Link roundup

1. Todd McFarlane gives a video lesson on drawing hands and fingers.

2. Long article about the Portal 2 ARG. For example:

Even a player who chased after a red herring had a good story to tell. One guy got the idea in his head that he was supposed to find a clue at The Couch Potato, a furniture warehouse in Santa Cruz, California. Team Meat learned about this by monitoring the IRC channel, so Edmund McMillan of Super Meat Boy fame intercepted him at the warehouse and surprised him with a signed copy of Super Meat Boy.

And also:

The second big mistake we made was pulling the ARG champions away from their communities too early. Based on contributions in various games, on the fan wiki and in the IRC channels, we hand-selected a few individuals who had contributed disproportionately to the ARG and offered to fly them to Valve.

In order to give sufficient time to notify them and make travel arrangements, Valve contacted them a few days before the start of the crescendo. We didn't require them to sign any NDAs, but to maintain the fiction, we encouraged them to take a step back from the ARG and claim that they had been kidnapped by minions of GLaDOS.

We failed to realize just how influential these few individuals had been in keeping the ARG running like clockwork. The wiki stopped getting updated, leaving other players confused as to what was going on.

Via.

3. And speaking of ARGs, "Duff Goldman offers a lifetime of birthday cakes to anyone who finds his stolen Corvette." Via.

Link roundup

1. The latest Green Lantern trailer is a huge letdown after the last, masterfully-edited footage. I have a sinking feeling that the "Wonder-Con Footage" will be far better than the movie itself.

2. Speaking of, there's a Green Lantern ARG. Via.

3. A former GamesRadar writer:

When I was handed my first game to review, an amusement-park simulator called Thrillville: Off the Rails, an editor told me that if my final score diverged from the Metacritic mean by more than a given amount (I cannot remember if it was 20 or 30), I would have to justify myself to the executive editor.

What writer in his right mind would make more work for himself by writing a review that deviated from the established norm?

DC created a super hero costume tailor shop in the real world

As the video explains, Mr. Lee's Tailor shop was opened in Madrid to create costumes for super heroes and villains. It was a promotion dreamed up by Leo Burnett to advertise DC Universe Online.

*Buy DC Direct action figures at eBay.

More on the Valve ARG

The Valve ARG is mostly gibberish to me, but these two emails give a taste of the goings on. A short time ago, Valve employee Jeep Barnett (supposedly kindly) told players that they were going on a wild goose chase:



But a second email indicates he's been taken over by GLaDOS:



*Previously: The first 20 minutes of Portal 2.

Valve ARG continued

Updates continue at the Valve ARG.





*Preorder Portal 2 at Amazon.

More on the Valve ARG

Really enjoying watching people explore the Valve ARG.







Funny update:

10:06: The Bathysphere has been found to have nothing immediately relevant to the ARG in or around it. However, the warehouse it is located at has a Realtor Box on the door. This could simply mean that it is for rent or sale, or could perhaps hold significance for later.

*Buy Companion Cubes at eBay.

More on the Valve ARG

Here's a wiki devoted to the ARG, here's RPS's summary, and here's the Portal 2 prequel comic.

*Buy Companion Cubes at eBay.

Link roundup

1. io9:

The Isle Royale wolf population was founded in the late 1940s, and it's been under close scientific observation ever since. Researchers had assumed that the wolves were completely cut off from their relatives on the mainland, but in 1997 one wolf crossed over to the island using an ice bridge, and his arrival may go a long way to keep the population genetically viable.

2. And also from io9:

About 9,000 years ago, the Fuzhou Basin in southeastern China fell victim to rising sea levels, pushing underwater the marshy lands needed for rice farming. The marooned people there became seafarers, which eventually led to the colonization of Taiwan.

3. An ARG at Valve.