Resident Evil 5 was bigger, said Travis Wade, 27, a store employee. Halo 3 was, of course, a week-long affair; he expects Modern Warfare 2's launch will completely obliterate what they saw during Halo 3.

But those series are every-other-year at most. Madden comes out every year, and whether you're a sports gamer or not, there's always a launch event, and the news trucks always show up, and it helps push the lifestyle further into the mainstream. Indeed, Eugene's KVAL-TV van rolled up just as I was leaving the scene.

And the launch delivers for non-sports gamers too. Reader Skaarg, who works at a GameStop, took advantage of his store's used-games sale, picking up four titles for less than $50.

So here's a gallery of midnight launch pics and gameplay sent in by readers. Feel free to share your own pics or anecdotes in the comments. And again, if you are looking to start Online Franchises among the commenter community here, by all means, use this thread to swap info.

Marietta, Ga. GameStop - Reader Brian S. and his friend.

Madden tournament at the Marietta GameStop. Sent by Reader Brian S.

Reader gfrank and his freshly-purchased copy.

Reader newbootgoofin42 fires up his game and immediately selects his fave team. "The Mountain Dew is stocked and the Cheetos are at the ready."

Madden tournament during launch night, Plano, Texas, GameStop. Sent by Reader saysay.

West Caldwell, N.J. Play N Trade event, sent by reader Matt G.

The line at Best Buy, Fort Wayne, Ind. In other words, there wasn't one. Reader Adam W. was first to pick up the game there.

It's pretty simple to answer: Just drop in picture of yourself and pictures of which character you'd like to play you in a game, and which actually would.

No contest, just oodles of Internetz fame.

Here's one to get you started:

Reality: Fahey
Want: Kratos
Get: World of Warcraft Ogre
Reality: Crecente
Want: The Prince of Persia.
Get: Title art character from DS failure Homie Rollerz

Pulling back (at bottom) we see Snow getting his Rock of Love on with Vanille and Lightning. As you can see, the crew is covering up an ad for Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars. I also believe it was the site of a GTAIV ad (before Tropic Thunder), so this is A-list game advertising real estate.

The location is South Figueroa St. at Olympic Boulevard, (right next to the Staples Center) if you're nearby and want to see it.

Thanks to all who noticed that the tag and the lead paragraph, like Sandy Duncan, was lacking an I.

SNOWing in LA? [Square-Enix]

Of course the best part is, no, you never learn anything. Even if you do manage to land the jumping kick to a shoryuken, it was probably just dumb luck or your equally self-unaware foe spazzing on his controls.

The pic uploaded to the Intertubes around March and hit reddit earlier this week, so here's the obligatory pardon-fucking-me if one of you have seen this before. See everyone back in here tomorrow.

Says Alex:"I just received the following as a birthday gift from my sister in law. She's been a mere spectator while my brother and I play through numerous Left 4 Dead campaigns ..."

The zombies are, IMHO, the best of the bunch. But no offense to Alex or his sister-in-law, the Louis doll might need a little explaining to someone not hip to games.

Coupled with the gameplay footage - I know this is a third person action game, but it looks like it strings together a bunch of minigames sorta like a rail shooter (rail-whipper? guided-first person experience?) would.

It's also up for the PS2, PSP and DS, and I'm a big Indiana Jones fan, but not enough to buy a PS2 for this one.

GALLERY




END

Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings Screenshots [Nintendo Everything]

Given my admittedly limited understanding of the actual periodic table, this arrangement would make the Sega Saturn the most reactive controller, and the Atari Pong controller the most inert. Hey, that actually almost fits. Share your science puns/coincidences in the comments.

Periodic Table of Controllers [Clusterflock, thanks Nick]

Before the significant increase in atmospheric oxygen almost all life that existed was anaerobic, that is, the metabolism of life depended on a form of cellular respiration that did not require oxygen. Free oxygen in large amounts is poisonous to most anaerobic bacteria, and at this time most life on Earth vanished. The only life that remained was either resistant to the oxidizing and poisonous effects of oxygen, or spent its life-cycle in an oxygen-free environment. This main event is called the Oxygen Catastrophe. Also the first Grypania fossils and the first Eukaryotes appeared during this time.

Yeah, you aren't reading this. Here are two more screens, sans boobie. What's up with that half-topless look? In or out? Wench, maketh up thy mind!

