So we were poking around in a local Best Buy and surveying the post-holiday consumer carnage, when we decided to take a peek and see if Myth II had made it onto the shelves yet. Myth II, of course, is the hugely-anticipated and long-awaited sequel to last year's smash hit Myth-- in our opinion, the best real-time tactical combat game available, if for no reason other than the fact that blood-trailing severed heads, limbs, and torsos go flying through the air in decidedly poetic trajectories. Anyway, we knew that Myth II had hit "golden master" status a few weeks ago and so we figured it'd start showing up in stores any day now. And while we weren't all too surprised not to find Myth II available, we were surprised to find out why: it's not just shipping slowdowns due to the holiday season or minor delays at the manufacturing plant; instead, Bungie has issued a recall of all Myth II units that had shipped to retailers but that had not yet had time to make it onto the shelves.

That's right, a recall. Turns out that there's a problem with the "uninstaller" used in the Windows version of Myth II, and that in rare circumstances bad things can happen when running it. Bungie.net has more information on this unfortunate cirumstance. Now, normally none of us would care at all about a problem with the Windows version of the game, but our understanding is that Myth II is on a hybrid CD-ROM-- both Windows and Mac versions on the same disc. So apparently this recall affects us Mac gamers, too, even though the Mac version of the software is just fine. Bummer-- even though we use Macs, bugs in Windows software is screwing with our fun. Oooo, frustrating.

On the bright side, even though the game never actually made it into retail stores, most people who pre-ordered the game from Bungie apparently received their copies about a week ago-- several faithful AtAT viewers wrote in to inform us of that fact, or rather, to taunt us mercilessly with tales of gameplay while we're forced to wait the extra three weeks before the "fixed" software makes it into the retail channel. So at least a few Mac users out there are blowing up hordes of Thrall without being affected by a bug in the Windows uninstaller. It's enough to make us want to use Myth II's included editing tools to turn all the forces of evil into little floating Windows logos...