About five of you get the joke. Anyway, it's Monday morning. I'm up with fewer than my requisite eight hours. I got a dog that whining to be taken out to piddle. I got a house that looks like a podcast hit it. I have a bare refrigerator. I have no tree nor Christmas presents yet purchased, much less decorated and/or wrapped. Tonight is my Christmas Eve... ... and today's my birthday. So, in order to get this GameHounds episode out quickly and keep you waiting, I'm posting it without show notes. If any of you really can't find the site or want further links, just email me at edie@gamehounds.net and I'll send you the link. I know many of you really count on those show notes, but they do take a long time to put together, and I know there's a bunch of you impatiently waiting on this show. Enjoy.

Wednesday may just be the Jan Brady of weekdays, but it's the Humpday and that makes it special. Another special thing about this Humpday is that GamerEdie Sellers' co-host this week is listener Heartbreak Ridge, who brings a scholarly edge to the show. This week, Edie and Heartbreak discuss:

• Peter Molyneux offers up a post-mortem on Fable 2 to Eurogamer and explains why he made so many of the game choices he did, including the vexing single-save slot. And the reasons aren't what you think. He also offers details on possible upcoming DLC.
• Sony thinks Home is a console seller. Maybe so, especially to hackers!
• Microsoft won't answer Jeff Mintner calls. Wonder why. (Hint: Rhymes with "Snase Sneraffe"...)
• Did Microsoft know about Xbox's tendendcy to eat game disks before the console ever launched? If it did, how pissed would you be?
• Gears of War map pack releases and prior furor goes down the memory hole.
• Errata and Data: HR responds to Commander Tim; Gamerscores are now job requirements; letter from Deadite; the next Metal Gear is...

Enjoy.

The little hand is on the thirteen and the big hand is on the elevendy-seven. In the legendary words of Town Cryer, "The time is... very late." And thus, we'll dispatch with this week's show notes. Gamer Edie and Cooper Hawkes bring you, once again, the latest in gaming news. Topics they discuss include:

• Hawkes' impressions of Playstation Home.
• The results of the Great Wii-Bate.
• The early leaked results of the Spike VGAs.
• Double Fine's Brutal Legend has a publisher! Nice score, EA!
• EGM and 1UP are in serious trouble. Not only is parent Ziff Davis possibly going to kill the magazine in favor of the website, it's already started the process by shuttering EGM en Espanol.
• No more maps for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare according to Infinity Ward's Robert "FourZeroTwo" Bowling.
• Top 10 games pirated this year? Yeah, guess which game took top honors!
• Random stuff: Fallout 3's editor, GECK, is out and available; Knothole Island, the Fable 2 DLC, coming December 22; Mercenaries 2 Blow It Up Again DLC now available on PSN, coming to XBLive on Tuesday; Harmonix confirms 28 million downloads.
• Emails from Akiira and JS.

Enjoy.

Yes, the long, long three-day wait is ovahh! The new Humpdate is here and ready for your enjoyment and scorn. Because we aim to do both. This week, Commander Tim returns for a more regular kind of Humpdate -- one with 100 percent fewer stories about scars. ... and 100 percent more gaming news. This week, Edie and Commander Tim discuss:

• The nasty economy hits Sony hard as it annouces 8,000 job cuts from its electronics division. No word yet how it may, or may not, affect Playstations and PSPs.
• Fable 2 lead designer Richard Ham leaves Lionhead Studios for Splash Damage to work on a Syphon Filter-esque title.
• Factor 5 opens a can o' whoop-ass on one of its artists reveals on his personal website tha the developer hasn't paid its employees for a month.
• Guitar Hero Arcade heading to movie theaters and corner bars near you.
• Resident Evil 5 viral site launches and proceeds to cause viral sites to jump the shark.
• Atari snaps up Cryptic Studios for $26.7 million.
• Time magazine lists its top 10 games of the year and proves once again that mainstream press is pretty clueless when it comes to video games.
• Data and Errata: Halo Wars coming to Japan on February 26, Europe, Africa and Middle East a day later, and North America on March 3; Sony launches yet another self-congratulatory news site; Playstation Home launch "immenent."

Enjoy.

Finally, a GameHounds episode where almost nothing goes wrong. GamerEdie and Cooper Hawkes return again to the podcast mics to bring you the wrap-up of the week in the gaming-news world. Let's face it, it's the end of the year; news is slow. That doesn't mean Edie and Hawkes don't find a lot to talk about. These two could chat up a fence post -- and manage to make it walk away offended. This week they discuss:

• Say goodbye to gaming legend Midway Games. With its recent purchase by what looks to be a corporate raider and looking down the business end of $240 million in corporate debt, stick a fork in it.
• Spike TV's Video Game Awards is looking like must-watch viewing this year. Dammit.
• Xbox says Friendship is Free for December. In January, it will cost ya.
• Have you see this Kojima Productions website thing? Seriously. Weird.
• Random Shit: Lips mic to be Rock Band 2 compatable "soon;" Killzone 2 coming February 27-ish to North America-ish; Get reconditioned 20GB Xbox HDs from Circuit City cheap.

Enjoy.

Some Humpdates are just a little more Salvador Dali than others. This week, Edie Sellers co-hosts with Commander Tim Wilsie , formerly of The Widget and currently of Pink Ninja Studios and the Commander Tim Podcast. With so little happening this week, rather than try to interest you in so-so news, Edie and Tim just kinda shoot the sh*t, you might say. Think of it like a pre-show chat up that just ended up becoming the show. Which is exactly what happened. No topic items, since no actual news topics really get discussed. But there's a whole lot of gaming chatter and even more details of how Tim and Edie got their best scars. Enjoy.

It's late and rather than bore you with the formalities, this will be a short and sweet explanation of this week's episode. GamerEdie Sellers and Cooper Hawkes discuss:

• Major Nelson offered little explaination of what causes Xbox to reset a profile's achievements. But Hawkes has his own take on the story of JackTheWhack and his claims of innocence.
• Jasper-equipped Xboxes are finally on the loose!
• Gamasutra notices that Gamestop's website shows Grand Theft Auto IV's DLC available as a code on its product page.
• A fan offers a bustier, younger-looking version of Mirror's Edge's Faith. That makes DICE producers sad.
• An Adults Only game producer says the ESRB isn't fair to porn gaming.
• Random Shit: Voice actor Michael Rudder (Assassin's Creed, Prince of Persia: Warrior Within) was one of the hundreds injured in the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai. Pete Hines says the upcoming Fallout 3 DLC will have similarities to Oblivion's DLC.

Enjoy.