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NBA 2K14 will add Euroleague teams to the series for the first time, reintroducing international basketball to console gaming after a three-year hiatus brought on by NBA Live's absence. Fourteen of the Euroleague's top clubs will be featured in the game, according to the league itself in an announcement made earlier today. The teams will be playable against NBA teams from the play-now menu. They are: Alba Berlin FC Barcelona Real Madrid CSKA Moscow EA7 Emporio Armani Milano Montepaschi Siena Fenerbahçe Ülker Istanbul Anadolu Efes Istanbul Olympiacos Piraeus Panathinaikos Athens Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv Zalgiris Kaunas Unicaja Málaga Laboral Kutxa Vitoria The NBA Live series routinely included international teams playing under FIBA regulations, up until its last entry in the series, NBA Live 10 of 2009. 2K Sports had only featured NBA teams of the present and past, before including the 1992 and 2012 United States men's national teams in NBA 2K13 last year. More images of Euroleague teams can be seen via Operation Sports. 2K Sports' NBA 2K14 to Include Top Euroleague Basketball Teams for the First Time in the Series [Euroleague.net via Operation Sports]

Patrick tries (and often fails) to balance a laptop on his legs, while he answers your questions from his new location in the midwest.

Simple yet elegant, seductive while at the same time innocent, the lollipop is one of the true icons of the candy snacking world. It deserves the star treatment, which is exactly what San Francisco-born, Austin-raised candy company Lollyphile delivers. Lollipops have come a long way since sweet-cravers in the Middle Ages dipped sticks in boiled sugar to create the candy's ancient ancestors. Those early ugly lumps have evolved into sophisticated works of art, as pleasing to the palate as they are to the eye. The act of... ...yes, I know that one says "Breast Milk" on it. We'll be getting to that eventually. Bear with me. Sucking on a lollipop can be more than simply snacking. A child with a lollipop is the picture of innocence, while an adult woman consuming the same candy is often presented as a source of titillation. Then of course there's guy: Telly Savalas' Kojak made lollipops cool in the early 1970s. Now Lollyphile is taking up the reins, but with flavors like Absinthe, White Russian, Salty Dog and, yes — Breast Milk — these are no Tootsie Roll Pops. Lollyphile is cool. Lollyphile is hip. Lollyphile's web page is filled with pictures of quirky, attractive people having fun and eating lollipops. But what initially drew me to Lollyphile was a link sent to me from our own Tina Amini, regarding one specific flavor. Breast Milk lollipops debuted in the number two position on my "Things I Do Not Want In My Mouth" chart, displacing "Someone Else's Pus" but failing to steal the top spot from perennial favorite, "Hundreds of Live Spiders." Of course, being a certified snackologist means doing things one might not be particularly proud of, so I went ahead and requested samples. The only remaining question was this: seeing as my wife is still with milk following the birth of our twins, would I compare and contrast? The answer may surprise you, but only because I placed it at the end of this sentence in all caps NO. Lollyphile sent me seven flavors to sample. Let's go through them one-by-one. Absinthe "Honey? What does Absinthe taste like?" "Sort of like black licorice." Mission accomplished. The legendary anise-based green spirit was the basis for Lollyphile's initial foray into the realm of gourmet lollipops, and as far as I can tell the candy replicates the taste admirably. Imagine an incredibly strong black licorice