The sixth of nine free online bonus chapters that are in addition to the 25 chapters found in our book, Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time, available at booksellers worldwide, including Amazon.com, is now available. Head on over to Gamasutra to read Spacewar! (1962): The Best Waste of Time in the History of the Universe. The remaining three online bonus chapters, released one a month, will be Defender, Robotron: 2084 and Star Raiders, which will form the complete set of 34 chapters between the book and online. Don't forget there are well over 100 bonus images not found in the book or in the online bonus chapters, available here. Want to know what others' think of the book? Check it out here and don't forget to get yourself a copy!

It was with great relief that the Slashdot review of our Vintage Games book went up on Wednesday. With the continued expansion of the World Wide Web and the vast quantity of high quality information resources available, Slashdot doesn't quite have the impact it once had, but it's certainly still an important and valuable site to have in your corner, particularly when you're trying to bring a higher profile to something like this book (in fact, it helped push the book to a sales ranking high of 3,282 on Amazon.com out of millions of products). With minimal qualification, the review was a positive one, rating the book a very high (for Slashdot) 8 out of 10, with the main criticism of our work being some of the images included in the book and their value in illustrating some of the text. Unfortunately in drawing attention to the images the reviewer failed to mention how nice the images are throughout the full color glossy production, and that - certainly in my opinion - it was important in our limited space to use the images as an opportunity to add to the text rather than merely illustrate what was already discussed. And of course I'm particularly proud of including images and the related history not found in any other work of this type.

Anyway, with all of that said, there are over 150 comments to the review (and by extension the book) and counting, and I'd just like to take this opportunity to clarify what "Vintage Games" the book is and isn't.

GameSetWatch has posted a fascinating look at the aftermath of the posting of our fifth (of nine) online-only bonus chapter from earlier this month, Rogue: Have @ You, You Deadly Z's, from our book, Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time. The best part is is that two of the original developers have participated in the discussion to shed additional light on the fascinating history of Rogue. As always, be sure to check out the book's official Website at Armchair Arcade, and don't forget to pick up your copy at Amazon or other fine retailers!

Well, it wasn't Slashdot after all, but Gamer's Intuition that got out the first formal review of Vintage Games: An Insider Look at Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time. The verdict? It's a hit! The review is available here, so be sure to check it out and all the other great content at Gamer's Intuition.

Gamasutra has just published the fifth in a series of nine bonus chapters not found in our book, Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time, on Rogue, entitled, Rogue: Have @ You, You Deadly Z's. If you enjoy this and the other bonus chapters (don't forget the bonus images!), you'll be sure to love the full color book as well. Let us know what you think!

Gamasutra has released the fourth of nine bonus chapters not found in our book, Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario and the Most Influential Games of All Time. The new bonus chapter is called, Elite: Space, The Endless Frontier, and like the other bonus and in-book chapters covers not only the title game, but discusses those games that influenced it, what it influenced, and the genre in general. You can read more about the book at its main page, where you'll also find links to the other online bonus chapters and well over 100 online bonus images not found anywhere else. The next bonus chapter will be on Rogue and will be released May 2009. Enjoy!

It was very interesting meeting with three of the publishers we either have been working with or will be working with on books. The most sobering aspect was how the behind-the-scenes machinations work in the book industry, which is to say it's a tough business. One of the aspects that was pointed out to us was the value of people posting reviews on Amazon.com (or any regional Amazon). In short, the more reviews - good or bad - the better for a book, as the higher it shows up in searches and the more likely it's to be paired with another book in the auto-recommendations. So, as usual, we're asking for your help. If you want to see more books like this, please be so kind as to let your thoughts be known on Vintage Games and write a review on the relevant Amazon site. Thanks, everyone!

Our latest book, "Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time", is now available from retailers worldwide. "Vintage Games" is a full color, illustrated book, that explores the greatest and most influential videogames of all time, including Super Mario Bros., Grand Theft Auto III, Doom, The Sims, and many more. While each chapter's focus revolves around the game title in question, precursors, clones, sequels, gameplay and mechanics, and the genre itself are discussed, along with plenty of quotes, references and amazing full color photos.

The book is available from fine retailers everywhere, including Amazon.com. You can check out either Amazon.com or the book's main page for more information, which also contains a full table of contents, links to the online bonus chapters and images not found in the book. Not counting what's contained in the online bonus chapters, there are presently 123 bonus images (and captions) not available anywhere else!

Let us know in the comments of any "Vintage Games" sightings, particularly in regards to reviews. Thanks, everyone!

Our publisher, Focal Press, which is part of Elsevier, is presently running a contest for you to win a free copy of our book, "Vintage Games: An Insider Look at the History of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the Most Influential Games of All Time", as well as a $25 gift card. All you have to do is fill out their short survey on which game YOU think is the most influential, here.

Let us know what you put down and if you win!