The Witcher: Rise of the White Wolf Screenshots with Digital Nipple Slippage [Troll in the Corner]
Paleoproterozoic [Wikipedia]

Redbeard Math Pirate on Flickr created 15, spanning the range of cart art on the Atari 2600 - original VCS, second generation, third generation, early Activision, and original Imagic. More of his offerings below:

Yo dawg, I herd you like memes ...

Yeah, and 33-69 is PORN.

I've played this game. It's like Outlaw with multiplayer.

Fake Atari Games [flickr]

I've had the same picture of the Pyramid Peaks in Colorado on my desktop since 2003. If your background's getting a little stale, too, certainly one of these will do the trick.

Lifehacker two weeks ago also posted some killer retro-gaming wallpapers (God, how I want the one with Asshole Dog snickering at me) but the flood of traffic killed Desktop Gaming's bandwidth. So keep an eye on that URL when it comes back up, it may have some good stuff. Just, you know, go there quietly, and in an orderly fashion.

We can't post them at full resolution, so following are previews with links to the full size versions (which is on deviantART, so there shouldn't be a bandwidth problem). Enjoy.

Orioto's Video Game Remake Desktops [deviantART via Lifehacker, thanks Jimmy]

This latest set of screens for the Xbox 360 version of Sacred 2: Fallen Angel show off the Diablo-esque co-op gameplay you can expect to experience in the console versions of the game come March 24th. Both the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game support 4 players online drop-in co-op play, allowing folks to enter and leave games as they please. The console version also ships with a 2 player offline co-op mode, but that's just to appease those of us who still maintain offline friends. Silly.

Next up, what looks like a school newspaper "review" of about three generations of consoles and hand-helds. It's new, because it references "grand theft auto 4" and "gutter hero" for the Xbox 360, but apparently the GameCube is still worth considering this holiday season. And PS2's pros? "Big ones and small ones." So true. We in the tower were impressed by the loved/hated arrangement of the critique, but then he ruined it by assigning a numerical score.

Here's some Pac-Man snow ghosts that popped up on Flickr. This improvisation sure beats the R2D2 mailboxes I saw around San Francisco about a year ago.

And finally, look, I'm reaching. And maybe this is an act. But if you have a shitload of video games, consoles, ROBs, maybe arcade cabinets and you have nowhere to put them, and you live near Chicago, Jones' Big Ass Truck Rental and Storage will hold your stash in comfort, style and security. How can you not trust a former "street pharmaceutical sales rep" who quit the business when he saw his "distribution manager" get shot?

Did You Know That Microsoft Stole the 360 Name from Sony? [Crunchgear]
High School Paper Console Review [Tinypic]
Snow Ghosts [Flickr]
Jones' Big Ass Truck Rental and Storage [YouTube]

Tiggerboy, who keeps a blog on the UK GameSpot, brought in all the hardware dignitaries to bid the 360 goodbye. You can see the 360 packaged in his foam coffin (aka the Peter Moore Catafalque), ready to to be ferried by the Boatman of the Dead Consoles (aka the UPS guy) on his way back to Microsoft, where his remains will become part of the circle of console life. There's a gallery of the proceedings on the jump, including an astonishing, last-minute appearance by a disowned relative that will leave you heaving up great sobs.

Master Chief, a lifelong friend, gave a moving eulogy. In the crowd: Venerable PSOne up front, leaning on his cane, pale and wan, feeling every day of his 14 years of age and wondering how it has come to pass that he is burying the children of his friends. And behind him, the grand statesman NES, his gaming days long gone and his service limited to ceremonial functions such as these.

Even R.O.B., gaming's great useless partner, like Andrew Ridgely or John Oates or Art Garfunkel, put aside his bitterness to come and pay his respects. Why, when I last heard of him, he was living in a Vermont cabin like J.D. Salinger, drinking heavily and refusing all requests for an interview. And in the back is the unmistakable PS3, dark and foreboding. Like World War I flying aces, there can still be honor and respect among blood enemies.

Then at the end, 360's biological dad Xbox showed up, only deepening the regret and sadness felt by everyone. Cast aside and virtually estranged for the better part of two years, reduced to living in basements on the kindness of others, Xbox still loves his son unconditionally, forgiving all of his design flaws.

In pace requiescat, Xbox 360. "The candle that burns twice as bright — or hot — burns only half as long."

The Funeral for my Xbox 360 [tiggerboy's Blog, Gamespot UK]

In deference to our sister site for this great get, you can see the second one on the link.

Halloween Wii Dogs Make Us Laugh, Shed Single Tear [Gizmodo]

Video Game Skills [SomethingAwful]

Eight Other Video Games That Obama Should be Advertising In [College OTR]