Ahoy there! In case you haven’t noticed, the Telltale store has been busy loading up with all kinds of Sam and Max related paraphernalia. They still have the DeSoto shirts and poster prints on sale, with new and exciting additions such as the Age of S&M sketchbooks and Max & Crossbones shirts and hats!

Let us be thankful we have commerce. Buy more. Buy more now. Buy. And be happy.

What’s going on with SamandMax.Net?

I dunno. Probably something.

- Unofficial Sam and Max Staff

Emily M. over at Telltale has updated the company blog with some great musical tidbits from the upcoming first episode of Sam and Max: Season One. There are three full songs that have been released as of this posting, including “The Office” (which plays on the Freelance Police’s infamous MySpace page), “City Streets”, and “Attack the Dog”. All these tracks were composed by Jared Emerson-Johnson, and they all sound great.

Read the post.
Listen to: The Office | City Streets | Attack the Dog

GameTap recently announced their plans for the weekly release of a new Sam & Max cartoon (actually repeats from the old television series) on GameTap TV beginning October 12th. Also, to further the enticement, they are throwing in an exclusive original entitled “The Making of Sam & Max” on October 17th. We can only guess what that will be about. Thanks to Banjo4321 for finding this scoop and posting the video.

To help dissipate some of the confusion, there will be short computer-animated segments made by Telltale released inbetween each episode of the game, which will not feature the old Canadian voice actors.

I hope everybody here is pro-choice, because Telltale sure is…with three different ways for you to purchase Sam & Max: Season 1!

Here’s the rundown of your options as an informed consumer:

1) $8.95 per individual episode via download from Telltale
2) $9.95 per month for a GameTap subscription (or cheaper, depending on how long you want to commit to a plan in advance)
3) $34.95 for the entire season (download as episodes are made available, after the season is finished, you can get a CD copy for the measly price of shipping!)

I was writing a somewhat longer update about a bunch of the stuff surrounding the Freelance Police this week, but my browser disagreed that I should be able to post it. So, here’s a slightly more caveman version of what needs to get said about Sam and Max at present. Don’t worry, it’s pretty much all good news, a true rarity in the history of Sam and Max fanpage updating. Let’s get down to it.

• The game has a title. The first episode in the new Telltale-made “season” of games will be called Sam & Max Episode 1: Culture Shock. Not entirely sure what is indicated by this title in terms of plot, but who cares! Fact number two is unprecedented!
• The second Sam and Max title, as in, not Sam and Max Hit the Road, but rather Sam and Max Episode 1: Culture Shock, has completed production. This has never happened before, despite a number of infamous attempts in the past few years. Telltale, in a recent Blog post, officially announced this fact, and have also posted up a dozen or so new screenshots!
• Oh yeah. Also there’s a new game trailer.In that same post, Telltale has posted a quite visible minute-long video highlighting some more visuals, audio, and gameplay sequences from the upcoming game. Woo.
• Myspace! What? Yes! The Freelance Police themselves have apparently found the resources to hire a clammy, pale online friend (for life) with time enough to manage their profile on Myspace. Hip!
• Also. you might want to read this preview of Culture Shock by Chris Remo.

That’s about it for now, sorry some of these were not spoken of in a more timely fashion on this site!

Late with the updates again! Telltale’s put up some gameplay footage from the upcoming first Episode of Sam and Max for you to look at. What stands out in most of these clips is the the banter between the Freelance Police, and while the voices are different than they were 13 years ago, it still feels like Sam and Max. If you don’t see it, then you’re clearly a jerk. Hey, and Gamespot has got some clips as well!

I’m excited.

Telltale Games have updated their site with actual facts about their upcoming first episode of the new Sam and Max adventures. First, the release dates have been revealed: Gametap will make the episode available on Tuesday, October 17, which is barely over a month away (woo!). The rest of the world will be able to get it directly from Telltale a little bit later, on Wednesday, November 1. Additionally, there are some details on the system requirements, but like Telltale’s previous releases, they really aren’t too demanding. The size of the first episode will be around 75 megabytes, which is also pretty reasonable, guy.

Man, our content is really out of date. We ought to do something about that. Until then, you can read over the original posting at Telltale.

Lots of Sam & Max related stuff has been going down lately on the so-called Information Superhighway. Here’s a handy list:

Online Previews: Sam & Max previews written by people who have actually seen and touched the first episode are finally starting to appear around the net. Check it out!

The first preview, from GameSpy, gives a nice overview of what’s going on with Telltale’s Sam & Max series, including hints about the plot of the first episode (so beware of spoilers).

Wired’s Game|Life blog has a great writeup about the writer’s visit to Telltale and his impressions seeing and playing the followup to what the he describes as “one of the defining events of my mid-adolescence.”

A third preview has also appeared at OCModShop, which contains some quotes from Telltale CEO Dan Connors about Telltale’s goals for Sam & Max episodes, some refined details on the pricing structure, and also includes a handful of unique digital camera shots of the game as demoed at the recent Penny Arcade Expo.

Sam & Max Webcomic Page: Page nine of Steve Purcell’s ongoing Sam & Max webcomic has appeared in record time! You can check it out here. If you’ve fallen behind, you can start with page one, here.

Other Stuff: Telltale’s Dan Connors was interviewed by online gaming radio station XBL Radio. You can check out the five minute piece right here.

Telltale has put up a zillion and one screenshots from the game. A mix of pre-rendered and in-engine screenshots are included.

Also, many of the stories linked above contain new in-game screenshots. In addition to the shots featured in the previews above, Adventure Gamers have scored a few of their own.