GeekNights with Rym + Scott

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider the technology and ramifications of Generative Pre-trained Transformer 3 (GPT-3) and autoregressive language models in general. We further explore other similar machine learning tools and their short and long-term ramifications for humans. In the news, Discord Stages have low bitrate limits , the US Department of Energy concludes with low confidence that COVID-19 emerged from a lab leak in China, the UK wasn't content with ruining its economy with Brexit and is also considering ruining its technology with the Online Safety Bill , and a terrifying toxic new Dust Bowl is descending on Utah.

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss games that are not fully dead, but are mostly dead . Dance Dance Revolution (at home), the resurrected Netrunner, The Realm , Steel Battalion, and whatever game you're mad we didn't include in this short list just now. In the news, The Last Rockstars have debuted, Rym has a high opinion of the L-TEK EX PRO 2 DDR pad , the Nintendo Direct is tomorrow, and the Nintendo Switch is the third best-selling console of all time .

Tonight on GeekNights, we review BRZRKR from Keanu Reeves, Matt Kindt, Ron Garney, and Bill Crabtree. It might hit you like a truck. Also Reaves is really into Wolverine . In the news, the United States House of Representatives is frozen as the Republicans repeatedly fail to elect a Speaker (something so unthinkable it literally hasn't happened in a century), Eurobeat is confirmed for MF Ghost , and Cartoon Saloon is moving forward with Julián !

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider animated Christmas specials and special Christmas episodes of animated shows. From Frosty the Snowman to The He-Man & She-Ra special to Claymation Christmas to Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer , nevermind the classic-for-all-time Charlie Brown Christmas . In the news, the legendary Ichiro Mizuki has passed away , and the new season of the Dragon Prince is... uneven at best. (I hope you like farting elves).

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss the concept of Zero Trust Security . It's a pain, and it's not necessary in all environments, but it's something you should understand. In the news, a company is suing to put profits over preventing harm to children , disgraced former president Donald Trump has been referred for criminal prosecution over his coup attempt , Apple introduces Advanced Data Protection , and Google introduces client-side encryption to paid gmail.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider teams. Playing on teams, forming teams, team sports, team games. All that team stuff. In the news, Dwarf Fortress with graphics is here (recall we interviewed Tarn Adams on GeekNights back in 2008), the FTC sues to block Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard , Blizzard will need someone new to offer World of Warcraft in China in a story that keeps evolving , and we hope Diablo 4 will let us click until we kill satan.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review the 2022 anime TV series Spy×Family . It's a solid regular anime with all the crowdpleasers you could want from an anime club screening circa 2003. In the news, we are back from PAX Unplugged , Saga volume 10 continues the... saga (which we reviewed the beginning of back in 2013), Funimation's acquisition of Crunchyroll continues with SKU changes , Makoto Shinkai's Suzume will be in American theaters April 14th one night only , and Shin Ultraman is in theaters soon!

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss Federated Architecture in light of the collapse of Twitter. Federation is how most of the Internet works, and you should understand the ramifications of it before you dive into platforms like Mastodon. From XMPP (formerly Jabber) to ActivityPub , even the nature of an email address , federation is how the Internet was intended to be used.
In the news, the FCC has a more accurate broadband map , and the rail unions are (rightly) threatening to strike over intolerable working conditions .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider Beetlejuice. The timeless classic movie from 1988 , the bizarre animated series , even the musical , loom large (with the possible exception of the latter) in cinema history, and luckily we've never talked about it on GeekNights until now. In the news, late capitalist dystopia attacks the city skyline , late capitalist dystopia attacks the concept of color (making a lot of Adobe users rightfully angry), and Scott's Chair finally broke.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review the surprisingly elegant Marvel Snap . Released this year on phones and PCs, it's essentially a flavor of Knizia's Battle Line (2000) , itself in a narrow class of similar games of a shared lineage .
In the news, Ross Chastain changed the meta in NASCAR with "Some Video Game Shit," Embracer rebranded Square Enix Montréal as Onoma before immediately shutting Onoma down , Dwarf Fotress with Graphics is coming in December, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 disabled Steam Family Sharing , a feature you should probably be using .

Tonight on GeekNights, we reveal the secrets of How to Not Suck at Smartphone Security. There is a lot of drama that can arise from mishandling your smartphone. Tonight we'll walk you through a simple set of rules that, if you follow them, will nearly guarantee such drama does not befall you.
In the news, KakaoTalk loses millions of users after a massive outage not only cuts people off from their primary means of communication but reveals sensitive personal information related to multiple profiles . This is on the heels of Google taking their cut and has now led to calls for a monopoly probe . Also Leica has a new camera for a lot of money and Scott has written about it in the forum .