flavor and you're right there with me. It's a powerful taste — I doubt I could make my way through an entire pop in one sitting. Maple Bacon A self-described expert in the combination of maple and bacon, I was really looking forward to getting my bearded lips around Lollyphile's Maple Bacon flavored lollipop. It's an interesting pop, filled with an odd sort of grit, which reveals itself as your saliva does its work on the confection. As for the taste — well, they come pretty close. There's a fine line between the taste of bacon and the taste of instant chicken soup, and this pop is just over the fowl line. Ginger Wasabi The taste is all ginger, the afterburn all wasabi — exactly what I wanted out of Lollyphile's Ginger Wasabi flavor. Ginger is one of the finest flavors on the planet, one that doesn't need any Japanese horseradish to make it sing. While the overall lack of wasabi taste might disappoint those craving the green stuff's signature nostril ravaging, a subtle burn on the back of my tongue is just fine with me. Pomegranate I'm not sure if this is supposed to be Lollyphile's Pomegranate Tangerine flavor — it's simply labeled Pomegranate — but either way it really doesn't matter. This lollipop is the epitome of generic red hard candy. There's a vague berry-ish flavor that I suppose could pass for pomegranate, but it never quite comes together. Definitely the most disappointing of the lot. Salty Dog I had to look this one up. A Salty Dog is, apparently, a mixed drink consisting of vodka (or gin) and grapefruit juice, served in a salt-crusted glass (without salt it's a Greyhound). Not surprisingly, given the pop's color, this one is another one of my favorites. The grapefruit flavor is mild but definitely present, and there's a saltiness that's so subtle I still wonder if I simply imagined it. Should I ever find myself in the position to order a mixed drink, I might give the real thing a try. White Russian A mixture of coffee-liqueur and cream ingested primarily by shaggy-headed dudes in bathrobes, the White Russian is probably the easiest alcoholic beverage to replicate in candy form. Hell, it's almost liquid candy as it is. The lollipop gets the flavor right, but without the alcohol kick or the hovering presence of Jeff Bridges, it's a bit boring. I guess that describes just about everything in existence, really. Breast Milk I've spent the past two years avoiding the taste of breast milk. It's been all over our house, all over my kids, all over my wife; yet somehow, perhaps through dark sorcery, I've managed to avoid ingesting a single drop. So I could not tell you if these Breast Milk lollipops — which are completely vegan and contain no actual breast milk — taste like the real thing. They do taste vaguely of milk, with a certain sweetness I've heard attributed to the human-produced product. If I were hard-pressed, I'd say it tastes a bit like rice pudding. Feeling I wasn't up to the task, I turned to a pair of experts in the field. Archer avoided, Seamus approved. While I may not like all of their flavors, I do appreciate what Lollyphile is attempting to do in the name of furthering the stick-based candy business. It's a market brimming with untapped potential, waiting for plucky upstarts with tattoos and piercings to sneak in and steal the crown off the head of Big Candy, with its tendency to play things safe. If more candy companies follow Lollyphile's example, maybe the image of the lollipop will be a little less this... ... and a little more this: Snacktaku is Kotaku's take on the wild and wonderful world of eating things, but not eating meals. Eating meals is for those with too much time on their hands. Past critiques can be found at the Snacktaku review archive.

ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED? No? Well, it might help if you bought some upgrades...

When he visited our television sets a generation ago he came to us in two different forms, one of them human. In his time he was unmistakably the best athlete of both realms, and his latter manifestation—the indestructible, immortal, and still unstoppable Video Game Bo Jackson—returns to the field next week. Jackson, whose appearances in 1989's Tecmo Bowl and 1991's Tecmo Super Bowl inaugurated a new type of sports nostalgia, will be available to all players in NCAA Football 14's new Ultimate Team mode once the game hits shelves July 9. Everyone who creates a team will receive a card of Jackson rated for his freshman season at Auburn, good for playing 25 games with him. A 99-rated Bo Jackson, based on his Heisman Trophy winning senior season of 1985, will also be available, but he will be very difficult to find, or very costly to acquire from the game's auction house. He will not appear in Madden NFL 25, which also has an Ultimate Team mode. "He was kind of a late addition for NCAA," said Tom Lischke, a producer on Ultimate Team for both games. "We had been trying to get Bo into Ultimate Team for years now. We thought we had him last year, but he decided at the last second he wasn't interested. "We've been chasing him for a long time. He's such an awesome video game icon. He is The Video Game Running Back." Once signed, though, Jackson presented a different problem to the team: How to properly rate such a gifted performer—and someone who brings back such fond memories—without breaking the game. Tecmo Bo Jackson, as he is commonly called, was such a destructive force that the Los Angeles Raiders had to be banned from human-versus-human conflict, like a rec room arms treaty. Yet Tecmo Super Bowl was not, in intent, an arcade game like NFL Street 2, Jackson's last video game appearance of any kind. It strove to create an NFL of believable performers relative to one another. With Jackson, it got plays like this: "We really had to talk with our core gameplay guys and go over, 'OK, how are people going to expect him to be? What sets him apart? What would be defining?'" Lischke mused. "To match Bo's last appearance that, I think, is iconic for everybody [Tecmo Super Bowl] we'd have to blow him all out and wreck everything. There's basically no room for any other running back in the game. "He needs to feel different from anybody else in the game, but still be true to the overall experience," Lischke said. The other quandary is much of Jackson's godlike persona is built on what he did as a professional—whether it was running for 221 yards on Monday Night Football, destroying Brian Bosworth in the same game, or as a Kansas City Royal, leading off the 1989 All-Star game with a 500-foot home run as President Reagan watched from the broadcast booth. In the popular consciousness, it almost blots out what Jackson did for Auburn, except for plays like this: As showstopping as that run is, it's more along the lines of what Lischke and the NCAA developers want you to do with Jackson in Ultimate Team. I've run with 85-rated Bo, and he is as advertised. Jackson was one of the most devastating outside runners in football history, college or professional. He was elusive only because he left behind all but the fastest runners. Between the tackles, he ran over defenders rather than slipping by them. Jackson plays true to that. His freshman, 85-rated form gives him 90 speed, 90 acceleration, 89 agility and 85 trucking (hitting a defender) versus 78 elusiveness. His 99-rated, Heisman-winning "epic edition" form gives him a combination of 99 speed and 99 trucking, with 98 acceleration, 97 agility and 82 elusiveness. He should also never fumble, with a 95 ball carrying rating. You get 25 games with 85-rated Bo. If you find 99-rated Bo, you'll get 45. A 99-rated Bo Jackson should be, relative to NCAA Football 14, about as jaw-slackening as Tecmo Bo was to his game. "People ask me all the time what is ID is; they want to take him out on the field in the test environment," Lischke said. "The QA guys and the different developers on other teams. They all wanted to see Bo Jackson." Of course, anyone can give a player a 99 in anything—you may create yourself and give all 99s in every attribute. Here's where you can tell not only how good he was in real life, but the special respect he still accords in a video game: If a 99 wasn't enough to properly credit Jackson's talents, the only alternative was to lower the ratings of other runners—some of them all-time greats. "Bo has impacted other ratings decisions," Lischke said. "Once we signed him, having him made us adjust other guys down." Such as? Lischke didn't dodge the question. "In this case it was really Barry Sanders," Lischke said, Oklahoma State's Heisman winner who appeared on last year's NCAA cover and graces this year's boxshot for Madden. "Barry was always the ultimate back in our game. But [he and Jackson] have always played differently, and that was a big part of our effort, to make them all play different. Once we added Bo to the mix, we had to make some adjustments. We had to leave room for them to feel different." It is a testament to Jackson's singular talent that he is remembered like a running back who played 15 seasons and immediately entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame. He played three, before dislocating his hip against Cincinnati in the playoffs in January 1991, a dislocation doctors attributed partly to the force Jackson generated as a runner. He never played professional football again. Jackson's baseball career, which he prioritized over football, and had him destined to be one of the game's greatest power hitters, shuddered to a stop three seasons later. The real things he did keep Jackson in the discussion of America's greatest athletes ever, in any sport. But Jesse Owens, Jim Thorpe and Babe Ruth didn't appear in video games while they were active. Bo Jackson did, and if he was brought down—by his own inhuman speed—in real life, he was invincible in video games. Only a few other real-life stars can provoke the same kind of two-stage awe: Ken Griffey Jr., Jeremy Roenick, Michael Vick in Madden NFL 2004. But none comes close to Jackson. "I don't know that there's been another player who occupies the same mind space in the video game industry," said Lischke, 41. "I got excited when we added in Joe Montana for Madden Ultimate Team last year. I spent a lot of time making sure we got him right. For my generation, as video games came of age, and video game football came of age, he was all that anybody ever talked about. And even Montana didn't have that moment. "Maybe Michael Vick did. But Bo's a whole other deal." To contact the author of this post, write to owen@kotaku.com or find him on Twitter @owengood. Top image by Getty.

