I posted this week's cartoon a little early because it was Easter. For those of you who might have been hiding under a rock, all sorts of electronic media have hidden extra "goodies" for users to discover. Gauntlet Dark legacy has several hidden levels, including a barnyard and a model of the studio's offices. Pixar DVDs (Monsters Inc, Finding Nemo and The Incredibles) have a lot of extra hidden clips that require a bit of effort to find. These extras are called Easter Eggs, because they are usually a pleasant surprise that you have to hunt. In pinball, these are sometimes called DOHO (Documented Occurance of a Hidden Object) and the DOHO's frequently involve cows. This is because an early Williams pinball game about the Chicago fire had a bit about Mrs. O'Leary's cow and that bovine has been cropping up everywhere since. So when I started 3D Ultra Pinball for Dynamix, who was I to buck tradition? I built cows into the font that relays in-game information to the player, but they were never accessed. However, the cows can be seen in the other 4 pinball games, including Nascar Pinball. The last pinball game, Thrillride, made use of Hershey's chocolate syrup mascot. There have not been any cows in my latest game, though there are some pink sheep in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Hmmm, maybe it's time for a new tradition...

CORRECTION
Last week's cartoon compared the points system in Microsoft's Live Marketplace to the ticket redemption system at an arcade. I was wrong. Evidently the gamerpoints one earns while playing XBox 360 games do not earn you anything at all! So it's still like an arcade but instead of tickets, they have a giftshop and you gotta pay cash. Glad we got that sorted out.

SEE ME!
This weekend (April 21-23) I'm going to be a guest at Concentric at the Crystal Lake Holiday Inn. If you're in the area, be sure to stop by and maybe get a book signed or watch me work on the next week's cartoons or maybe even play a little Star Trek with me. It'll be fun!