While Michael Abbott of the Brainy Gamer doesn't have any new news on his history of RPGs class, he has penned an interesting little meditation on comedy, satire, the Marx Bros., and Penny Arcade's On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness. It suffers from an overabundance of quotations, but has some interesting points:

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That's a little nugget couched in a defence against charges Ubisoft has a crappy lineup for Wii and doesn't care. Oh but they do care! The lineup is crappy for a reason! Read on.

On Ubi's forums, a commenter complains, "we get no new Core-titles and when we get some like Shaun White Snowboarding it looks worse than SSX on the Cube. Doesnt really look like Ubisoft is trying to put some effort in it."

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Gamasutra has a nice wrap up of an event held at Valve's Washington offices; the topic was (surprise!) PC gaming. On the question of whether PCs are really lagging behind:

"Is there a crisis in [PC] gaming?" asked [Gabe] Newell, who led the first segment of the talk. "You know, 'Piracy killed my game,' 'Console numbers are huge,' 'People don't want to play their PCs in the living room' - all these stories get written over and over again, and our view is that it's exactly the opposite. PC is where all the action is, and there's a perception problem."

Also on the agenda was a discussion of piracy (and indicator of "unserved customers"), the worldwide PC market, and how Steam and Valve fit into this whole PC new order.

PC Has 'Perception Problem,' Piracy Reflects 'Unserved Customers' [Gamasutra]

We had this up as a rumour yesterday, and I'd say IGN UK's review of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots pretty much confirms it. "In return for letting us play Metal Gear Solid 4 before its release, Konami issued us with a list of things that we're not allowed to discuss. This list of prohibited topics is pretty long, and even extends as far as several facts that the company itself has already made public." Might that be the length of the cutscenes (upwards of 90 -gasp- minutes)?

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We historians are a little protective of our respective domains — but a constant (and well-deserved) criticism we lob at each other in general is that through various means, we deliberately make ourselves inaccessible to the average, interest layperson. Over at Terra Nova, Nate Combs takes up the question of historical video games, referencing a great 2006 New York article by Niall Ferguson (Harvard professor and historian) on the 'state of play.' The answer? Pretty damn bad, at least when looking on from the Ivory Tower:

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Gaming Age yesterday posted a report that in-game Xross Media Bar support will in fact be a part of the Playstation 3 Firmware Update 2.40, which will release "sometime in June."

Reader hukeedonfonics also tipped us to the above video, which shows in-game XMB over the BioShock title screen. Comments claim a BioShock developer leaked it.

Gaming Age writes that requested features like a universal friends list, and in-game messaging will be a part of the drop, in addition to "a few rather nice surprises (*cough*soundtracks*cough*)" (their words, not mine.)

So, spread the word, and we'll hopefully have more on this as it develops.

PS3 In-Game XMB is Coming[Gaming Age, via NeoGAF, thanks hukeedonfonics]

In an effort to make learning Chinese less painful (and ostensibly to capitalise on the 'MMO as language learning tool' trend that's been talked about a bit in the past few months), Michigan State University's Zhao Yong (professor of education technology and educational psychology) has designed Zon!, where players can graduate from tourist to resident to citizen of this little virtual slice of China:

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OK, after much teeth gnashing, I realised that the trailer referenced in Gametrailers TV super-galactic exclusive show last night is actually available unto itself at, naturally, Gametrailers. So there it is.

But the countdown has stopped at Capcom's official Resident Evil 5 site , so the site has fully launched. You can catch the trailer there, and check out other eye candy for the game. That is all.

Resident Evil 5 Official web site [Capcom]

Reader Allison sends a chuckleicious play-nice -- "just my advice, nothing official" warning-- from an Age of Conan GM to a Something Awful guild member. (.jpg of the chat after the jump). Remember that large-scale player-vs-player? Well, just don't make it too large-scale.

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Back in November we pointed you to Pac-Txt, Pac-Man as a text adventure. Now we deliver you Pong rendered as a 180-page Choose Your Own Adventure book. It's like someone sat around thinking "Hey, you know that game Pong? What if we could make it even slower and more boring. But admit it, you're intrigued. And you can read the entire thing after the jump.

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Shortly after coming aboard here one of the first things I did was set up a filter to capture and set aside Jack Thompson's bullshit from all the tips cc'd to me. After the preamble to his professional obituary two weeks ago, I went back looking through the "Crazy Fucker" queue to see if I could find some kicking-and-screaming ravings that, even if they didn't deserve to run under the Kotaku nameplate, would at least be fun to read. Instead, I found something unexpected.

It was a news release from mid-May, and in it, Jack was up to his usual schtick of making hay off others' misery -- in this case claiming a murder defendant in North Carolina was motivated by Grand Theft Auto of course. But the story Thompson was citing was published in Fayetteville, by a paper I interned for 15 years ago. And it was written by my housemate that year, a friend and a guy who introduced me to some excellent video games himself.

So I emailed the writer, Paul Woolverton of The Fayetteville (N.C.) Observer, to dig deeper into this story.

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Welcome back fair weekend readers. I promise a full two days of posting this go around, unlike my Memorial Day snafu that left you high and dry after half of Saturday. That said, we still pounded out a reason to mock Owen's alcohol tolerance worthy features and videos in the abbreviated week/end preceding.

Just to let y'all know, I seriously thought about pouring Lipton iced tea into an Early Times bottle and releasing a video of me downing two 16 ounce glasses of it in succession. But that would make me feel like Nicholas Cage in Leaving Las Vegas and after the thrilling conclusion to GTA: DUI, figured you could do without the self-pity and self-destruction, however staged.

Anyway, here's the week that was in Kotaku original reporting. Crecente doubled up on Wii Fit and tripled up on Far Cry 2; Fahey swooned over Age of Conan. Even if you didn't, something might pique your interest. Give it a look.

SITE Refutes Fallout 3 Goof, Is Not "Red-Faced"
Wii Fit Review: An Identity Crisis
Raving Prince, Assassin and Fischer Rabbids
Pokemon Pizza Party
Grants Awarded For Inspiring Health Games Research
Far Cry 2 Dev and Port Teams Range from 175 to Three
Making Far Cry 2's Africa
Brothers In Arms: Hell's Highway Hands-On
Far Cry 2: No Girls Allowed
Prince of Persia Ditches Roots, Gets a Final Fantasy Make-Over
Shaun White: Wii Play, Pics and Press Release
Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X. Hands-On
Ubisoft Officially Announces Beyond Good & Evil 2
Shaun White Delivers Death to Snowboarding with an Assassin's Creed Engine
Far Cry 2 Brings GTA Sandbox to the Serengeti
And Now, The Metal Gear Solid 4 Soundtrack
Grand Theft Auto: DUI
Yes, Age Of Conan Is Having Problems
Wii Fit: Innovation in Gaming or Marketing?
Korea Getting That "Very, Very" Limited Edition MGS4 Pack, Too!
Square Enix President Laying Down The Law
Age Of Conan - My New Best Friend
Let Me Show You The Dragon Balls
Square Enix Lose Money, Need More Greenbacks
PSN Cards Must Hit Soon
Who Teases a Teaser, Anyway?