Lord British returns this week to flesh out our discussion of the later Ultima games, including the groundbreaking virtue system. Richard relates some of his favorite fan mails and comments, which include a heartfelt letter about a little girl whose life was changed forever by Ultima.

Please help spread the word about Matt Chat by posting this episode on your favorite social networking and bookmarking sites! Download the episode here.

A review of the GameMID Android Handheld produced by REP Electronics Ltd (Hong Kong based) that will be brought to the market by various vendors under various brands. My unit comes with 8Gb of memory, the bare minimum will be 4Gb, but 16Gb or 32Gb of Flash memory is possible depending on ways the resellers would like the setup.

This video contains a look at the device itself, the specifications, some live gameplay, a look at its guts, benchmarking it and comparing it to the JXD S3700B, the Archos Gamepad and the Nexus 7, HDMI captured gameplay of various Android native games and various emulators. Read more below.

In the second part of my interview with Richard Garriott--aka Lord British, we chat about the origins of Ultima, J.R.R. Tolkien, and the Apple II.

Download the mp4.

A cool little 3rd person perspective Tube shooter developed by Tetragon and published by Virgin in 1996-1997 on the original Playstation. The only platform it came out on.

Sony PS4Before the year is out, we'll have the choice of the latest console systems from the three big manufacturers, with three very different value propositions. I'll briefly break each of the three down, one-by-one, then I'd like to continue the discussion in the comments.

First up, there's the Wii U, relying mostly on the same type of technology found in the current generation's Xbox 360 and PS3 consoles, with its primary hook being its tablet controller that allows for touchscreen interactions and off-TV play, priced between $300 - $350. There's a good chance, despite Nintendo's insistence that they won't or can't, that this will drop in price just before the launch of Microsoft's and Sony's new consoles. I base this on the jockeying Nintendo already seems to be doing, for instance with eliminating the $300 BASIC version of their system in favor of the DELUXE (and no doubt different future bundles). The negatives for the Wii U are that, for various reasons, third party support has already dried up, and there's no evidence that their tablet controller hook has resonated (or will) with the public. There's always a chance for things to change, but right now, I don't see how Nintendo recovers a dominant console position, particularly since there's really nothing that reeks of "next gen" in their forthcoming software line-up. Certainly with their first party software they'll continue to appeal to the Nintendo faithful, and that should be enough to help the platform stick it out for the next few years. Beyond that, it's impossible to speculate, particularly since we don't know how Microsoft and Sony will ultimately fare (it could just be the new norm, in light of smartphone, tablet, and PC competition to have a tough time with traditional consoles and gaming handhelds).

In anticipation of our upcoming book for CRC Press/Taylor & Francis Group, CoCo: The Colorful History of Tandy’s Underdog Computer, my co-author, Boisy Pitre, has started a new series of blog posts that will (very slowly) lift the veil on some interesting stuff that we discovered during the course of our research. He's doing it in the form of series of puzzles. You can read the second posting, or clue, here. Enjoy!

In other news, in terms of important milestones for the book, we turned in everything to the publisher last night. That means once it goes through the editorial process - which could take several months - the book will be on its way to release. We appreciate everyone's support through this process and hope you're anticipating publication of this book as much as we are.

You need to stop the spread of a deadly Nano virus. You must fight to make cells healthy again. Sounds like a boring biology themed bit of educational software disguised as a game but it is far from anything remotely educational. Nano Assault NEO is a great twin stick analog shooter on the WiiU - available as a downloadable game. Read more below...

This episode is a review of the game Towns, a 2012 release reminiscent of games like Settlers, Rogue, Dungeon Keeper, and Minecraft.

Download the mp4.

Ever since I got my Atari 800XL I've been slowly expanding on my 'LEFT cartridges' containing all sorts of arcade ports. It's a bit of a weak spot of mine to try to get all sorts of classic arcade ports on various machines I own. The Atari 8bit line is no exception. I play each cartridge until the 1st game over and this results in about 50 minutes of video. Hope you guys enjoy this one as well.

http://atariage.com/
http://oldcomputers.net/atari800.html
http://www.atariarchives.org/
http://atarihq.com
http://www.atarimania.com/index.html

I must say I just ordered a good microphone on Amazon.de, so things may be looking up on this end sound-wise.