The meal comes in four configurations, offers four "collector's cups" featuring NFLers rendered, interestingly, in their cartoony Madden-for-the-Wii forms. McWhertor, still nauseous from last year's unboxing of the Guitar Hero meal, assigned this to me on the pretense that as the sports writer, it was my responsibility.

I selected the five hot wings version over the two-piece grilled chicken (white or dark meat), the three chicken strips or the Twister (a wrap with lettuce). I went with the hot wings because I figured five pieces would allow me to burn 66 percent more calories reaching into the box than I would with three crispy strips, and that would be healthier than whatever I got from the Twister's vegetable matter.

The KFC Madden Box also comes in a standard $5 version and a $7 special edition that, while it doesn't include night vision goggles, is packed with enough pupil-dilating sodium you'll see in the dark on your own. I went with the $7 configuration, which is supposed to deliver an extra side item and a dessert.

But as you can see in the above unboxing, this product shipped in such an incomplete state I'm not sure any patch or update can fix it. Opening the box reveals just the five wings and the mashed potatoes and gravy - which I had declared as my extra side item. No crumbly biscuit doused in butter pheromones. No chitinous coleslaw in mayonnaise the color and consistency of watery ejaculate. In fact, since the hockey-puck brownie bites come in plastic and I poured the Diet Pepsi (oh hell yeah, I went with the diet), there are a grand total of two items here actually prepared by KFC employees, even though the loading time for this was an unacceptably slow seven minutes.

KFC #D705027, Springfield, Ore., you fail. Well, maybe you were thinking of my health by subtracting 360 needless calories. Either way, my review of this meal's components follows:

Hated (Secretly Loved):
Hot wings: These babies start slow, not really hitting you with the spice until midway through the third piece. Then it was like Cayenne Frankenstein farted in my face. Even after the meal my mouth had this residue on it that reminded me of the time I drunkenly kissed this chick who had that bee-sting toxin lip gloss to give her the Angelina Jolie pouty look. Both encounters were degrading, but this one diminished my self-esteem. Also, these are not boneless wings; I thought "wings" was an allegorical reference in lieu of "nuggets," a competitor's term, because these things were fried up to the point they no longer resembled the limbs of any known terrestrial animal. So I took a big mouthful of bone on the first attempt, and believe me, that's not a sentence I ever wanted to write. I didn't expect the amount of meat in this item to be nourishing; I did expect it to at least be filling. Rating: Anorexy.

Mashed Potatoes and Gravy: The pudding-like body of potato flour and pureed notebook was at least free of lumps or standing water. It was thoroughly mixed with the viscous tailings of cooked chicken, whose bouquet hit artful notes of obesity, unemployment, and parole. If the chicken didn't fill me, this sure did, as not soon after polishing off the MP&G it felt like my large intestine was mixing up Redi-Crete, certain to turn my commode into a birdbath. Rating: Lunchlady.

Brownie Bites: These pucklike treats came packaged in a cellophane sleeve upside down on a piece of waxed cardboard, evocative of the conveyor belt that shat them out. In March. But ultimately, they were chocolatey and thus the highlight, comparatively speaking, of this dining experience. Rating: Hockey.

Despite the grandiose packaging and $7 pricetag, even if this order had been completely filled it would still be engineered for a 15 minute experience, tops. I expected that this calorie bomb would have left me doing the old Dad thing of unbuttoning my pants and laying on the couch to watch Jeopardy and blame my farts on the dog. But all it took was one tuberculose belch-cough and I was back to full strength.

If there was $1.95 worth of actual food in this meal I'd be astonished. That, coupled with the EA Sports sponsorship, must make this cross promotion an insanely profitable no-brainer for Yum! Brands, and all but guarantees a sequel in the coming year.

KFC Madden NFL Box was developed in a conference room by marketing geniuses and produced by KFC, a subsidiary of Yum! Brands, Inc. Retails for $5, $7 if you want the extra side-item and brownie bites, assuming they remember to pack all the base items. Eaten until regretted.

On Sept. 9, The New Yorker put the definitive tack in Seth Schiesel's balloon over The New York Times writer's eyebrow-raising praise for The Beatles: Rock Band.

It offered a selection of "previous write-ups the Times has given big games." For nonsubscribers, this means "satire incoming."

Acclaimed short-story writer and poet Raymond Carver died today. He was an influential force in American literature and an all around mega man. You know who else is a mega man? Mega Man, the new video-game character who will likely be bigger than Carver, Shakespeare, and even the printed word itself.

Since the dawn of man, there have been those with athletic skill and those without. For decades, those men and women without the coördination and skill to play professional football have had to sit idly by, passively watching football games on television and dreaming of futures that could never be. But thanks to Madden NFL '94, impossible dreams will come true. Move over, Helen Keller-there's a new miracle worker in town!

A princess has been kidnapped. Her name is Zelda, she is beautiful, and I love her.

Next month, don't try leaving your home. Lock the doors and barricade the windows. This is not a drill, this is the real f—-ing thing. As soon as Grand Theft Auto: Vice City hits the streets, eleven-year-olds around the country will morph into rabid pit bulls out for blood. This game is evil propaganda designed to teach babies to murder. Hide your possessions and swallow your gold fillings.

