The latest episode of Glitch in the System makes it horribly obvious that the "celebrities" attending Gamespot's E3 bash had no idea who was hosting the party. That street probably goes both ways because, straight up, we had to Google almost every single one of the "celebrities" that we saw in the video. Check out the cringe-inducing footage o the red carpet interviews after the break.

PS: Thanks again to the 300+ people who attended -- or used astral projection to attend in spirit -- our Joystiq E3 meet-up. Watching something like this makes us appreciate you all even more.

The 1942: Joint Strike shirts from E3, featuring Street Fighter's Cammy doing her best bomber nose art impression, are available now from Meatbun.com. The shirt will cost $26, plus shipping, and is available worldwide in the three colors seen above. A close-up of the shirt's image can be found after the break.

Fun fact: Yoshiki Okamoto created both 1942 and the Street Fighter series, so the shirt's image with Cammy isn't an entirely random cross-promotion.

[Thanks Jared, Via John D's blog]

Check out the NSFW review of Age of Conan after the break.

When Gamespot Editorial Director Jeff Gerstmann was abruptly fired under controversial circumstances late last year, it set off a sort of domino effect. In the wake of the scandal, Gamespot staffers Ryan Davis, Brad Shoemaker and Vinny Caravella all decided to leave the venerable site to start a new project with Gerstmann: a project called Giant Bomb. A skeleton of the site has been up since March, but the project really got going Monday with an overhaul that mixes user-created, wiki-style pages with editorial reviews, videos and podcasts from the four-man ex-Gamespot crew.

We talked to Giant Bomb co-founder Ryan Davis about his thoughts on the new site and his departure from Gamespot, and game journalism in general. Some excerpts from our conversation (be sure to click the "Continue" link for the full interview):

On Gerstmann-gate and the state of game journalism
"Obviously we still have lots of friends and a ton of history there [at CNET], but we're so focused on the good stuff we're doing now. ... [Gerstmann-gate] certainly helped get our names in people's mouths in certain circles. ... Before [Gerstmann-gate] even happened, I felt like people needed to be more skeptical about what they read, with the massive influx of news-blogs giving little distinction between rumor and fact.

"We're not in the business of reporting news, but as far as the review process goes, we're being very open about a review being that person's perspective. We don't use fancy math to come to our reviews, we just go with what the reviewer feels the game merits. I think when a review has to represent an entire organization's perspective on a game, that's where you can run into trouble. Also, for what it's worth, I've never considered myself a 'game journalist.' I think they exist, but I'm a reviewer and a commentator more than anything."

Inside every horror filmmaker lurks a budding comedian struggling to claw its way out, showering the audience with the goo inside. At least that's Microsoft's hope, as this week the company tapped a handful of directors, known for creeping us out in films like Hard Candy and Friday the 13th, to create a set of freely downloadable comedy shorts for release globally this fall over Xbox Live to coincide with the service's major facelift.

The brainchild of Slither's James Gunn and Peter Safran of Scary Movie infamy, the film series has a number of notable directors on board, including James Wan (Saw), David Slade (30 Days of Night), Lucky McKee (The Woods), Andrew Douglas (The Amityville Horror) and Marcus Nispel (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre). With each itching to trade in their bloody hatchets for hilarious, madcap antics, with now look forward to the filmmakers' unique take on what promises to be sidesplitting comedy.

In a season of Hollywood blockbusters, it's no wonder why Electronic Arts would want to sink its teeth into the movie industry's delicious celluloid pie. This morning the company announced that it signed with talent and literary agency, UTA, to help catapult its properties onto the silver screen.

EA currently has a movie deal in the works for The Sims, as well as plans to bring an animated version of MySims to TV. In addition, earlier this year EA signed a deal with Starz Media to develop an animated prequel to Dead Space, as well as other unspecified franchises. But that's just the tip of the iceberg, as EA notes that this new deal will "significantly ramp up" efforts to bring its IP to other forms of entertainment, such as movies and television, as well as online, print, and social networks. With some of these projects likely to surface this week in San Diego during Comic-Con, are there any EA properties you could see yourself sitting through with a bucket of popcorn in your lap?