Tonight on the GeekNights Book Club , we review and discuss Binti . Because it was short and also extremely good, we ended up reading and will be discussing the complete trilogy. Her name is Binti, and she is the first of the Himba people ever to be offered a place at Oomza University, the finest institution of higher learning in the galaxy. But to accept the offer will mean giving up her place in her family to travel between the stars among strangers who do not share her ways or respect her customs.

The first in Nnedi Okorafor's trilogy, it won the Hugo and Nebula awards for Best Novella. You know if there's one thing GeekNights is into, it's space universities.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Unknown Worlds' Moonbreaker (2022) . It's a turn-based digital miniatures game that shares a lot of lineage with Hearthstone, Magic, and possibly Neuroshima Hex (at least in terms of the net effect of some of its mechanics). It's all right, but it has a lot of issues and remains in early access .
In the news, Discord's Watch Together shows you ads and is broken by adblock (and also doesn't actually work very well), Discord launches a cheaper Nitro Basic , Rym is playing a lot of Overwatch 2 which itself is struggling with its new free-to-play model that you can ignore if you just pay for the game, and GUNDAM Evolution is terrible .

Tonight on GeekNights, after a surprisingly long hiatus between Rym going to Europe for work and Rym & Emily biking 480 miles across the state of New York , we talk a bunch about IPv6 woes with Intel NICs , and happenings in the street before we get to the news that companies shouldn't spy on their employees , and the GTX 4090 is coming . Eventually, we talk a bit about web scraping and why it is noble and just.

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss the history and current state of online game servers. Rising primarily out of competitive FPSs like Quake and Counter Strike back in the day, they were often the only way to play with a reliable community of people. There weren't matchmaking or friend lists or anything like that.
In the news, Rym and Emily are back from PAX where they did a panel on losing , Scott is back from Costco, the Nintendo Direct had a bunch of things to talk about, and GeekNights will have a roughly three week hiatus between Rym and Emily biking 500 miles and Rym going on a business trip.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider single player tabletop games. Distinct from Solitaire and Simple Games or Solitaire Puzzles , expanding on our discussion of The Number of Players , we look at what it takes to have a regular old tabletop game for one . We cite Why No One Will Game With You in the course of this, but there are plenty of great single player experiences (so long as they are official rules and the game was designed with a solo mode in mind).
In the news, Blades in the Dark continues to be fantastic, Cult of the Lamb is moderately disappointing to Rym, Moonbreaker holds promise, the fake Amazon-buys-EA story was debunked before we even saw the bunk, and Disney is throwing the weight of its intellectual property around with a high-production TCG: Lorcana .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider the feature films of Hayao Miyazaki . They are instantly recognizable and every one of them is worth seeing. In the news, Joe Biden has cancelled a huge amount of student debt (more than you probably realize ), the nightmare that was the attempt at a 90s American live-action Sailor Moon has been found in its full glory, the new Beavis and Butthead is fantastic, the novel Paprika was based on is getting a live-action series , the AMC meme-stock is doubling down on this nonsense , and Evangelion Voice Actor Motomu Kiyokawa has passed away at 87.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider how to not suck at buying a new smartphone. Android or Apple, you actually do have a choice, and there are some basic things to think about. In the news, you can't park there , this program is illegally packaged in 14 distributions , BeReal is pretty cool , this is why schools are banning smartphones , and the lack of transparency in algorithmic CSAM detection is causing harm .

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Masaaki Yuasa's Inu-Oh (2021) . (trailer ). Per William Bibbiani in The Wrap it is best described as a "feudal-Japanese hair-metal-demonic-curse serial-killer-political-tragedy rock-opera" anime movie. Go see it. Don't wait. In the news, Daisuke Jigen Voice Actor Kiyoshi Kobayashi Passes Away at 89 , Crunchyroll buys Right Stuf in the continued consolidation of all media industries, and Natasha Allegri's new Bee and Puppycat has a new trailer !

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Sonic X (2003) . An anime TV series based on Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog video game series, adapted poorly by 4kids, it's not too bad. In the news, convention "leaks" are always funny , retroactive editing is becoming more and more common , someone leaked the entire 87 minute animatic of the (sadly) canceled Genndy Tartakovsky Popeye feature , and Anime Matsuri remains one of the worst anime cons in the world, and it's spinning off a "dubbing studio" with a known sex pest.

Tonight on GeekNights we discuss Software as a Service (SaaS). This is one of the most lucrative, important, and enduring ways software is created and sold. In the news, a chess robot attacked a kid , Amazon buys One Medical as we edge ever closer to cyber-capitalist dystopia, Minecraft (rightly) bans blockchain (and nothing of value was lost ), and warming rivers due to human-caused climate change threaten the nuclear power that is crucial to transition us off of fossil fuels .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider streaming games. Not to Twitch, but to devices. From Google Stadia to Steam Link to Steam Remote Play to adjacent game library services like Xbox Game Pass it's a space that continues to evolve. In the news, blue states in America are trying to save lives , Scott geekbites Nobody Saves the World , Asmodee sells Keyforge , Ubisoft kills 15 multiplayer games , Counter-Strike is still the #1 game on Steam by a wide margin , Pokemon cards are now easy to get , and video cards are now easy to get .

