheroes in France. We have super cooks (laughs). It’s more an American vision. Captain Marvel.

§ Microsoft is launching an anti-piracy campaignusing the international power of comics:

Dubbed “Genuine Fact Files,” the campaign is now launching in the U.S. It went online last month in Italy, France, the U.K., Indonesia, Brazil, Australia and the United Arab Emirates. Microsoft plans to draw attention to it through banner ads on its Web sites and promotional material that it will hand out through partners. By using comics, the company aims to make the message more accessible to a broader audience. They are black and white, in a style similar to newspaper comics.

Still out there believing and thinking, Stan Lee thinks video games have even more potential than movies for comics tie-ins:

As significant as Hollywood has been in reviving the Marvel brand, Stan Lee believes video games can have an even bigger impact on the growth of the comic book label. “Video games are more exciting, more colorful and more complex than motion pictures,” says Lee, “”In a movie, you just sit and watch. [In a game] you’re not only seeing the story but you’re participating in the story.”

Despite Lee’s enthusiasm for the games medium, he admits he doesn’t have the time or the skill to play video games. Lee is certainly not alone, which explains why Marvel movies have grossed billions of dollars, while the games have managed only hundreds of millions in sales (hardly insignificant, but nonetheless paled by the film industry’s results). Still, Lee remains optimistic about the future dominance of Marvel games, hoping to become more involved with game makers’ efforts by contributing to the content and narration of future titles.

You may have noticed that we had to take down our thoughts on 300 yesterday, due to…oh, stuff. It’s kind of cool because when you have to take stuff down you’re in the blogging elite. Anyway, it turns out we may be involved in some other V.V. exciting 300-related activities. More to come. We will say that it looked spectacular, and was the bone-crunching, head-slicing, Spartan-shouting extravaganza they all say. And DDGB was very, very kingly.

In the meantime, we’re a little sad that none of our Beat Spies thought to remind us about all the cool 300 merch coming out. We can’t be EVERYWHERE you know!

First, as we have mentioned in casual convo with some pals in the past, there WILL be a 300 video game. If ever a movie was made for a video game, it was this, believe you me. GameSpy has a preview of 300: March to Glory:

300: March to Glory doesn’t just celebrate ancient head-popping, but also the upcoming film of the same name. But unlike many modern movie-to-game adaptations, 300 won’t try to recreate the movie scene-for-scene. It’ll draw upon the film (as well as the Frank Miller graphic novel) for inspiration and general style, but will focus more on gameplay than on rehashing every minor plot point. Given the number of ham-fisted movie games that are out there, any sort of variation on the old routine is welcome. Sometimes game designers come up with better level ideas than screenwriters.

In even more exciting (for The Beat) news, Neca will be releasing 300 TOYS., er, action figures. The figures include Immortal, Queen Gorgo, Ephialtes and, of course, Leonidas. We hear the figure’s midsection doubles as a washboard! Not that you can tell from this photo. COME ON, MOVE YOUR GODDAM SHIELD.

Violence broke out around the nation as crowds scrambled for the new Sony PlayStation 3 which has been released in limited quantities; a Massachusetts man was shot while waiting in line to buy one:

At 3:15 a.m., two armed robbers shot Michael Penkala, 21, of Webster, Mass., outside a Wal-Mart store in Putnam, Conn., as he waited in line to be one of the first to own the machine, the state police said. The robbers approached Mr. Penkala — along with 15 to 20 other shoppers — and demanded money. Mr. Penkala resisted, and one of the assailants unloaded a shotgun blast into his chest and shoulder, the authorities said

[snip]The robbers in Putnam were apparently taking advantage of a captive group likely to be carrying cash, as lines formed across Connecticut — and the country — outside stores in anticipation of the widely hyped release of the PlayStation. Sony, the market leader in video consoles, is selling the new model for $499 or $599, depending on the size of the hard drive.

The Associated Press reported several other robberies and attempted robberies around the country including in Sullivan, Ind., Allentown, Pa., and Englewood, Ohio.

In McLean, Va., the police fired pepper pellets to subdue a rowdy crowd of about 200 people outside a Circuit City store at Tysons Corner Center mall. One person complained of shortness of breath after the pellets were fired and was taken to the hospital, the authorities said.

Meanwhile, the Nintendo Wii launch has been a time of peace, love and understanding.

In sharp contrast to the PS3 launch yesterday, the Wii launch is going very smoothly so far. Lines started forming today all over the country and reports are coming in of 20-80 people deep. Everyone seems to be in good spirits and no one’s gotten mugged yet that I know of. The Wii seems to be pulling more people in a short amount of time as opposed to the PS3’s short lines and protracted camp outs. About 80-90% of the line waiters interviewed said they would be keeping their Wii’s or were buying them for presents rather than selling them on eBay for a profit.

So which strategy will win? The “Supplies are limited” scam, or the “actually in high demand” plan?

Our rating: 9.7!

As you read this, we’re probably recovering from our birthday celebrations, so enjoy. Perhaps the best part of this video is hearing Viggo speak with Clive Owen’s voice. Slash away!

[Link via Colleen.]

This music thing seems to be working out for James Kochalka, with a lot of good press for his latest album and a strong showing on indie music charts. Today he writes to tell us he’s posted a new rap song about The Legend of Zelda video game on his mp3 page at AmericanElf.com. Comics, music and video games united in one mind-boggling brew! Oh god, these are the good times. James tells us:

The song is titled Old Skool White Rap, and is about the unique way that white people used to rap in commercials back in the 80’s. Directly inspired by the old Zelda television ad, it features a verse about THE LEGEND OF ZELDA as well as a verse about Cool Ranch Doritos. I’m giving the song away as a free download in honor of the new upcoming Zelda game for the Nintendo Wii.

Here’s the lyrics from the Zelda verse, which I tried to make as lame as possible:

Well, The Legend of Zelda
It is the best.
Those Moblins put you
To the test.
You open up
A treasure chest,
And you gotta save
The Princess.

However, it is very diffiucult to come up with lyrics as lame as those
in the original commerical.

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Today mobile payments ranging from mobile banking to mobile credit cards to mobile commerce are very widely used in Asia and Africa, and in selected European markets.