Rise of the Triad, the insanely fast-paced remake of the classic '94 Apogee first-person shooter, will be released on the PC in just a month, on July 31. Pre-ordering also gets you four more classic Apogee titles, including the original Rise of the Triad with its expansion pack, and the two Blake Stone games. Not bad.

Okay, so Professor Layton on iOS? Seems alrigh-wait. Did you say sandwich investigation?

Thanks to an amazing title sequence and an imagination-capturing low fantasy world, Attack on Titan has been one of this season's most popular anime. Five weeks ago, I even proclaimed it one of the five anime you should be watching. Unfortunately, despite all it has going for it—and it certainly has some amazing aspects, no doubt—it is a series that has failed so far to live up to its own potential. Good – A Dark Inventive World Perhaps the greatest star of Attack on Titan is not a character but the world in which the story exists. In a world filled with the mysterious titans—who seem to have no goal or motivation other than killing humans—all of mankind hides behind three great walls in an attempt to survive. Moreover, the way humanity attempts to fight back against the titans—by making the average soldier into a sword-swinging Spider-Man proxy—simply excites the imagination. But just like Berserk, Attack on Titan keeps its story more or less tense and grounded by showing the mortality not only of the random grunts in the background but also of the supporting cast. Everything is filled with constant tension as the question seems to be not “if your favorite character will die” but “when your favorite character will die.” Good – A Strong Female Lead One of the three main leads in Attack on Titan, Mikasa is clearly the break-out character of the series. While Armin is the thinker and Eren the leader, Mikasa is the one-man army of the group. She is calm, skilled, and intelligent—and the only one of the three who seemingly has no problem slaughtering titans left and right. But behind the calm veneer is a deep and interesting character. Every moment she's on screen is captivating—whether that's exploring her back story, watching her confront a selfish merchant, or discovering exactly how she reacts to encountering her greatest fears. Mixed – The Mother of all Cliffhangers [This section contains major spoilers, skip to the next section to avoid them] Attack on Titan spends its first five episodes focusing almost fully on Eren. Then, at the end of the fifth episode, we see him lose a leg and an arm before being swallowed by a titan. And then we wait and ponder. “Did the creators of the show really kill the main character only five episodes into the story? No, of course not.” But then one episode passes, then another and another. His death is played completely straight even though it’s almost impossible to believe. It takes nearly three full episodes before we find out what happened to him—a horrible, agonizing wait for a cliffhanger to be resolved. As a critic, I respect the creators for sticking to their guns and being fully committed to the bluff that the main character was, in fact, dead. But as a viewer, I hated it. Each week I tuned in to see how exactly he survived (because, let's face it, shows never kill off the main character before the final climax) and was instead shown some other character's backstory or watched as the plot followed some characters I wasn't nearly as invested in. Basically I was shown everything except what I wanted to know. It was maddening. Bad – Too Much Talk, Too Little Action Attack on Titan brilliantly sets up tense situation after tense situation and then spoils them by indulging in endless inner monologues. This is one of the pitfalls of adapting a manga into an anime. On the page, stream-of-consciousness angst flows as fast as you can read. However, in an anime, the same passage slows down to the speed of talk—turning a one-minute exploration of a character’s thoughts into a ten-minute digression. These moments are the bane of Attack on Titan. And worse, they are as frequent as they are tension-killing. Many of the show's conversations have the same effect as the inner monologues for the same reason. In manga form, they seem to be covered in a matter of seconds, but in an anime they become long and drawn out—making you wonder how the characters were really in any danger if they could afford to talk for twenty minutes about what to do. Bad – Uneven Pace But the conversations and inner monologues are not the only problem with pacing. The overall pace of the first half of the show is odd as well. While the first four episodes are somewhat standalone stories from different points in the main characters’ young lives, from the fifth episode on, the series suddenly changes into a serialized epic with no end in sight. So, if you enjoyed the first few episodes of the show, each week you'll find yourself waiting for the end of the arc so you can get on to the next adventure—only to discover that there are full episodes of nothing but angsty conversation padding out the episode count. It seems that the first few episodes would have been better served as flashback episodes interspersed throughout the “Battle of Trost” arc like how the Mikasa origin episode was used. Instead, by putting these episodes at the beginning, it sets a false pace for the viewers and makes the major arc seem even longer and more drawn out than it would have on its own. Final Thoughts In the end, the first half of Attack on Titan has the potential to be great, but fails somewhat in the execution. The world is captivating and the characters are excellently developed, but the show's pace is a major thorn in its own side. So while I have been enjoying much of what Attack on Titan has to offer, I find watching it week to week, cliffhanger to cliffhanger, to be nearly unbearable. However, while the first half has its mistakes, there is nothing to say that the second half won't learn from them. Join us here at Kotaku East in 12 weeks when we look at the second half of Attack on Titan. Attack on Titan currently airs on Tokyo MX in Japan. It is streamed in the United States with English subtitles on Crunchyroll, Funimation, and Hulu.