Actually, in a newspaper, that last one would sound rather believable.

Video Games Bigger than Jesus [The New Yorker via Ian Bogost]

Serious Metroid fans may get a titter out of the referential piece, but conservative Galactic Federation types aren't going to approve of Aran's faux pro-gay marriage editorial. Hey, it's McSweeney's, not The Onion. It's dry, but amazingly authentic.

Now back to *my* Samus Aran lesbian coming out fanfic...

METROID'S SAMUS ARAN SPEAKS OUT ABOUT GAY MARRIAGE [McSweeney's]

While it's possible P or D didn't know or overlooked the rumblings of just such a game, going back a year, that's some absolutely karmic timing. And so here are the other four we can look forward to being announced sometime this week (commentary is mine):

• Guitar Hero: U2 - I'd have to agree here. I'm one of those guys who came in with "Joshua Tree" and then worked his way backward, not forward. I'm not sure I could must up the self-regard necessary to even do a plastic peripheral cover of "Vertigo." I'd feel like I was in an iPod ad. Plus I'm not sure how the African debt relief minigame would work.

• Guitar Hero: Nickelback - Don't know a damn thing about them or their music, other than they are used as a punchline only slightly less often than Insane Clown Posse.

• Guitar Hero: Coldplay - I'll confess to being convinced to buy their album by a woman I briefly dated. Then "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" came out with its infamous line. Since then, every time I've bought a new computer or iPod, god damn iTunes makes sure to redownload this to my hard drive.

• Guitar Hero: Creed - Simply because the game would consist of 80 songs played to the same note highway. Also because they are used as a punchline slightly more often than Insane Clown Posse.

On that score, now I want some DJ Hero: ICP. How about you Juggalos?

5 Bands That Don't Need Their Own Guitar Hero Game [Pwn or Die]

Obama supporters can guide the new POTUS-elect on to another stunning victory - this time against Pigs (Pork barrel politics! Do you see what they did there?) and money bag toting lobbyists. McCain supporters can settle for repeatedly plunging the Prez off an Alaskan ice shelf.

The makers promise that Arizona, Illinois, and D.C. levels will be added soon. The Alaskan maps on offer did provide one moment of authentic Biting Satire - a several screens long Bridge to Nowhere that ends in an impassible barrier. Nice touch.

[Super Obama World] Thanks to reader UppityCracker for the tip.

Hate Hillary? Want to beat down Barack? Whichever your pleasure, this NYP game lets you play as your candidate of choice and pound the opposition's face in by clicking your mouse a million times until you win. And yeah, that's pretty much the extent of it.

Ian Bogost is rolling in his grave. Oh, wait, he's not dead yet, though I'll bet this game will make him want to drive rusty nails into his eyeballs.

Beat Up Hillary Clinton! [Wonkette]

A key part of the development process, I am told, is pitching your game ideas to studios and publishers. After some practice, I believe I am starting to get good at this. For instance, I know that if you want to be taken seriously as a professional, you need to use something called "Powerpoint". In fact, I have been writing all my game proposals in Powerpoint and I am starting to see a marked improvement in the quality of my ideas.

It's funny (I laughed — a lot) and worth a couple of minutes of your time.

The Pitch [Hit Self-Destruct via GameSetWatch]

Street Fighter: The Later Years, Part 9 [College Humor]

The game's creator Conor O'Kane told ninemsn he wanted to make people more aware of the current whaling situation.

"If people [are] offended by the game they should be even more offended by real whaling," he said.

"I hope people make the next logical step and realise that reality is much worse than a video game.

The game is available as a download over at the Harpooned website.

Fans hunt down whaling game [ninemsn via Water Cooler Games]

Let's think about the future for a second. You probably don't understand the kids that make up the bulk of our audience, but I do. I call them the network MySpace remix 3.0 social generation. Unlike any other people before them, young people today like to interact with each other. They also like music. YouTube is the perfect example of whatever point it is I'm making. Everything should be online and customizable.

It's short. It's funny! It's worth a read. As someone in the comments section said, "You just saved me so much in travel expenses." Touché.

Five Short Video Game Industry Keynotes [Magical Wasteland via GameSetWatch]

The Onion has a Swiftian bit up about Take Two Interactive's "latest" video game Stacker. Poking fun at uptight video game critics who blame video games for influencing children to do bad, bad things - Stacker wouldn't influence anyone, but that's by design. It's a clever read.

New Video Game Designed To Have No Influence On Kids' Behavior [The Onion]

Katrina: The Gathering is a brilliantly poignant card game designed by Ubiq and Lum (who author Zen of Design and Broken Toys) with heavy tongue-in-cheek nods to Magic: The Gathering. Cards like Condoleezza Rice's (Puts a 3/3 token black creature into play) or Sean Penn's (Creature classification of Liberal Entertainer) take dead aim with biting sarcasm. We hope it gets to a playable state soon. If something like this offends you, we can only dream how offended you were with the government's response time in the wake of the Katrina tragedy. Lighten up.