Matt\'s back with the first of the 2006 Mailbags, full of international flavor. We\'ve got some feedback about our glowing review of Kutoka\'s Creatures and Creatures Exodus titles from the developers. And of course we\'ve got the requisite letters suffering from \"TLI\"-- Too Little Information. You tell us: How DO you get engineers to build siege machines on the top of large towers? Is it some kind of riddle? Check out the latest reader mail right here.

This week in the Wrap-Up, Val Townsend, the Atomic Goddess, takes gamers on an audio adventure through the recent history of video gaming. In addition to a summary of recent news, Val has reviews of Kameo: Elements of Power (XB360), Cuban Missile Crisis: The Aftermath (PC), and those cute little GelTabz (multi). Rounding out this week\'s podcast is a preview of Square/Enix\'s Code Age Project, which spans games on mobile phones, PS2, and a comic book series. Serve yourself up a heaping helping of steaming hot podcast goodness, right here.

This week in the Wrap-Up, Val checks out the biggest gaming news of the last couple weeks, catching us up on any news we missed while we were stuffing our gullets on stuffing and gullets. She also checks out reviews of PoPoLoCrois for PSP, Kosumi for PC, and Call of Duty 2 for Xbox 360 and PC. After all that, she serves up a tasty preview of Chromehounds, coming soon to Xbox 360 from the makers of the legendary Armored Core series. Get the latest podcasty goodness from your pals at GF!

When half your comic team disappears overseas for the holidays, it\'s hard to keep things running smoothly at a game comic. That doesn\'t explain all of TP Comics recent venture into the bizarrely inconsistent, but it explains a good portion of it. Now that the Xbox 360 is resting next to piles of used wrapping paper and a Christmas tree suffering from dehydration, it\'s easier to find the time to make fun of things. Hopefully that means we\'ll get back into a pattern again here after the new year. Take a look at this week\'s TwoPlayer comic, gamesfirst.com/index.php?thisComic=38\"" onClick="window.open( this.href, '_self' ); return false;" title="">FingerBang, the \"banned\" ad commercial.

Twoplayer game comics are published kinda, sorta weekly at gamesfirst.com\"" onClick="window.open( this.href, '_self' ); return false;" title="">http://comics.gamesfirst.com.

On behalf of the staff of GamesFirst!, we would like to take this space to wish all of our staff, readers and colleagues a happy, happy holiday season. We wouldn\'t be here without you, and we know that. On our 10th holiday season, we are thankful for all the people who have helped make GamesFirst! what it is today. Our staff is among the best online, and we value your efforts. To our fellow websites (especially the ones who kick down the kind links), we thank you. You know who you are, and you inspire us to do better. To all of the game developers, PR reps, and publishers who work with us on a daily basis, we want to extend our most sincere gratitude. We couldn\'t do what we do without your continued support, and life wouldn\'t be as much fun without you.

And, of course, we want to wish Happy Holidays to our readers. We are proud to be able to serve you for the past 10 years, and we look forward to number 11. Without you, we\'d just be posting up articles for our mothers to read, and although they never complain about our reviews or call us idiots, GF! would feel pretty empty without you. Thanks.

This week in the Wrap-Up, Val takes a look at a bunch of the reviews we couldn\'t fit into other podcasts. We rundown some of the best games of the season, including the wild-west adventure game GUN, the vehicular mayhem of Need for Speed: Most Wanted, the stylish Project Gotham Racing 3, alien warfare in Quake 4, and the handheld racing action of Mario Kart DS. We\'re cutting the crap and getting right to the goods. Check it out.

The 4th Asian Game Show & Digital Entertainment Expo Asia 2005 in Hong Kong might not be showing off anything cool from Microsoft, but they\'ve certainly got something from Sony. GamesFirst editor Aaron Stanton takes a quick peek at the show floor the day before the expo opens to the public, and reports on the warm fuzzy feelings he got at seeing the PlayStation 3 logo being raised above Sony\'s booth. AGSDEE might not be as well known in the west as E3 or CES, but it\'s an opportunity to see hands-on what Sony plans to offer. You\'ll want to keep an eye open as the four day exposition kicks off.