"Final Fantasy VII was a popular game and it still is." -- Gang Starr

Following the news of their game getting greenlit, the developers of Guncraft, the heavily customizable voxel-based multiplayer shooter, released a video of the game's much-touted build-your-own-gun feature. Hopefully, dubstep is not an integral part of the crafting process. Guncraft is set to hit PCs on July 11.

Well, you can get it at a 10th anniversary event in Kyoto for Japanese t-shirt maker King of Games. More here. To contact the author of this post, write to bashcraftATkotaku.com or find him on Twitter @Brian_Ashcraft. Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.

For many in Japan, English is a hard language. Most textbooks are dull. Not this one. Titled English Words That Don't Appear on Tests (試験に出ない英単語), the book is packed with ridiculous words, phrases, sentences, and photos that will never help you on any examination. But they might make you giggle. For example? These are even better if you aren't a student and already understand English! And the wonderful illustrations by Chino A totally sell the ridiculous sentences. Photos: Excite, suni@Blog, まつでぃ録, 2ch To contact the author of this post, write to bashcraftATkotaku.com or find him on Twitter @Brian_Ashcraft. Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.

A bit over a month ago, we showed you Lacuna Passage, an amazing-looking and quite mysterious indie Mars exploration game. Now, developer Random Seed Games is taking to Kickstarter to raise some money so they can work full-time on their first commercially released game. So yes, Lacuna Passage is a survival game set on Mars, but what sets it apart, besides its attention to realism? Well, take a look at this: The game has a very important photography mechanic—inspired by Pokémon Snap, according to Random Seed—which requires you to take photos of important clues and locations as you work towards uncovering the mysteries of the game. Here's the developer: The mystery at the heart of Lacuna Passage requires a keen eye and the proper tools to document everything you encounter. Your digital camera will be an invaluable tool while exploring. At any time you can snap a photo of your view to capture what you see.Perhaps you find a handwritten note that you want to save and reference later, or you find a footprint in the sand that could be blown away in the wind at any moment. Take a photo and both can be saved permanently. Or perhaps you just want to practice your composition skills with some impressive landscape shots.Every photo you take is saved directly to your hard drive at full resolution. You can share these photos online and collaborate to solve the mystery or just swap new beautiful desktop backgrounds. And there you have it. Hardcore survival gameplay, on Mars, with Pokémon Snap-inspired photography. Sounds neat? Head over to the Kickstarter page and take a look. Lacuna Passage [Kickstarter] Questions? Comments? Contact the author of this post at andras-AT-kotaku-DOT-com.

