The International House of Mojo

Zaarin (no, not that Zaarin) has returned from his South American voyage and has gotten back to updating Mixnmojo's hosted Dig site. The community forums are back up, and there is a new design on the horizon for that site. Check it out!

Fernandes Guitars and LucasArts Entertainment Company have teamed up to bring you several limited-edition Star Wars electric guitars, as well as picks, straps, and other extras! Check out the release information here. They're looking really nice; I must say that the red Darth Vader guitar is my favorite :), but they're all well-designed. Be sure to check out the mini-gallery below!

The official Star Wars: Knights of the Old Repbulic site launched today, featuring first-ever screenshots, interviews, and more details for this role playing game. Here's a snippet of information:

Engage in this saga set in the Golden Age of the Republic - over 4,000 years before the first Star Wars film, when both Jedi and Sith number in the thousands. With the Galaxy reeling from a recent conflict with the Dark Lords, the ongoing battle between the Jedi and the Sith rages on. Your actions determine the outcome of this colossal galactic war - and your destiny as a Jedi.

Unfortunately for us PC gamers, KOR will make its debut on the XBox in the Fall of 2002 while it won't come out for PC's until the spring of 2003. Still, this looks to be one very different Star Wars game.

GamesDomain.com is hosting a chat event that is not to be missed. Take a look at the details:

• What: Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast Live Chat


• Who: Raven Software/Activision


• When: Friday March 1st, 6PM GMT/1PM EST

That's tomorrow, so don't miss it!

There is an intervew on Homelan Fed with Gary Gaber, the project lead from SW Galactic Battlegrounds. In it he talks about Expansion packs that will fit in with Episode 2 upon it's release this Summer (amongst other things).

What has the response been to the included map editor in Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds and have you checked out any of the third party maps that have been released?

The response has been great! I've seen quite a few fan-created scenarios and screenshots popping up across the web. They really seem to like the toybox full of units in the scenario editor. We are not going to let them down either with the expansion pack: we are filling out some more cool toybox units, including the much requested Jabba and some of his minions.

I wonder if he approved of our Special Ultimate Star Wars Smackdow Section?

In what can be described as an effort from the marketing department, the Official LucasArts Website has posted a few icons relating to Jedi Outcast. These icons can be used for avatars and things of the like. Check them out if you've got some extra free time.

Today I was sent a translation from this months Swedish edition of PC Gamer. I has an article about future games from LucasArts, I'll just let you read it.

... Maybe the most exciting news for us nostalgic folk here at the editorial office is that they [LEC] are planning sequals to "on-hold[?]" Sam & Max, Day Of The Tentacle and Indiana Jones-series, yes, maybe even Full Throttle. Although, not nececcery in the same genres as the first games were.

Apparently the translations might not be that great, but you get the idea!

Of course, Sam and Max 2 isn't being developed by them, and they announced Indiana Jones a few weeks ago (unless it's another one). The other 2 are rumours we have heard a few times before... Could they know anything more than we do? I hope so.

Well, for those in the market for second opinions about some recently-discussed releases, your day has come! GameSpy has put up reviews for both LucasArts' Obi-Wan and Infinite Machine's New Legends.

Both of these reviews reflect much what we've heard already. Obi-Wan gets panned and New Legends gets mediocre marks overall. The reviews are well worth reading though, so check them out!

LucasArts has posted the smallest site possible for Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. KOR is an RPG co-produced by LucasArts and BioWare, the makers of Baldur's Gate. It takes place thousands of years before the films, so there are packs of Jedi roaming about doing good deeds and whatnot.

Out of all the games LucasArts was previewing at E3 2001, this one was the most impressive in my mind. Here's the original press release from when the game was first announced, for more info.

...through our fabulous auctions of rare and trinkety LucasArts merchandise! That's right, to raise money to pay our mammoth outstanding debt, and to provide you with the goodies you love, we're selling all the crazy LEC merchandise we can find, right here.

To start it off we have some stuff from EMI, including official bottles of Monkey Island Grog, some fridge magnets, and a copy of the game personally autographed by it's project leads, Mike Stemmle and Sean Clark.

Watch this page in the coming weeks as we hope to cart off more strange things. Pay for Mojo, get crazy stuff you cant find anywhere else... What a deal!

Thanks to Met for donating the signed copy of EMI, even after he won it from us in the first place!

Gamespot has taken a look at New Legends, the new XBox game from the creators of Jedi Knight 1, and rated it a 7.0 out of 10. The review basically says that while New Legends isn't set up to be an XBox classic, it's got some really nice elements (most strongly noted is it's combat system), and is all around a fun play:

In the end, New Legends isn't a game that will win any awards for its graphics, nor will it be known for having an engaging story or being an incredibly polished game, but New Legends does one thing right: It plays great. The game's combat system is executed so well that it saves the game from being just another cookie-cutter beat-'em-up.