Famous for groundbreaking science fiction novels such as Schizmatrix and Heavy Weather, author Bruce Sterling is also regarded as one of the world's leading futurists. That is, he's really good at predicting where everything from media to industry to consumer technology will be at in the near future. Now he's going to do the same with video games ... and what they will be like in the year 2043.

Sterling will deliver his keynote address, "Computer Entertainment 35 Years from Today," at the upcoming Austin Game Developers Conference being held September 15-17. It will certainly be intriguing to hear what one of the founders of the cyberpunk movement has to say about the future of our shared hobby, especially given the recent introduction of technology such as Wii MotionPlus. We also have to wonder if he's seen Sony's famous "PS9" commercial.

In keeping with the retro-y spirit of Mega Man 9, Capcom decided to commission I Am 8-bit artist Gerald de Jesus to create the most awful faux box art possible for the game. Capcom then put it on T-shirts for its staff to wear at E3. The idea was to mimic the atrocious cover of the original Mega Man for NES (widely considered to be the worst box art of all time) and it worked. Really well.

Capcom's head PR honcho, Chris Kramer, has updated the company's blog with word that the exceedingly kitsch shirts will actually be re-printed for sale to the masses, although exactly when and where we can expect to snap one up is still being ironed on out.

This random sighting of Zombie Le Chuck is part of an awesome Flickr collection from Paul The Wine Guy dubbed IT Everywhere that answers the question, "What happens if some IT comes into our real life?" It reminds us of those virtual/real hybrids for Starcraft and The Sims. (Thanks, Kjell S) Check out the highlights for today:

Joystiquery
The best of WoW Insider: July 15-22, 2008
Joystiq E3 hands-on: Dead Space
Joystiq E3 Hands-on: Novint's Falcon controller
Joystiq E3 sticks-on: Ion premium drum set
Joystiq E3 Q&A: Spore detailed
JoystiQ&A on Xbox Live Community Games
Mahalo Daily talks arcade games with Wiebe, Walter Day, Joystiq

News
Quake Arena trailer shakes up web games
Tilted Mill shows off first Hinterland images
BioShock PS3 receiving trophies, some details given
Capcom patching SSFIITHDR 'open beta' after all
Splash Damage hires four industry vets for multiplatform mystery
Dragon Age: Origins screenshots and gameplay footage
Nintendo: Hardcore gamers 'critically important to us'
BioShock's PS3 graphics identical to Xbox 360
Zelnick: GTA isn't Take-Two's only moneymaker
User-created Xbox Live games to cost as low as $2.50, devs get up to 70% revenue
Microsoft makes Games For Windows Live free for all
DirectX 11 detailed; Vista and DX 10 / 10.1 hardware supported
Certain Nintendo controllers face retail ban
New York governor signs 'unnecessary' game law
THQ games joining GameTap this summer
Fallout irradiates GameTap this Thursday
BioWare has 'never confirmed any plans' for Mass Effect 360 exclusivity
Rumor: WipEout HD held up by epilepsy tests
Nyko FrontMan guitar compatibility chart
First real, tiny screen of Sony's 'Massive Action Game'

Rumors & Speculation
Rumor: PSP-3000 adds built-in mic, PS button
Not so fast! Alan Wake may not be at TGS 2008 after all
Rumor: Oldman confirms Dark Knight game, G4 pulls video

Culture & Community
Star Wars Retrospective: Episode VII visits the Empire's shadows, the old republic
Bethesda defends E3, says it needs to change
The 'ultimate proof' that PS3 is winning
So it begins: Feminist gamers decry Sony's Fat Princess

[Update: Now with video (thanks, VVP)! Watch Gary Oldman spill the beans after the break. And hey, G4 – you guys totally got that story fair and square, so why pull the video?]

Far be it from us to tell Electronic Arts how to run its business, but one would think that announcing a long-since-leaked game based on a hugely anticipated movie which just so happened to premier the very same week of the industry's largest press event would be – what we in the video game blogging business call – "a no-brainer." But, then again, we're not Electronic Arts so, despite being first rumored and then leaked by IGN over a year ago, Pandemic's totally secret adaptation of The Dark Knight did not make its debut during the serendipitous collision of E3 and Batman-mania last week.

