Though I just finished ranting about how useless an endeavor creating year-end wrap-ups and best-of lists is, I do appreciate reading them from time to time. In the case of best-of comic book lists, it gives me an idea of what collections and on-going series’ I should look into catching up on.

Comic Book Resources has compiled and released their best 100 comics of 2008 list. I’m bringing it up here because four of the five books ongoing in 2008 that I’ve recommended via Comic Tips have placed in CBR’s list. I think this is as good a time as any to say: told you so!

The four comics in CBR’s top 100 of 2008 that I’ve said you should be reading are as follows:

• #85 Dynamo 5
• #72 Echo
• #42 Air
• #08 RASL

I was absolutely thrilled to see RASL in the top ten. I’ve voiced my concerns for it and its quarterly release schedule in the past, and it’s good to see it getting some recognition for being something special. I was disappointed to not see any Jonathan Hickman books in the mix; I’d imagine that the delays affecting his books have caused many to wait for trades. I would also liked to have seen House of Mystery in the list, but everything else feels just about right.

One thing is for certain: I need to read this Criminal TPB that has been sitting on my desk for three months.

One Hell of Holiday Season

So yeah, its busy as hell around the holiday seasons for me, but I just wanted to pull up a digital music artist for the month of December, but someone spiked the egg nog. 7 Days later I wake up in Death Valley with this song being played in my head like angels. Not gonna sit here and talk on and on about this. From the dark corners and generally shadowed areas. I give you, from their latest album FH3, TZDV by Faderhead…

An update for Gravitron 2 has just been released in the form of a 15 level map pack. These new levels can be accessed from the game’s main menu by cycling the “Map Pack” setting. Be advised that starting a game on the new map pack will overwrite your progress on the original map pack and you’ll have to start over.

Steam users will get this update pushed to them automatically. If you purchased Gravitron 2 directly from the developer’s site you’ll now find a patch available there.

It seems that the thing to do at the end of each year on sites like this is to write a series of wrap-ups. Game of The Year, retrospective reports, trends analysis. People also like to make predictions for the impending new year. I really do disdain things like holidays and imposing tradition, and while I honestly have very little sentiment for New Years, I do think it’s appropriate to acknowledge what has happened as long as the world insists on operating cyclically.

But I won’t. In fact, I tried to just now. I got half a dozen items into a list before I scrapped it. Deciding what’s universally important isn’t for me. I’m not sure who it’s for; the real enthusiast press doesn’t do a good job of it either. Much of what they say is very hype-driven, lazy and predictable. I won’t do that, though that may be what people really want.

I’m going to go finish riding the planet around a star now.

A fantastic store-wide sale is currently happening on Steam from now until January 2nd. Everything is at least 10% off, all the way up to 75% off. This includes both individual games and game bundles. Every cheap game that we’ve covered here at DoSu (that isn’t free) is available on Steam. As cheap games are now much cheaper, it would be silly not to pick up a couple. Some highlights include:

• Trials 2: Second Edition – $2.49 from $9.99
• Audiosurf – $4.99 from $9.99
• Beyond Good & Evil – $7.49 from $9.99

I’d also like to point out BioShock for $4.99. The full list of games we’ve covered along with links to the Steam store can be found, as always, in the Cheap Games Database.

Happy Day-After-Christmas Eve, everybody. We’re almost there.

We have a bunch of snow on the ground here. A white Christmas is rare here in Portland, Oregon. It’s been a blast sledding and playing with my niece in the snow. Here’s hoping you’re having a good time and a wonderful holiday.