Val Townsend, the Atomic Goddess, is back again with lucky podcast number 13. This week, we take a look at the latest news, including speculation on Nintendo\'s recently hinted \"secret\" regarding the upcoming Revolution console, as well as Clinton and Lieberman\'s Family Entertainment Protection Act. We also have reviews of Perfect Dark Zero and King Kong. Finally, we take a look at Dreamcatcher Interactive\'s cult-hit Painkiller, coming to an Xbox near you in January. Download the latest audio offering from your pals at GF! right here.

Last week, we here at GamesFirst published a side-by-side comparison of King Kong on the Xbox and Xbox 360. By looking at nearly identical games, it\'s interesting to see the graphical differences between the two. However, the Xbox 360\'s major differences are in the ability to render dynamic lighting and environmental effects, which are difficult to see in static screenshots. As a result, we\'ve redone the article using side-by-side video capture from each system. The differences are both more obvious, in the cases when a difference is visible, and more underwhelming, when certain key scenes are difficult to distinguish between the two. Take a look, and decide for yourself.

We here at GamesFirst want to congratulate everyone working on the King\'s Quest IV project, and a thumbs up to everyone that helped save it. On December 9th, 2005, Vivendi Universal, who owns the publishing rights to King\'s Quest, announced that they would allow King\'s Quest IV to be developed with a name change to, \"The Silver Lining.\" This came about after the gaming community pulled together and made enough noise to change Vivendi\'s mind, who had shut down the project with a cease and desist letter. Kudos to Vivendi, as well, for being a large company that\'s still willing to change its mind from time to time.

This week in the Mailbag, we\'ve got all kinds of media-centric inquiries, ranging from the Xbox 360\'s media features to getting media onto the PSP and a few more tips to help you find an HDTV that will be compatible with the PlayStation 3. As usual, Matt James has put all of the best letters of the week together for your reading pleasure.

We are proud of our all-original GamesFirst! gear, created by the GF! staff and always available in the GamesFirst! Gift Shop. Being the team players we are, we thought it would be nice for us to try out this whole \"Black Friday - Day After Thanksgiving Sale\" and see what happened. So we\'re happy to announce that for TODAY ONLY (that\'s Friday, November 25, 2005) we are offering this coupon code which will save you up to $100 on your next purchase at the GF! Gift Shop. Visit the gift shop at http://gamesfirst.spreadshirt.com and add some items to your cart. Once you\'re in your cart, enter the coupon code 328VUDW in the \"Voucher\" box and click the button labelled \"Redeem Voucher.\" Get on over to the Gift shop and try it out, or read on for more information about the sale. Hurry! This offer and coupon code expires at midnight tonight.

This week in the Wrap-Up, we take an in-depth look at the Xbox 360. We\'ve been playing our 360 all weekend, doing our best to work through as many launch titles as we can so we can bring you the latest word on the Xbox 360 lineup. Join Val for hands-on looks at Perfect Dark Zero, Condemned: Criminal Origen, and Amped 3, as well as a look at the new features of Xbox Live and a roundup of the media capabilities of the Xbox.

This week in the Mailbag it\'s clear what\'s on gamer\'s minds: Xbox 360. With questions rolling in daily about the hard drive, backwards compatibility, and media features on the Xbox, we\'re doing our best to keep up. Check out this week\'s roundup of letters to GF! wherein you will witness not only answers to burning Xbox questions, but also the true power Matt wields to bestoweth the highly sought after \"shout out.\"

Sometimes articles rub people the wrong way. Sometimes somebody criticises a beloved video game, or says the wrong thing in an editorial about Nintendo. Sometimes, though, they just mention the fact that they\'re a girl that happens to play games. This week\'s twoplayer comic is partially in response to the reader reaction we got from an article we published last week called, gamesfirst.com/index.php?id=958\"" onClick="window.open( this.href, '_self' ); return false;" title="">A Look Behind Alice: A Woman\'s Reason for Gaming. The character profile of a casual gamer was received with mixed results. gamesfirst.com/index.php?thisComic=37\"" onClick="window.open( this.href, '_self' ); return false;" title="">Did You Say Something? is this week\'s twoplayer comic.

Twoplayer game comics are published weekly at gamesfirst.com\"" onClick="window.open( this.href, '_self' ); return false;" title="">http://comics.gamesfirst.com.