Assuming recent rumors are false, Infinite Machine's next title is a sequel to Sam & Max Hit the Road. For now though New Legends is the game to read about, so read about it here.

Three new screenshots have been posted on the official Star Wars Galaxies site. These screenshots feature three VERY impressive environments that practically scream, "EXPLORE ME!" And not in that way, you sickos. Be sure to check them out!

We have a new hosted site here at Mixnmojo, and it's a little different. May we present Moobox, a site holding true to the widespread belief that LucasArts game developers don't get enough crazy mysterious mail. Worth looking at are this and this.

To be honest I think the replies will be what make or break it, but without encouragement nothing may ever be mailed off. Too crazy, or definitely worth continuing? What do you think?

To start off this week (or finish up last week, depending on how you see it), we've got a review of Galactic Battlegrounds, the recent Star Wars RTS from LucasArts and Ensemble Studios. Also included is a Mojo exclusive: the Special Ultimate Star Wars Smackdown Section, in which your least favorite Star Wars celebs duke it out in the Battlegrounds universe for no reason whatsoever. Exclusive!

Game publishing house Aspyr Media has put up a spotlight site for the Mac edition of Galactic Battlegrounds. They say you'll need a 333 Mhz G3 or G4 to play it. The port's current status is listed as "first playable build" and the estimated release date given is April 2002.

Aspyr also handled the Mac port of Escape From Monkey Island, so hopefully this is a start of a nice trend (*cough*JKII*cough*).

Gamespot has published an article dealing with the controversial topic known as Abandonware. As we probably all know, Abandonware is the term used to describe games, etc., that are no longer supported by the company that made them. Some people believe that means that they should be freely distributed.

A great deal of LucasArts games are considered to be abandonware, it is hard to still find let alone buy some of their older games. Enter Tim schafer (amongst some other developers) to comment on this issue:

"Personally, I'd rather my old games were stolen and played for free than forgotten about..."

...and then goes on to say:

"Most of the game makers aren't living off the revenue from those old games anymore. Most of the creative teams behind all those games have long since left the companies that published them, so there's no way the people who deserve to are still making royalties off them. So go ahead--steal this game! Spread the love!"

The article does take a good look at the subject at hand and gets some interesting view points accross. I suggest you go read it!

The questionable sequel and Mojo office joke Star Wars Racer Revenge was reviewed by IGN PS2, and received an 8.4 out of 10. That's pretty nice! According to IGN, Racer Revenge isn't the mediocre sequel that everyone expected, but is instead a fun, polished arcade-style racer.

The review calls Racer Revenge's appearance at last year's E3 "assy," and we couldn't agree more. Out of all the games demoed, Racer Revenge had the smallest crowd (if any) at LEC's booth no matter when we stopped by. It's honestly good to hear that the game may have shaped up so much since:

Always breaking down the essentials of every game it takes on, Rainbow [Studios] has fine-tuned the pods, fleshed out the courses and infused the game with a Road Rash sensibility, adding in bruising pod racer-style fights to the mix. As a racing fan and someone always hoping that LucasArts will live up to its potential on the consoles, I was pleased as punch to play through this racer several times...

Whether you doubted Racer Revenge's quality or you knew all along that it would be pure gold (or at least... 8.4 gold), you ought to give the review a read.

Are you irritated to no end by the fact that your old LucasArts favorites don't work with WindowsNT4, Windows2000 or WindowsXP? Well, bgbennyboy has come up with an update to his solution.

LEC Quick and Easy Fix 2.0 includes a nice new install system as well as support for the Sam and Max Hit the Road talkie version. Of course, like the previous version, you can also play Day of the Tentacle, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Monkey Island 2, and more with full sound support! Simply download the program here and, if you haven't already, install VDMSound. Enjoy!

Remi, of The SCUMM Bar, has written us a review of Star Wars: Obi-Wan for XBox, and basically crushes it.

What?s worse is how the textures used for Obi-Wan himself seem to break up completely when there?s some additional movement on screen. Something like this would be half-way excusable if it only happened on some of the bad guys, but on the main character? For heaven?s sake, we have to look at him all the time!

Hopefully this is the last time we'll have to lay into a Star Wars game this hard, since the games on the horizon don't look so horrible. I'm actually frighteningly excited about JKII and Jedi Starfighter.

In case anyone was wondering, extreme fan game IndyProject is still alive and kicking, if only a little. Not surprisingly, they've run into trouble with TeleFragged, and are stuck with a minimal temporary page until they get back on their feet.

