Telltale Games has announced that "Sam and Max Episode 1: Culture Shock" has gone gold and will be available to GameTap Customers on October 17th and will have a worldwide release on November 1st.

"Today we can definitively tell you that the wait is... well, not over, but, you know almost over. In a little over a month, on October 17, people in the United States can sign up for GameTap and play the pilot episode of Sam & Max: Season 1 in all its glory. And as of November 1, the episode will be available for purchase from Telltale's site for anyone and everyone who wants it. That's right, folks. Sam & Max are on the verge of taking over the world.

There are a lot more questions we're dying to answer – how much will each episode cost? What will they be about? What is the secret of life? We aren't quite ready to dish the dirt on all of this just yet. We're still working out the details on pricing (which will be announced very soon), and we're keeping the plots of future episodes under wraps for the time being. But we can tell you a few new things about the pilot episode, Culture Shock.

Those little red-and-white clad guys who have been creeping into the new screenshots? They're the Soda Poppers – former child stars who have been out of the TV scene since the seventies, and in and out of trouble almost as long. They're on the loose in Sam & Max's neighborhood, and it's up to our unscrupulous crime-fighters to figure out why. And we do mean unscrupulous. To get to the bottom of the ever-thickening plot, you'll have to throw heavy objects, hit people over the head, shoot stuff (in point & click style, of course!), and drive around like a maniac. Oh, and don't forget about faking mental illness and outsmarting a deviously clever bell-bottom-wearing foe. That's right, kids, we've got it all in Culture Shock. And this only the first episode!

System requirements will be about the same as they were for Bone and CSI: 3 Dimensions of Murder."

Along with this announcement, new screenshots have been released: