In an unusual development, I actually made a new oekaki. OHP-themed, even! But it's naughty, so don't look at it if you're at work. Unless you happen to work somewhere porn is okay. Then, by all means!

I'm gonna try to have the next ep. up by the end of the coming weekend, since I've got a few days off. See you next year!

Started on this year's holiday splash, which should be up this weekend. It's always tough deciding who to include in these things, because no matter how much we'd like them to, most aliens just don't give a shit about Earthling holidays. But even aliens like getting presents, and most of them also like getting hammered; combine the two, and they'll probably warm up to the whole affair. Julian and the villains have yet to make an appearance, so maybe I'll rectify that this time around!

Holy fuck, where did 2008 go? This year flew by, and I've got nothing to show for it! Actually, that's not entirely true. I've been really happy with the art in OHP this year. My goal's been to push a much toonier style and shed a lot of the anime-inspired baggage. What's resulted is a weird hybrid of styles, often fluctuating wildly from panel to panel, but one that I'm enjoying a lot. There's nothing wrong with an Eastern influence, but these days I'm feeling that cartoons seem more alive with a more fluid approach to drawing. I've been on a Bakshi kick lately, so maybe he's to blame. Is anyone else freakin' excited about The Last Days of Coney Island, whenever it finally comes out?

I never thought I'd be pumped about a game coming out of EA ever again after my nine-month stretch at Redwood Shores, but I'll be damned if Mirror's Edge isn't totally amazing. Is this the dawn of a new age of puzzle-platforming? Don't be dissuaded by the lukewarm reviews this thing's getting, it's one of the most refreshing takes on first-person gaming since Portal (though definitely lacking some of its polish). Despite a short story mode, the core gameplay mechanics are so intuitive and so much fun in execution that the prospect of multiple play-throughs is actually sort of appealing. I think one of the worst things to happen to the game industry was when RPGs fooled people into believing that games needed to be more than 30 hours long in order to be good. I understand that with retail games costing 60 dollars a pop these days, people want more value for their money... but length is about as useful a measurement of "fun" as graphics. Play fun games because they're fun, not because they take a long time to finish!

America had an historic election this month! I would like to extend a heart-felt "thank you" to voters for choosing progress over fear this time around. This country has come a long way in just a few decades, and it's clear that an interest in real social and economic change isn't fleeting. However, I'm more than a little disappointed with my home state of California for voting bigotry into the constitution. Shame on you. After the leaps and bounds made in civil rights for women and ethnic minorities over the past century, we deny another group of people their right to marry the people they love under the false pretense that we're protecting "family" and "the children"? It's incredibly disturbing that we, in this day and age, even entertain such hateful notions as being in any way defensible. The only thing being protected here is the treatment of gays and lesbians as second-class citizens. This is the 21st century, folks. Let's try to act like it!

I really appreciate you folks sticking with me these past few months. I know it's frustrating to have the story crawl like this. I figure this is preferable to letting work get the better of me like it did during the 2006 hiatus. I'm working hard to get the pages out a little faster every update, but it's been challenging. I hope you're still digging it.

I've been playing Mother 3 on my breaks at work. It's exciting to finally get the chance to jump back into the EarthBound universe, since Itoi has a knack for making extremely funny and weird games. This is also the first RPG I've played in years, because... who has time for RPGs anymore? 80-hour epics are just too much of a time-sink these days. It takes something really special to make me want to overcome that hurdle. I was surprised with how emotionally engaging it's been. Even though it's been said that this will be the last game in the Mother series, I hope he's still planning on doing other games. Even if it takes another 12 years.

Hate falling into this bi-weekly routine, it really makes the story hit the breaks. Gonna try to put a move on it this week and get the ball rolling a little faster. You folks have the patience of saints, and I hear they are pretty patient people.

There are lots of fun looking games coming out soon and I don't have the time to play any of them!

The update schedule continues to be a little spotty. I'm still pulling pretty long hours at the office; I wish I could say that my efforts there were not in vain, but with some of the titles we've been working on lately... yeesh. Makes me wish the days of the Dreamcast were still upon us. In an alternate universe, Sega still makes video games consoles! Not only that, but Sonic never went 3D.