Anyone interested in helping out with IndyProject (but might not be qualified to program, design, or create art) should note that they are currently looking for a news editor for their site.

Although the system requirements for JK2 have yet to be posted on the official website, Amazon.com has posted the specs as follows:

• Pentium II 300 MHz or faster processor
• Microsoft Windows 95, 98, Me, NT 4.0, or 2000
• 16 MB 3-D accelerator with full OpenGL support

Update: LucasArts has posted the official requirements here. They're not much different from the Amazon ones, but they're more detailed.

GalacticBattles.com, thanks to LucasArts, has an exclusive video going "behind the scenes" of Galactic Battlegrounds. They've only published the first part, dealing with the thinking behind the art of the game, but apparently more will follow.

Those not interested in Battlegrounds or Star Wars at a whole should watch it for the exclusive LEC content: a sneak peek at a LucasArts cubicle, computer screen, and art binder!

The Formulaic Friday Fun continues with LucasArts.com announcing that its new PlayStation 2 title, Jedi Starfighter, has gone gold. There is also an exlusive and very cinematic trailer for this new title over at the official product page. Jedi Starfighter should be in stores the week of March 11th.

The Official LucasArts Website has established a new contest that is sure to wet the appetite of you wanna-be (oops, we mean "aspiring") game makers. Simply create a mission for the game Star Wars? Galactic Battlegrounds? with the scenario editing tools and then submit it to LucasArts by April 3rd.

If you win, your level will be included on the upcoming expansion disc Clone Campaigns?. Plus, you'll get $50 worth of credit at the LucasArts store. There will be four grand prize winners as well as four runners-up. For the details, please visit this page here.

Lucasarts' featured screenshot is from Jedi Outcast this week. In this shot, it looks as though Kyle is facing a very formidable foe: himself. Could some diabolical force have cloned Kyle their own evil purposes? Or could he just be looking into a well-disguised mirror? Only time will tell.

Have you beaten The Sword Master of M?l?e Island and feel like bragging? If so, then you can pick up an "I Beat The Sword Master" t-shirt at Cafe Press for only $15 each. It's made from 100% cotton and is available in many sizes. Plus, you can rest assured that these shirts aren't manufactured in one of those inhumane monkey sweat shops. Check it out!

IGN's XBox site has a new article reporting that Bioware will now develop its Knights of the Old Republic title only for PC and XBox. In case you don't remember, Knights of the Old Republic is a Star Wars role playing game that was quietly announced last year. Mojo was treated to a private showing of this product last May at E3, and I can say that this looks to be one really cool game. Here's a quote from the IGN article:

As a young padawan, you'll get to explore eight unique worlds and interact with numerous characters. Gameplay will be nonlinear, allowing players to choose which subplots to explore and which to ignore. Knights features some really cool (from what we've seen of the PC version) lightsaber battles.

More information on this title will mostly likely be revealed at E3 this May.

The Grim Fandango Network is sporting a new redesign by official Mojo Network Slave, Metallus. The new design (their fourth revision) features a php script based backend and quick access to hot forum threads.

Also, GFN has picked up three new sites: The Grim Mausoleum, The Rusty Anchor, and Grim Fandango World. Some of them seem to still be setting up, but they're worth checking out at least with the intent of visiting them again soon.

To continue the promotional media frenzy of Jedi Outcast, the official LucasArts website has updated its Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast product spotlight with a new Jedi Knote exploring the art of the game as well as ten new screenshots.

Paco Vink, illustrator and co-webmaster of Mojo Network site World of MI has completed and published the ninth page of his comic book rendition of Monkey Island 1. As usual, the quality is great, so go read. The previous eight pages are of course available if you missed any.

The Massassi Temple has obtained seven new screenshots of Jedi Outcast from PC Gamer UK. The screenshots include a more up-close and personal view of some of the character models. While these aren't the best screenshots we've seen so far, they're still quite interesting. Scroll down a bit on the Massassi page to see them.

Game File Formats have done it again! They have programmed a PAK Explorer for the recently released Star Wars Starfighter. PAK files are the archive files which hold all the raw data for the game.

Just to remind you folks, this page also has tools such as a background image viewer for Escape from Monkey Island and Music extractors for Grim Fandango.

So you spent Valentine's Day alone and now you find yourself home on a Friday night. What do you do? Why, go to LucasArts.com of course! In today's update, you'll find a new PC demo for Starfighter, some concept art for the recently announced Galactic Battleground: Clone Campaigns, new screenshots for Jedi Starfigher, and an online intro video to Racer Revenge. Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Yep... time to go hit the local clubs.

And just as I was about to ask if anyone had actually tried making the dish from the Cooking with Spaff feature, I get handed this url. The SCUMM Bar's RemiO has decided to try out the brilliant Dom dish for himself, accompanied by photos et all. Has anyone else attempted the meal? Let me hear your stories!

That's right, Adventure Developer, the pride of the Mixnmojo network, is back online after overcoming some technical troubles. With many amateur adventures making the news these days, we're very glad to have them back!

For Valentine's Day, the official LucasArts website has issued a press release, announcing an expansion pack for Galactic Battlegrounds entitled Clone Campaigns. The expansion pack, "inspired by the large-scale battles in Star Wars: Episode II Attack of the Clones," will be released in May and will require that you own the original Galactic Battlegrounds game. In other news, how many italicized titles can I possibly include in one news update? Also, Star Wars? Racer Revenge? is now in stores.

Adventure Gamer(s) is almost back! It sounds like they're sorting out some last minute (being maybe a few days) server issues, but as you can see their site now boasts a large Finally Coming Back image.

Remember, if you think Mojo went through hard times, Adventure Gamers has been down for almost 12 months, and has had their original domain (adventuregamer.com) stolen by their old web host!

....Or is it? The House of Mojo wishes you all a lovely Valentines day, if you are reading this and you've got a 'date' then GO AND SEE THEM!!! Today this page is dedicated to all the lonley souls out there: Don't be sad, consider this your very own message of love, because as we all know M O J O L O V E S Y O U !! I myself recieved some lovely cards from both my Mum and my Gran so that was great!.. at least i got some chocholate tho. :) Oh and thanks for all those folks that sent me some e-cards last week, those rocked my world!

CNNMoney, a business news website, has posted an article about LucasArts and its use of the Star Wars license. The article includes some of the sales figures for Episode I games. However, the tight deadlines of these games and their critical reaction were also explored. Here's a quote from the article:

"What we learned from 'The Phantom Menace' was that we didn't want to be in that position again," said Twist Phillips. "We, as well as everyone else, wanted to explore more, rather than be tied in with the narrative. ... We're looking at the universe in a much broader way -- not just limiting it to Episode One or Episode Two and so on."

The article goes on to drop hints about some new titles to be announced in the coming months, although sadly, there is no mention of an original title.

Are you a successful college student who is eager to get involved in the gaming industry? If so, you may want to check out the LucasArts Summer 2002 Internship Program! Since late December, LucasArts has been accepting internship applications for such majors as computer science, fine arts, marketing, accounting, coffee-making, and more. However, in order to be accepted, you must first pass... THE THREE TRIALS! Well not really, but only the best and most talented students are considered for the program.

LucasArts has updated the official Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast page with some new weapons and some very nice character models. Give it a look-see.

Update: One of the most noteworthy updates to the site is the addition of Jan Ors to the character profiles page! - Metallus

PC Gamer UK has released a review of the upcoming LEC title, Jedi Outcast. They gave it excellent marks, and revealed some interesting tidbits as well. Here's what they had to say about the game overall:

"A consistently excellent, always varied 3D shooter.
[It's] The Star Wars game [that] fans deserve."

Some facts revealed in the review (hilight for spoilers):

• You get to fight alongside Lando (voiced by Billy Dee himself) and Luke.
• First Level: armed with only a stun baton + a Bryar Blaster you must gain acces to an imperial outpost (by shooting the main doors with a gun emplacement)then Jan helps you infiltrate the outpost.
• You get to control an R5 unit and a mouse droid.
• There are controllable vehicles in later levels (at Yavin).
• Fight against the Reborn - a dark sidecult and Shadowtroopers who weild lightsabers.
• The final boss is a dark Jedi "whose appearance is bound to suprise you."
  

Thanks to JediknightII.net (as always) for the info.

TheForce.net has posted about two newly discovered codes for Rogue Leader on its site. These codes allow you to fly the Naboo starfighter and... the Millenium Falcon! Sounds cool. Click here to check them out.

The new Star Wars Kids newletter is out, and it's more touchy-feely than a pedophile at a Pok?mon convention, so if you missed it, here's what's new:

• Three New backgrounds are up so you can add that special touch to your desktop.
• Harrison Ford couldn't express his feelings to princess turned drug addict, Carrie Fisher.
• Sexy new Valentines Day Cards.
• All new Saga Talk highlighting the romantic side of Star Wars.

Well, sorta. It's just a small part of it, but Vg Jam has a tab posted up of the intro to SOMI.. it's pretty well tabbed out and worth a look.

Hell, maybe you could make a band like The Minibosses that plays only LucasArts music... Now wouldn't that be great?

The good people over at LucasArts have given four exlusive screenshots to fellow LFNetwork site, JediKnightII.Net. You'll love them and then cry because you realize that it's not March yet.