This is Ryuchalo. He's four years old. And he appears in grown-up men's fashion magazines. Heck, his Facebook page lists him as "Ryuchalo, the four year old host". Let me explain: "Four years old" as in pre-school and "host" as in a paid male drinking companion. In Japan, host fashion is...different. Little Ryuchalo sports "host hair" and host threads. On 2ch, Japan's largest online forum, photos of Ryuchalo are going viral. His Facebook page currently has over seven thousand likes. Some of the comments are supportive. Others are not. "This kid is gonna go bald," wrote one Facebook user. "I dyed my hair when I was a kid, and it hasn't impacted me at all," wrote another. "So perhaps, it's none of your business?" The image text reads "Four year old little host Ryuchalo." Bleaching a little kid's hair probably isn't good! Depending on how it was done and what chemicals were used, bleaching can be bad for one's hair, scalp, and even eyes. That's one of the least worrying things, because while he's not an actual night club host paid to drink and smoke cigarettes with customers, calling him a "host" and putting him in host fashion magazines with actual hosts is thrusting a very small child into a very adult world that he cannot begin to comprehend. Japanese mothers who came of age during the 1990s and the 00s are perhaps more open to unique or funky kiddy fashion. When these mothers were teens, Japanese fashion got rather outrageous among some subcultures. That, thus, filtered down to how they shop for clothes and brands like Boo Homes. However, Ryuchalo's get-up is not normal children's fashion in Japan. This is host fashion. Calling your pre-schooler a "host" is not normal, either. That's why photos of Ryuchalo are surprising people online. "This is child abuse," wrote one commenter on 2ch. Others said the kid's fashion seemed "unsettling" and didn't like how the kid's parents weren't letting him be a kid. The child's mother is apparently very much into host fashion. On her site, she says she likes reading fashion magazines and dreams of putting her son in a boy band. Here are photos of the kid's magazine spread and photo shoots. Kids, as a rule of thumb, wear ridiculous clothes. They often don't have much of a choice. And to be honest, whether that means dressing your kid as a honeybee or like this, it's really my place to judge other people's fashion sense. But we're not only talking about fashion sense here, are we? ４歳のホストくん琉ちゃろ [Facebook] Note: "Ryuchalo" is how the child's name is spelled in English To contact the author of this post, write to bashcraftATkotaku.com or find him on Twitter @Brian_Ashcraft. Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.

Somebody in Christina Stephens' research lab joked that she - an amputee - should build a fake leg out of LEGO. Challenge. Accepted. This awesome video shows Christina rummaging around like a kid for the right pieces, before taking the leg for a test drive. AmputeeOT: My Legoleg [YouTube, via ALBOTAS]

It's a good question! I mean, Darwinism holds that species evolve over time. Yet some creatures - sharks, crocodiles, cockroaches - have gone unchanged for millions of years. There must be an explanation for this. And whaddya know, here it is. MiniMation No.1 - "Hold B Button" [YouTube]

Google has released a report on how gamers use YouTube, and it's pretty interesting! Looking at the viewing statistics behind every single video game-related clip on the service, they've found that, well, pretty much all of you use it. All the time. For all kinds of stuff. Here are the important bits from the study: 50% of overall views were for videos made by developers/publishers, while 47% were for "community" clips like "Let's Play" videos and walkthroughs.A staggering 1 in 3 views for gaming clips took place on a mobile device, Google hypothesising that much of these were "second screen" views, done while gaming on a TV or PC for things like FAQs.The most popular clips on YouTube aren't announcement trailers; they're reviews.Over 50% of the views associated with a game took place in the month before launch or immediately after launch.95% of gamers watch gaming videos on YouTube. You can read the complete study below.

In the wake of Saints Row IV's "ban" in Australia, a "Low Violence Version" of the game has appeared on Steam. Available for Australian customers, there's no explanation as to what this version actually changes, leading to the suspicion it's simply being offered in expectation that publishers Deep Silver will resubmit a modified copy of the game to try and get past Australia's notoriously conservative Classification Board. Kotaku Australia asked the publishers for further information on the matter, but were told "Deep Silver has no further comments at this time". This seems...silly. A "low violence" Saints Row IV is like a "low driving" Gran Turismo.

I can't think of anyone else who would consider owning one of these ostentatious fingerprint magnets. Announced earlier today, its full product name is the "Xbox 360 Special Edition Chrome Series Gold Wireless Controller". It's out next month and will retail for $55 "at GameStop and Microsoft Store locations in addition to select regions worldwide".