As if EA's counter-intuitive marketing plan wasn't funny enough, an interview on G4 with Commissioner Gordon himself, Gary Oldman, revealed – surprise! – that a game was indeed in development. Oldman stopped short of naming developer Pandemic or EA, but we all know the score; in response, G4 had the video removed from YouTube as well as their own site. Our favorite part from the interview teaser reel? When Oldman says, "It's hard to make a movie like this under the radar." You know what, we were just thinking the same thing about games ...

Source – IGN forums
Source – YouTube video (since pulled by g4 Media, Inc.)

Shown for the first time at E3, Sony and Titan Studios' upcoming PSN title, Fat Princess, grabbed us with its classic Zelda-like presentation, 32-player online, and off-color infusion of blood & guts for such an otherwise cutesy title. We also figured there would more than a few folks none too pleased by its title.

It's not just the title that's angering the folks behind sites Feminist Gamers and Shakesville, female-run gaming blogs who are already voicing their displeasure to Sony. It's also the concept that players must feed the titular princess – who starts out slim – in order to make her fat, and thus harder to capture.

Melissa McEwan of Shakesville writes: "Congrats on your awesome new game, Sony. I'm positively thrilled to see such unyielding dedication to creating a new generation of fat-hating, heteronormative assholes," while Feminist Gamer's "Mighty Ponygirl" suggests a simple gameplay switcheroo would solve the problem (and change the title). "Instead of running out into the forest to find cake to fatten up the princess with, why not go out and find gold (which is a lot heavier than cake) to stuff into a treasure chest," she says, adding, "The more gold in the chest, the heavier it would be, and the harder it would be to carry."

Despite the (still limited) fury being directed at Sony, we suspect that there's a fat chance either the title or gameplay will change.

[Update: Titan Studios' art director, James Green, emailed in to say: "Does it make it better or worse that the concept artist (who designed the look, characters, everything) is a girl?"]

[Via PS3 Fanboy]

Source - Feminist Gamer
Source - Shakesville

New York Governor David Patterson has signed some of the most ... well, put it this way, if you like the government wasting time, then you're going to love the recently signed New York game bill. GamePolitics reports the legislation establishes an advisory council to conduct a study between games and real-world violence. It also requires -- here's the kicker -- new video game consoles to incorporate parental lockout features by 2010 and retail games to disclose ESRB ratings. News flash: All consoles already have parental lockout features built in and ESRB ratings are prominently displayed on each game's box and disc.

For its part, the Entertainment Software Association believes the law ignores "legal precedent, common sense and the wishes of many New Yorkers in enacting this unnecessary bill." It points out that the mandates required are already voluntarily in place and the bill unfairly singles out the video game industry. The ESA asks if New York would like to convene a government commission on books, theater and film as well. It's still up in the air if the ESA will sue New York, but the lobby group has gotten good at getting game laws overturned in several states and making its money back for doing so in the process.

After returning to its old stomping grounds, last week's E3 was a bittersweet reminder of not only what the annual event used to be, but also what it had become, its once bustling halls now comparatively vacant as handfuls of press scurried past. Even so, while some continue to call the occurrence irrelevant, others, such as Bethesda marketing front man Pete Hines, believe that E3 remains an important event for the gaming industry.

"I'm a firm believer that we need an E3," Hines told TechRadar UK in a post-show interview. However, the exec qualified his statement, adding that "we just can't have it like this year." Hines instead feels that E3 needs to become an "improved version" of 2007's Santa Monica beach side trek, or even a more controlled version of previous years' media bazaar. It will be interesting to see where E3 goes from here; with the event being a few pounds short of a megaton, we couldn't shake the feeling that we were attending both a showcase and a wake.

[Thanks Adam]

GameTrailers starts with the galaxy far, far away's near past, and then goes deep into the history books in its latest Star Wars Retrospective episode. This time around the excellent series starts by taking a look at Shadows of the Empire, an action game which fills in a piece of the story between the movies Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi.

The rest of the episode delves deep into the past and covers the Knights of the Old Republic RPG games, which take place millennia before Luke and Leia were even a dirty thought in Darth Vader's mind. And if anybody complains that we should have put a spoiler alert there, we hope the cave you've been living in for the last 25 years has central heat and air. Check out the 24-minute retrospective episode after the break.

[Thanks Andy]