There have been a number of people asking about what this "LF Network" business is. By now, most people have a pretty good idea, but for those who are still in the dark, the official LFN site is now up and running, so check it out.

Greg Osborn of LFN site LucasConsoles has written a "classic" review of LucasArts' own Tekken-style fighting game Masters of Ter?s K?si.

Is the game any good? Probably not, but the review is entertaining. The opening especially, which is basically Greg ranting about the abuse of franchises in the gaming industry. Possibly familiar. Anyway, give it a read.

Tomorrow there will be a chat event featuring Anthony Castoro and Raph Koster, hosted by Station.com.

This is the third official chat from the makers of Star Wars Galaxies, and this one will focus on game systems and skills. If you're at all curious about this promising title, be sure and stop by!

The event will take place on Tuesday, February 12th at 5PM Pacific.

... or not. Today's feature du jour is a bit on the crazy, albeit tasty, side for a gaming news site. May we present Cooking with Spaff, a feature series for the chef in us all in which Spaff will cook up a new LucasArts staffer's recipe about once a week.

This week we have a pasta dish from Dominic Armato, the voice of Guybrush in the most recent two Monkey Islands. The recipe and steps Spaff went through are included, but if you don't care about cooking, or even reading, you can just look at the crazy pictures. Enjoy!

There's a review of New Legends, the new game from Dark Forces and Jedi Knight creator Justin Chin, by VoodooExtreme, who gave it an 85% (presumably out of 100%). The review also has some interesting back story on Infinite Machine for those who don't know:

After developing Dark Forces and Jedi Knight, Justin Chin and his supporters broke free of the LucasArts yoke to form their own development house - Infinite Machine. For a while things were going well; they signed a seemingly solid publishing deal with GT Interactive (who was later gobbled up my French mega publisher Infogrames), went full force into developing their first non-LEC property and the future looked bright. But a few steps down the road to success were blocked with trouble and turmoil for Infinite Machine and their ambitious game. Due to pressure to release the game or be released from their deal, Infinite Machine decided to part ways with GT and look for a new sponsor.

There's also a preview up at GameSpot, or the game's official site for some more information on New Legends itself.

I wouldn't regularly post silly POTD's like this, but after working on both Mixnmojo and the Urban Terror Quake III Mod this is pretty hard to resist. Fun times.

The near-grandaddy of Monkey Island sites, The Monkey Island SCUMM Bar is back online after our second server move knocked them out again. Note, though, that they have a new url: www.scummbar.com.

Go take a look at the news, read their features, create a user account account, go to user preferences, and set your color choice to "Dainty Lady."

Update: http://www.thescummbar.com is now forwarding to the new domain. - Metallus

Head on down to the Grim Fandango Network section of LucasForums and you will come across the work in progess of a Grim Fandango-inspired novel being written in several parts.

Highly enjoyable literature or pure piffal in a glass? Why don't you read it for yourself and post your comments accordingly.

Update: There is actually another Grim Fandango novel, written by MeddlingMonk, floating around LucasForums as well. Give it a read while you're at it. It's long. - Jake

Community artist "DanSky" (or, Giuliano "DanSky" D'Angelo) has opened the beginnings of his site, MicroXel Arts here at Mixnmojo. Though he hasn't put everything up yet, he plans on adding sections with art dedicated to or influenced by varions LucasArts/LucasFilms creations. DanSky's also been doing some art for Mojo which you will be seeing in the coming weeks. Though there is much more of it at his site, here are a couple quick examples of his work:

Ex-Mojo News Editor and GameStop employee Sarah has written an editorial feature about getting made fun of for being a fan of LucasArts that isn't in it for the Star Wars games. Definitely worth a read.

As some of you might have noticed already, the majority of hosted sites on LFNetwork are back and fully functioning since the server move. However, there were a few that did not come back online as quickly as the rest.

While some are still offline, I'm glad to announce that two large sites have returned. The veteran LEC gaming site LucasGames.com is back online, as is Escapemi.com, LG's haven for Monkey Island fans.

Hopefully we'll see the rest of the sites around the LEC community returning soon.

The latest screenshot from the official Jedi Outcast site shows Luke Skywalker himself in full 3D-rendered glory! There was some speculation as to what he would look like and how he would dress in the game. From this shot, he looks pretty dark.

Anyone who is looking forward to Jedi Outcast and hasn't played the original Jedi Knight (or anyone who's lost their original CD) should be interested in Amazon's buy JKII, get JK free promotion going on right now. No, this doesn't include the lapel pin you get when ordering from LEC, but for anyone who missed out on the first game its a pretty nice package.

Now that we've started working more on the 3 missing sections (Features, Community, Hints & Tips) we want to know what you guys want to see in them, most importantly the Community tab (we basically have Features under control, and Hints & Tips isn't ready to be pounded out quite yet).

If there's anything you think would help make that part of the site worth checking more often than never at all please leave us some comments!

The trailer is up for you Lucas Online members at this link. And damn is it sweet.

In anticipation of the official JKII trailer, which will be previewed at 6:00 PST tonight for LucasArts.com members, LFN site JediKnightII.net is having a hype party. The gathering will be held in #JediKnight on irc.gamesnet.net tonight starting at 5PM PST (8 EST). Discussion, observations, and general obsessing about Jedi Knight II is greatly encouraged. As an added bonus JKII.net will be releasing 3 exclusive screenshots at the start of the chat.

Remember, signing up at LucasArts.com is free and takes no time at all, so if you haven't yet it's in your best interest.

Attack of the Clones is coming to Game Boy Advance alongside the release of the movie this spring. Read the full article with screen shots here. It's being made by THQ, so the quality is practically guaranteed.

Tonight to round off all the Starwars news, we have a nice download for you boys and girls. Bgbennyboy has created a quick fix to get LucasArts adventures working in WinNT, Win2k and WinXP. The file is 80kb and uses VDMSound. So far supported games are:

Fate of Atlantis (White Label talkie cd version)
Last Crusade (White Label cd version)
DOTT (While Label talkie cd version)
Full Throttle (Original cd version)
Sam and Max (White label talkie cd version)
Monkey Island 2 (White Label cd version)

There are some untested games, but you should read the attached readme for more information. I have been unable to test this fix because right now one of my CD drives won't close and the other one won't open! So we would appreciate some feedback on this. Remember, its not supported by LEC. That's all folks!

There is an audio interview "tonight" at XGR with Brett Totsi, producer of Jedi Knight II. The interview is at 9:30 EST and will be accompanied by some new screenshots on the site.

There are also 2 new screens available on Mod Central a new hosted site over on our networked affiliate Jediknightii.net

Jedi Knight II fans, especially those who follow the forums, are probably aware of the controversy that has sprung up over the call to separate JKII's force powers down the middle, creating Light and Dark players in online games. LFNetwork site JediKnightII.net, in an attempt to settle the debates, has gone to the source and interviewed Raven Software's Pat Lipo, head of JKII's multiplayer component.

I realize that there is an interest in allowing light-and-dark jedi to exist in the game ? while it's not like such a request is unreasonable, I do believe that the voiced support for such an option reflects a few aspects of the general internet community...

The first is that no matter what, people want as many options as possible. Who would vote against such a thing, if it meant that each person could have their own way?

The second is that gamers always want more, to be more powerful than ever, to have all positives and no negatives. Many people dream of playing a Druid with a Warrior's Dual Wield ability in Everquest, or of commanding a battalion of Terran Tanks supporting their Protoss Carriers in Starcraft...

Lots more interesting details and information behind the decisions made when creating the JKII multiplayer experience can be found in the complete story.

In further news fom Starwarskids.com, we have a "Who said that?" game, in which you must guess which Star Wars character said the lines poted here.

Imagine what it would be like if the Olympic games were comprised of athletes and spectators from planets across the galaxy, not merely from countries around the world. What kind of games would be played? What kind of alien creatures would be participating? The possibilities may be found in the Star Wars universe. Click here to learn about Blob Racing and more.

There are sooo many more fun things to do there, I almost can't be bothered to write them down... erm.. anyways go to Star Wars Kids I guess!

So Valentines day is almost upon us again, I myself am single and depressed. So feel free to send me as many valentines cards as you like. I am, of course, beautiful and deserving of your love! :)

Anyway, if you can't find the right card for that special someone this year why not try these Star Wars ones from StarwarsKids.com.

Star Wars may not be considered one of the most romantic movies, but if you just scratch the surface you will see all kinds of love and affection swirling throughout the saga. Jabba the Hutt, for example, loved monkey-lizard, Salacious Crumb, so much that he chose to keep him as a pet rather then eat him.

Brilliance. There are four cards to choose from, or you could send all four. I'm sure the recipient would appreciate them!

According to a LucasArts game alert, LucasArts.com will feature the first ever Jedi Outcast game trailer on Friday. However, if you are a Lucas Online member, you can view the trailer Thursday night after 6:00 p.m. (PST) at this URL. So sign up if you haven't already.

An old friend of mine emailed me out of the blue to point out that I hadn't mentioned the version of ScummVM for pocket PC's. You can now play all your favourite games while commuting or pretending to test pocket PC games at work. I myself would never ever pretend to test a game while playing an entiretly different one... honest guv.

