This comes straight from our WTF department.

Long have philosophers wondered, "What could be better than slapping your friend in the face with a fish?" 

It seems that Maple Story, that uber-cute 2D side scrolling MMO, is now advertising on TV. The ads for the game are just a wee bit unconventional, however.

I can imagine the guys in the PR department saying to each other, "Hey, what if we hire some really bad actors, and have them slap each other with fish, and..."

You can check out the video for yourself in our own illustrious Theatre of Doom.

Arriving next month is Tabula Rasa, the long-awaited game from Richard"Lord British" Garriott, creator of classic role-playing games likeUltima and Ultima Online. As a massively multiplayer onlinerole-playing game, Tabula Rasa is a bit like World of Warcraft andEverQuest in that you'll be able to explore huge online worldsalongside thousands of other players. However, while World of Warcraftand EverQuest are fantasy-themed games, Tabula Rasa is science fiction.The game is set on alien worlds in the distant future, and humanity ispart of the Allied Free Sentients, a coalition of races battling theevil Bane. Like in many MMOs, you'll have to pursue missions. However,the mission design in Tabula Rasa will strive to make it feel likeyou're taking part in military operations to free worlds. To learnmore, we caught up with mission designer Rebekah Tran.

GameSpot: Tell us about the way players find and accept missions in the game. Will all missions have in-depth briefings?

Rebekah Tran: There are two ways to accept missions inTabula Rasa. The first is the traditional way of finding a non-playercharacter at a base or town that needs you to do something. The secondis via a radio transmission,

Dennis Kucinich is running for president. What better way to swing hip voters to your cause than by hanging out in Second Life?

Is it just us, or does Congressman Kucinich look sort of elfin in this picture? 

Well, someone took the time to make a video of Kucinich's HQ in SL, complete with a 70s guitar vibe. Gotta be honest: I'm not sure this'll get him any extra votes. You can check out the video in our Theatre of Doom.

• 18,114 new signups bringing us to 9,918,375 signups total.
• A peak concurrency of 52,538 (a new record!) at 1:55PM, and a minimum concurrency of 29,872 at 1:35AM. Median concurrency for the day was 39,514.
• The Grid Stability Index for the day was 1.76 (lower is better).