I've been having my schedule at work flipped back, then forth, and finally back again for the past month, and it's been challenging trying to set aside time to draw. I think it'll be calming down from here on out, which will definitely help with maintaining a little more consistency in the update schedule. At least, I hope it will. A man can dream. On the plus side, I'm not working nights anymore.

Over the past few weeks I've been going through my archives in an attempt to catch spelling mistakes, zap grammar disasters, and otherwise fix some minor inconsistencies like stray pixels, wrong colors, and the like. Despite my best efforts to break these perfectionist tendencies, they seem to be here to stay! I've made some minor updates to the first 16 pages of the comic; prior to establishing the visual "rules" for OHP, the speech bubbles were all drawn by hand... and looked terrible. Early comics suffered from some truly awful bubble placement and shapes, which made for a bunch of pretty ugly wall-of-text scenarios. These have been fixed, with a little polish on the dialogue tossed in for good measure. Have a look for yourself!

I haven't really played much of anything lately. But it's cool to see that Castle Crashers was apparently worth the wait! I've been a long-time advocate for the glorious return of the side-scrolling beat-'em-up.

Thanks for all that voting, folks! OHP was in the top ten for about a week and a half this month, which is totally awesome and completely unheard of... until now! The sleeping giants have awoken, of course, but we're still holding on to an extremely respectable 19th on the list. Keep fighting the good fight!

Bionic Commando: Rearmed finally came out! I never got very far in the original--mostly because I didn't own it and was completely terrible at it--but I still had some fond memories of the experience, and have been pretty psyched about the prospect of a ground-up remake. I was not disappointed. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that this is some of the best 2D platforming in years, and it's certainly at the top of the list for the 360. Not only that, but some serious 8-bit flavored beats to go along with it? Has real gaming finally made a comeback? If I'm dreaming, don't wake me up!

By the way, have you seen this freakin' sweet business? I do believe this is officially the first time OHP has broken the Top Ten! Let's not split hairs over the fact that everyone else probably has broken toplist links this month, this is for real. We're on top of the world, baby! Keep rockin' the vote!

Sorry that the updates have been so sporadic lately! I'm still drawing the night away, but life has been extraordinarily busy and stressful lately. Hopefully that will stop soon, because I feel like I haven't slept in a month.

Evan Dahm, of Rice Boy fame, started a new comic called Order of Tales. Just in case you're into incredibly stylish and fantastical comics.

As promised, a new oekaki happened over the Fourth of July weekend. The results were extremely patriotic and pornographic, as you can probably imagine. I was hoping to do another while I was off, but I ran out of time! Baby steps.

I would like Bionic Commando: Rearmed to come out right now, if not sooner.

Yahtzee posted a review of webcomics instead of games this week, which I found pretty funny. Oh, that man. Let the wailing and gnashing of teeth commence!

American readers, have a good Fireworks Day! What better way to celebrate freedom than by drinking too much, eating too much, and watching things get shot into the sky and explode? The American dream, in a nutshell. Sorry for all the noise, Canada and Mexico! We'll be done partying by Saturday.

Holy crap, y'all. I'm getting four days off of work starting next week while Sega relocates to a new building a few blocks away. With any luck, I'll be able to use this time to a) relax, b) catch up on OHP, and c) draw some oekaki FOR REAL JESUS CHRIST CAN I GET FIVE MINUTES TO MYSELF SO I CAN DRAW SOME SMUT. In case you've been wondering, here's a list of some of the "fantastic" titles I've been working on lately: Condemned 2: Bloodshot, Universe at War: Earth Assault, Iron Man, and The Incredible Hulk. SIGH.

Also, have any of you sent me e-mails with attachments? I discovered the other day that my spam blocker was painting with some pretty broad strokes, and I think some letters with things attached may have been accidentally flushed. It's been tweaked, so that shouldn't happen anymore. If you've been waiting for a response, just shoot me another e-mail. Thanks!