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Just What You Need: More Gaming T-Shirts

More gaming tees for the nerdy! But these are unquestionably cool (unlike this) because the designs are like secret handshakes: only people equally as nerdy as you will get what your T-shirt means. Whether you want a blood-drenched Pyramid Head or a cute, squishy Loco Roco, Way of the Rodent has got the shirt for the gamer in you. I think I'll get the Elite Beat Agents tee myself, but if anyone tries to hit my "beats," they'll get an "elite beat" to the face, courtesy of my fist...

T-Shirts [Way of the Rodent]
[via GayGamer.net]

Don't Hate the Player, Hate the Shirt?

Another design from my favorite T-shirt makers at Threadless. But I can't decide if this shirt is nerdy and lame or nerdy and awesome. Either way, it's definitely nerdy, and if you feel that you are the "Original Gamester," then this shirt is for you (I'm looking at you, Jaded Cynic). I think I might've considered buying this shirt had it not been shown on these models... They make me feel icky...

Original Gamester Tee [Threadless]

Yeah. I’m Jealous. So What?

So when the collector in me sees game rooms like this (and this) it really makes me question my commitment. I fully understand that I, in fact, do have a life, and other things that I have to spend money on than video games. At least that’s what I tell myself, because, frankly, I’m jealous… very, very, very jealous.

Overheard at the Pac-Man World Championships

Our good buddy Pete from Game Head was also at the Pac-Man event yesterday, and he heard a little something about us while he was there...

Microsoft rep #1: "Hey, has anyone seen Pac-Man anywhere?" 
Microsoft rep #2: "I think MTV has him in the bathroom...for real."

Wondering just what sort of hijinks we were up to? Well you'll have wait and watch the G-Hole later on to find out. MWAHAHA...

The Future of Pac-Man?

Pac-Man has lasted for 26 years and with new mazes and modes on the way, it'll reach generations beyond what creator Toru Iwatani ever imagined. In fact, it already has: above is a photo of 13 year-old James Rodgers, who is the U.K. champion and placed sixth overall (ahead of legend Billy Mitchell who placed eighth). We didn't get a chance to talk to him, but I heard through the grapevine that he and his dad saw that the tournament was coming up and decided to use their quality time together just beefing up their Pac-Man skills (I guess they don't play catch in the U.K.). That's a pretty amazing feat for such a young kid. But he better watch out, because Billy Mitchell Jr. plans to live up to his dad's legacy:

Pac-Man Legends: Toru Iwatani and Billy Mitchell

So Jaded Cynic had the opportunity to get his Pac-Man marquee signed by two Pac-Man legends -- creator Toru Iwatani and Billy Mitchell, the first person ever to score a perfect score (3,333,360) in Pac-Man in 1999. When we interviewed Iwatani for our upcoming G-Hole segment, he said he had no idea a perfect score could be achieved -- that is, until Billy came along. However today, in this tournament, Billy placed eighth overall (I guess the new version of Pac-Man threw him off a bit). Regardless, Billy was as nice as could be, signing autographs, giving interviews and handing out bottles of his proprietary hot sauce:

Getting Beat at Pac-Man Championship Edition in Five Minutes

 

Apparently, I’m the designated Pac-Man enthusiast for MTV.com. So much so, that my co-workers thought it would be a good idea for me to actually play against (read: get destroyed by) the newly crowned Pac-Man World champion, Carlos Romero, in an upcoming episode of our videogame show, The G-Hole. So what happened?

It’s kinda sad; I wasn’t even close. I barely broke 90,000 points in fives minutes of the Pac-Man Championship Edition, and Carlos scored somewhere in the realm of 170,000. I'll admit that he's far superior to me, but he also had a whole day (and an entire tournament’s worth) of practice. It was the first time I even saw the game...

Pac-Man World Championships: We Came, We Saw, We Didn't Conquer...

Speaking of Pac-Man, today we headed over to the first-ever Xbox 360 Pac-Man World Championships. In a nutshell, gamers qualified to be in the finals by having the highest Pac-Man score in their region (on Xbox LIVE Arcade, of course). The finalists then headed to New York City to participate in the World Championships. After four intense rounds during the wee hours of the morning, the ten finalists were whittled down to two: Austria's Robert Glashuettner and Mexico's Carlos Romero. But the biggest surprise of all was not who were in the finals, but what they were playing....

Yep, that's right. A brand new rendition of Pac-Man -- the Pac-Man Championship Edition, which had creator Toru Iwatani working on new mazes for the lovable, pellet-muncher (the first in over 26 years!). Our own Jaded Cynic got a chance to play the game for five minutes. Click here to read his initial impressions (and how he got his butt whupped), then hit the jump to see more photos of the event...

Pac-Man Gets Tennis Elbow!

Pac-Man has made more than a few video game appearances since the early '80s. Even though he’s appeared in what seems like hundreds of derivations of the original he’s never really stepped too far out of his rotund role as a pellet-chomping ghost hunter. Unlike other video game mascots (who've played so many sports they're going to the Olympics this year), the Pac's hefty weight hasn't really let him step up his game. However, this could all change with the release of Smash Court Tennis 3 for the PSP in early July. It looks like Pac-Man might be able to shed some pounds on the courts as the star of one of the training mini-games.

When Mario Bites the Big One...

It makes perfect sense!

Where Does Mario Go When He Dies? [Coin Heaven]
[via Digg]