Xbox 360 Fanboy

So, as luck would have it, I'll be in Toronto immediately after PAX'07. My flight comes in around 4:30 PM ET, and that evening I'll be free to meetup with you readers. Unfortunately, Red Robin isn't as widespread as originally thought. It turns out there are only 18 in Canada, and much to my surprise, 14 of them are in British Columbia, which would explain how commonplace I thought they were. The other four are in Alberta which doesn't really help matters.

What does this mean? This means I need your help figuring out a good place to wine and dine. As the people from the local meetup would recall, I'm a fan of good burger joints (and bottomless fries wherever possible). Any suggestions? Also, feel free to start "signing up" now, so I can organize an RSVP list. Either leave a comment with your attendence or eatery suggestion, or shoot me an email at david [at] xbox360fanboy [dot] com with the subject heading X3F@T.O. I look forward to seeing you there.

Geoff Martin heeded our call for pics from the "Art of Xbox 360" gallery show being held in Toronto's Blue Dot Gallery, except he did one better. He linked us to a piece he wrote for canada.com, slideshow included! He writes, "Wil Overton, an artist from UK-based Rare Games, and the lead concept artist for the Xbox 360’s Perfect Dark Zero, also doesn’t have much time for quibbling over definitions, or debates on what should or shouldn’t be considered 'art.' He said at the opening of "Play: The Art of the Xbox 360" on Thursday that he's thrilled to see his work hung on the walls of an art gallery."

On the other side of the net, Tony Walsh from Clickable Culture says, "If you happen to be at the Distillery this weekend, it couldn't hurt to drop by the Blue Dot Gallery to have a look, but I wouldn't recommend making a special trip just for the show. I think what we have here is a classic "post-release attention-span" grabber, geared towards retaining a semblance of public interest in the Xbox 360--in other words, this event isn't so much about art as it is about commerce."

Having not seen the show, I can only speculate, but I think Walsh's take sounds about right, but was their any doubt? All the games are published by Microsoft, and the show was advertised as being "Xbox 360" specific. We could also get into an argument about semantics--aren't many gallery shows about commerce and art?--though, this case takes that observation to an extreme, replacing enterprising artists with a Fortune 500 company.

Also found another gallery of images from photojunkie (via Flickr): Play: The Next Level of Gaming.

[Thanks, Geoff]

UPDATE: 360 Fanboy reader Zoltan posted his own review of the "Art of Xbox 360 exhibit", complete with pictures at YYZTech.ca. Thanks!