Update: In the tradition of ScummVM threads I'll update to point out that there is also a Macintosh version of ScummVM under development for MacOS X. Apparently there is a second Mac port underway by the author of SCUMM Explorer, but it doesn't have a website. - Jake

Wondering what's up with Grim Fandango creator Tim Schafer and his game company, Double Fine Productions? We were, so we did the logical thing and asked him. But, since they haven't officially announced any projects, Tim couldn't reveal any development news. He tried really hard though:

"A junkie OD'ed in our alley last week, does that count? And the awning at the deli caught fire. How about that?"

Double Fine!

The Official LucasArts website recently announced that its new PlayStation 2 title, Star Wars Racer Revenge, has gone gold and will be in stores around February 14th. However, if you order the game directly from the official site, you can get Star Wars: Episode I The Phantom Menace for PlayStation along with free shipping and handling.

Lucasarts has launched the website for their highly anticipated game Star Wars Jedi Starfighter(Expected in March). Along with the new site come the first screenshot, concept art, and three beautiful wallpapers.

Also posted is an interview with Haden Blackman (LucasArts story developer, and concept artist for Star Wars Starfighter) about his work with the character Nym, who recently spawned a new comic book and short story from Dark Horse (comics). The interview also concerns the upcoming comic book series based on Star Wars Jedi Starfighter. Here's a snippet:

"At that point, it all came together, and we realized how cool he looked," says Blackman. "There's something you can do with an alien that is harder to do with a human character. You can really punch it up and go overboard with his emotion, so we really made him wear his emotions -- especially his anger and frustration -- on his sleeve. That was incredibly fun to write."

Visit the site here. Or go directly to the interview.

Rum Rogerz sent me some almost scary, but kinda cool fangame news today: "Night of the Hermit" is a game in which you play Herman Toothrot of Monkey Island Fame. Here's the Blurb:

It's been eight years since that pesky Guybrush left my Island, I've used up all of my money from that game and things started looking down. Until one day, i've received a message in a bottle, it said my great grandpa died and left me with a big mansion in a little place called Badger island, somewhere in the Caribbeans. I was overjoyed!, finally, a way for me to start life anew, so i packed my bags, and left my beloved hut on Monkey Island (TM) to claim my airloom...

Apparently, it turns out that messages in bottles take ages, so by the time he gets to his mansion, it's been taken over and turned into a sleezy motel where I'm sure all kinda of chaos will ensue. The idea is of course, to claim back your mansion. Go here and read allll about it and it's lurvely talkie version (not to mention, of course, download and play it)!

FragOff recently interviewed Kenn Hoekstra from Raven Software and Brett Tosti from LucasArts about the upcoming Jedi Knight II. The developers are asked about the length of the game, controls, and multiplayer options. Here's a question:

Some people are finding it hard to believe that Jedi Knight II was started in February, how much earlier than February was Jedi Knight II in pre production?

December of 2000 was when we started gathering reference materials and began work on a prototype for the game to present to Lucas Arts for approval to move forward with production.

If you haven't given the JKII stuff a look yet you probably should. It's looking to be one of the most polished games LEC has had their name on in quite some time.

AtomFilms of Shockwave.com has posted a short (but mildly entertaining) Star Wars Spoof. It's been around since about a year ago, so many of you have probably already seen it.

It is entitled Star Wars Gangsta Rap. Click here to check it out.

While Mojo was away on, erm, vacation, a new SCUMM tool has taken the fan community by storm. ScummVM, a free and open source application, allows you to run the old LucasArts adventure games on various operating systems. For example, you can run Day of the Tentacle on WindowsXP with full sound support! Of course, there are still bugs to work out and some people may find it a bit user-unfriendly, but it's certainly worth checking out. Go to the website for downloads and to see what games are supported.

Update: I've just noticed that there is even a Dreamcast port under development! It currently only plays the DOTT demo, but hopefully soon we will be able to play our favourite adventures on Our favourite Sega. - Spaff

Update: Another port is being worked on, this time for the ever classic Amiga. As far as I recall LEC stopped making their games for the Amiga after Monkey2. Anyone know better? and while we're at it, any other ports we should know about? Thanks Remi O - Spaff

Fans of Trapezoid's Animutations will be glad to see this tribute to his fine work, complete with Matthew Lesko cameo, in the form of 'The Internet in a nutshell' (Ignore the lame beginning part! :).

Dave Grossman, writer/programmer for the first two Monkey Island games and co-project lead for Day of the Tentacle, has been up to his old tricks again. Dave has written a new children's graphic adventure for Ron Gilbert's new company, Hulabee Entertainment. Ron, as you should know, was the project lead for Maniac Mansion and the the first two Monkey Island games.