The story of Francis Tsai is an inspirational one. An accomplished games, comic and film artist, a few years ago he was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease, a condition which has gradually robbed him of his ability to draw with his hands. Yet through sheer perseverance, and some help from his friends, Tsai has been able to continue drawing, thanks to an elaborate rig which is able to track the movement of his eyeballs, which he uses to operate illustration software. Tsai's story has been so inspirational, in fact, that it's led to the formation of a collective of artists known as Magnus Rex, who are in the process of publishing a book called RE-INVENT. If he could do what he was doing with everything he was facing, then there was nothing stopping us from remaking our careers and creative lives into what we truly wanted. "Good enough." is not enough. There were no more excuses. It's a collection of works by some of the best artists working in video games, advertising, comics and Hollywood, in which they take a sledgehammer to their comfort zones and try breaking out into new, fantasy projects. Some of the artists featured include Stephen Chang (who we've highlighted here on Fine Art previously), while Francis himself will also be showcasing some work. Derick Tsai (unrelated), the founder of the project, explains the thinking behind it. In the end, why did we do any of this? The reason is that is our time here is very limited and we need to make the absolute most of it. Creating this book was a major wake up call for all of us. We saw that even though it’s easy to get caught up in the rhythms of everyday life and work, we really owe it to ourselves to take risks and maximize our potential to see what we can truly become. Where we are is not where we have to wind up. A Kickstarter project, it's already passed its funding goal, but you can still contribute in order to get hold of a copy of the book (which contains all the art I'm featuring below) at the campaign page. To see the larger pics in all their glory (or, if they’re big enough, so you can save them as wallpaper), click on the “expand” button in the bottom-right corner. Fine Art is a celebration of the work of video game artists, showcasing the best of both their professional and personal portfolios. If you're in the business and have some concept, environment, promotional or character art you'd like to share, drop us a line!

In the Total War community, Darthmod occupies a place behind only developers Creative Assembly themselves. For years, his comprehensive (and easy to use) mod packs have transformed the flagship strategy series from "great games with whiffy AI" to "amazing games oh God where is my life going". Last year, though, he all but walked away from the modding game. Normally the progression for a man accomplished in this field is to get a job with the developers of the game he's been modding, but not in this case. Darth - aka Nick Thomadis - is striking out to make his own strategy game. It's called Ultimate General: Gettysburg, currently in development for PC and tablets, and while it naturally shares some aspects of the Total War series, it also looks like a refreshing (and realistic) take on the real-time strategy genre. Some of the things Thomadis is looking to address - things that have long bugged him about more commercial strategy games - include independent unit AI (so your units can fight and react on their own if you're looking elsewhere) and the removal of a reliance on "rock paper scissors" unit design. Drawing on his Total War experience, meanwhile, the game will also make use of stuff like terrain, the presence of commanders, morale and flanking to influence the outcome of engagements. Tinkering with someone else's code is one thing; building your own from scratch is something else entirely. So it remains to be seen whether Thomadis' experience improving on Total War games has given him the chops to break out and improve on the strategy genre itself. But if anyone's going to step up and make a decent indie strategy game, it'll be the guy who's spent years up to his elbows in terrain modifiers, ballistics and real-time AI. You can follow the project at its official site.

With Kickstarter projects, it's important to know where your money is going. Liege creator John Rhee attacks this issue for his own campaign with an in-depth gameplay video featuring seven minutes of commentary and gameplay.

Liege is a turn- and party-based RPG for PC, Mac, iOS and Android, due out in early 2014. It tells the story of a violent civil war that engulfs an entire kingdom, following the mysterious deaths of the royal family. Liege features eight playable characters from disparate backgrounds, but whose destinies eventually align. Gameplay doesn't include "jarring transitions," Rhee says.

"As war erupts across the land, we track the converging paths of characters aligned across various factions, from the noble houses vying for the throne, to the orphaned Royal Army, to an underground movement of outlaws with plans to incite revolution amidst the chaos," the Kickstarter page reads.

Liege is already funded on Kickstarter - it hit its target of $15,000 in less than one week - and it still has 27 days to go. It's also up for a spot on Steam Greenlight.