The graphic adventure is called Moop and Dreadly: The Treasure on Bing Bong Island. Dave describes it as "kind of like a Pajama Sam game, I guess, but a little smaller - designed to be small enough that you can buy it online and download it." Moop and Dreadly should be available this spring, although if you're a Cocoa Puffs fan, you might find a demo in specially marked boxes.

In addition, Dave has also written a game for even younger kids called Ollo. This game will also be released by Hulabee in the future. As for Ron Gilbert's involvement in these projects, Dave says that Ron has a creative influence in all of the projects in his company. Many thanks to Dave and Ron for getting them hooked on graphic adventures while they're young. The future looks bright.

Gamezone have reviewed LEC's new action PC game, the all-shooting all-flying Star Wars Starfighter. Here's a sample:

I was able to fight my way through eighty percent of the game in about two hours. Okay that was on the easy setting, but the bottom line is simple. Starfighter is an action arcade game. It?s not gonna blow you away, or keep you up very late while you desperately try to defeat that next level

Or You can read our very own review of this game for another opinion! More alternatives exist at ActionTrip, Gamespot and IGN. AND! You can read some reader reviews of the Xbox version on Shacknews (1, 2).

We also have reports of a Galactic Battlegrounds review on GameZilla.

4 months, nearly to the day, but we're actually honestly back. We're not "Mini," we're not "Back From The Dead," we're full on crazy-bad-spelling-excessive-feature-bloat-user-account-hosted-network Mojo. Rejoice!

With the return of Mixnmojo comes a new big update to the site, and with that big update comes a couple big features we'd like to talk about:

• MojoMessenger: After browsing for a bit you'll find that all email links have vanished from the site, both in the Comments pages and the news updates themselves. Where you used to see a mailto: link you'll instead see some crazy link within our site.
  
  The reason for this change is to cut down on spammers stealing email addresses from the site, and for all the fun that will inevitably ensue. Once you create an account and log in you can send and receive messages with other readers and news updaters on Mojo, either by knowing their username or by clicking on them when they post a comment.(at this point it would probably be a good idea to sign up to Mojo with the same user name as you use on the forums)
  
  The messages are all stored in an inbox on Mixnmojo, where you can read, reply, or forward the message to your email address. Never again will your email inbox get spammed because your email address appeared on the site.
  
  
• Folder-Tab Navigation: We've added tabs at the top of every page to make it quicker to jump around on the site. Anyone who has already used our forums has seen them, but has probably been annoyed that they don't go anywhere. Well, mostly they still don't go anywhere, but thats going to change in the near future.
  
  As you can see, the "Features," "Community," and "Hints & Tips" tabs are still greyed out, but will be opening soon. It's pretty obvious what will be behind each of them. In the mean time you can browse the news archives by category by clicking on any of the titles directly below the tabs.
  
  
• The Future: So with those 3 inactive tabs maybe we're not completely all here. We have 3 new feature stories up right now, available right above this post, but the complete archive back to Mixnmojo's opening (or as close as we can get) will be online in the coming days. Also we plan to finally offer walkthroughs and hints for LucasArts games right at the main site, as well as a place to feature and showcase the numerous sites that make up the Mojo community and Mojo Network.

Hopefully that was a sufficient filling-in on what's been going on and what's coming soon! From Spaff, DJG, Jake, Sarah, telarium, Metallus, Mercatfat, Narrative, Jamesh, Emma, Lemonhead and, erm, Webmonkey we send a huge thank you to everyone who has stuck around through all the insanity and ugly downtime. Thanks, it's great to be back!

Another collaboration with an outside studio has been announced. This time Planetmoon, creators of Giants: Citizen Kabuto, have been chosen to create a "Game to Complement LucasArts' Celebrated Legacy of Humor", a unique humorous action game for next generation consoles.

Planet Moon's game for LucasArts will follow in the rich tradition of wry humor and intelligently crafted play style of the company's classic titles. The game is expected to release in 2003.

"With Planet Moon's development of a unique humorous action game for LucasArts now madly underway, I suspect the pubs around its Sausalito, Calif., headquarters may be in for some tough economic times," says Simon Jeffery, president of LucasArts. "In seriousness, a relationship with Planet Moon is an obvious choice for LucasArts. It's one that will complement the brand of humor for which we're well known and bring to our fans the kind of game they've always loved."

This we can only assume is an adventure game disguised with some action elements, something I think we are about to see a good deal of over the coming years. No screenshots have been released but LEC put up this tiny teaser in their sidebar. Update: Oops, that character is from Giants: Citizen Kabuto. Carry on :)