As my proper Monday Snacktaku review got pushed to tomorrow, I figured I'd at least slip in a little public service announcement for the hungry masses. Wendy's has a pretzel bacon cheeseburger. It's the opposite of horrible. I am a huge fan of pretzels and pretzel bread, so when a friend called me to tell me about this latest fast food creation, my initial thought was "Oh good, Wendy's is going to ruin pretzel bread for me forever." Pretzels can be paired with beef, but a delicate balance between the two must be maintained, and only certain condiments may be used. There was no way the boneheaded creators of the OMG LOOK AT ALL THE F***CKING BACON burger could pull it off. Well, damned if they didn't do just that. Cheddar cheese is perfect for the sandwich. The smoked honey mustard — that smoked bit is important, helps ease the transition between bread and beef. The "applewood smoked bacon" feels unnecessary here, but I guess it wouldn't be a pretzel bacon cheeseburger without hoity-toity pig bits. Field greens instead of plain old lettuce, some red onions and a tomato — the balance is perfect.It might not look like much, but it tastes like I got it from a classy burger joint. Well, except for all the grease and the overwhelming feeling that the person who crafted it didn't give a shit. I don't normally eat at Wendy's these days. I used to get their salads all the time, but then I realized they were the most horrible salads imaginable (mmmm, chili salad — wait). Seeing as the pretzel bacon cheeseburger is a limited-time item, I still won't normally eat at Wendy's, but for whatever window in time this lovely beast is available, they have my attention.

For going on a decade now, I've had a love-hate relationship with the San Francisco fog. It's our city's defining characteristic; so beautiful from afar, so smothering and depressing up close. But there's no denying that beauty, captured here in a gorgeous new video from photographer Simon Christen called "Adrift." He describes his project thusly. The weather conditions have to be just right for the fog to glide over the hills and under the bridge. I developed a system for trying to guess when to make the drive out to shoot, which involved checking the weather forecast, satellite images and webcams multiple times a day. For about 2 years, if the weather looked promising, I would set my alarm to 5am, recheck the webcams, and then set off on the 45-minute drive to the Marin Headlands. I spent many mornings hiking in the dark to only find that the fog was too high, too low, or already gone by the time I got there. Luckily, once in a while the conditions would be perfect and I was able to capture something really special. Adrift is a collection of my favorite shots from these excursions into the ridges of the Marin Headlands. The San Francisco fog may be a drag sometimes. It may have ruined more than its fair share of BBQs and its Twitter feed may be a maddening mix of lovable and annoying. But damned if it isn't also lovely, when it wants to be. Everyone doing well? Have a good weekend? American readers, are you psyched for July 4? Talk fog, fireworks, or anything else, here or at TAY. (Via Andrew Kelly)

The I CAN'T JUST PAUSE MY GAME, MOM AND DAD is such a cliche, I know. MachinimaPrime doesn't do much to dispel stereotypes about gamers in this video where a gross man refuses to stop playing a game, but damn if they didn't do a good job of showing how that situation can get extremely out of hand quickly. Gamer - Game Over Episode 2 [MachinimaPrime]

Yesssss. The madmen and women at OC Remix have pulled together a massive group of musicians to pay tribute to one of the most beloved video game soundtracks of all time: Square Enix's 1994 classic Final Fantasy VI. The album, titled Final Fantasy VI: Balance and Ruin, is out today. It's the result of a successful Kickstarter drive from fall of 2012, during which OCR raised $153,633—more than five times their goal—to help pay for physical copies of the album and for licensing fees from Square Enix. You can get a taste of the music by watching the teaser video up tup, and download the entire thing for free on the project site. Want to see just how kickass some of the music on this remix album is? Check out Jake Kaufman and Tommy Pedrini killing it with this Queen-infused take on the opera house music: Good gravy!

Two great essays about Animal Crossing: New Leaf: In this smart analysis by Gamasutra's Christian Nutt, he looks at why this entry in particular has been such a sensation. Meanwhile, USGamer's Jeremy Parish talks about how summer arrived today and caused him to finally fall for the game. I haven't seen a game this broadly discussed in ages; everyone I know with a 3DS is playing it.

Respect the Dota, for it shall give you no quarter.