Tonight on GeekNights, it's a News Roundup! Specifically an Animation, Anime, Manga, and Comics News Roundup! The new Urusei Yatsura anime series has a trailer , TFAC has uninvited the NFT Lady after severe backlash from TCAF attendees and guests, Seven Seas' workers form a union that Seven Seas will not voluntarily recognize . Ni No Kuni: Cross Worlds is a crypto scam , Flying Ghost Ship is getting a Blu-Ray release and a new dub from Discotek , Anime Boston had a delightful swap meet , Rym is continuing with The Owl House as new episodes drop, Saga returns after a long hiatus , and Bob's Burgers has a movie .

Tonight on GeekNights, we talk about trains . (Not the X train ). Critically important in the era of radically accelerating climate change, trains are our future. In the news, Republicans are now the leading cause of death for kids in the US , Republicans have filibustered the gun bill from the previous mass shooting , and Twitter was fined for stealing your phone number to target ads at you .

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss how games monetize. How can you make money making games? We've done at least three panels around this topic: Monetizing Games and Game Design (PAX East 2012) , Money Making Games (MAGFest 2012) , and more recently The Real Harm of Games (PAX East 2019) .
In the news, the Rangers are still in the playoffs , Sony's Playstation Plus upgrade isn't going well , Arcs is coming from Patrick Leder (though it's unfortunately on Kickstarter ), Reggie Fils-Aime thinks the games industry needs to embrace unions , and Raven Software's QA team has unionized , despite Activision Blizzard's uncomfortable opposition .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider the fascinating art project x portable game console: Playdate . It's neat. In the news, the contest for Lord Stanley's Cup is underway, EA Sports loses FIFA , Bethesda finishes off their PC game launcher , Square Enix continues its long fall from grace by doubling down on a scam , Embracer is embracing a gaming empire , Overwatch 2 is very promising for competitive play thus far, and American fascists are destroying basic human rights in overturning Roe v Wade .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider tech debt . Where it comes from, what it means, and what you can do about it. Rym's made a career of owning and addressing the tech debt of legacy systems, and there aren't really "correct" answers here. In the news, Microsoft is offering an Edge VPN , Ukrainian drones are shockingly effective against the Russian Navy , and you should check your home to see if it has any of these strange old holes .
Also don't forget that the GeekNights Book Club is a thing!

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Tatsuki Fujimoto's one-shot manga Goodbye, Eri . It's 200 pages long, and it's absolutely worth reading. Especially starting at page 18. In the news, the YAOI Paddle resurrection was thankfully short-lived , AnimeNEXT has to cancel for a very good reason , Anime Expo's twitter was hacked by NFT scammers, Delicious in Dungeon is getting an anime , and The Orbital Children is a fantastic hard sci-fi.

Tonight on the GeekNights Book Club , we review and discuss N.K. Jemisin's fantastic The City We Became . It's a book about New York. And about cities.
The City We Became is a 2020 urban fantasy novel by N. K. Jemisin. Taking place in New York City (a setting in which we are heavily invested ), the City itself is in peril in a world where great cities become sentient through human avatars. After the avatar of New York falls into a supernatural coma and vanishes, a group of five new avatars representing the five boroughs come together to fight their common Enemy.
It's the first book in her ongoing The Great Cities series, but it is self-contained and well worth reading alone. We've discussed her work before in the book club with The Fifth Season (also 1000% worth reading)!

Tonight on GeekNights, we revisit the topic of hosting we last covered in 2006 . From simple web hosting to SaaS (Software as a Service), PaaS (Platform as a Service) and even Iaas (Infrastructure as a Service), a lot has changed. Amazon EC2 didn't even exist when we did that first episode. In the news, Vimeo moves further into B2B , Twitch pauses its "porn on the front page" feature , Amazon is reportedly censoring interesting words like "union" in its new internal app.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Offworld Trading Company . An RTS with a M.U.L.E. lineage, we're having fun with it and even playing some multiplayer. In the news, Pokémon Scarlet and Violet are coming, and the Playdate has a nice dev kit .
In much more somber and tragic news, since the last episode we made, Russia has invaded Ukraine in what can only be described as a naked act of imperial aggression.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Mamoru Hosoda's Belle . A beautiful film that deals with the disconnect (or the lack thereof) between the online and the real, we have previously reviewed Hosoda's Mirai , The Boy and the Beast , Wolf Children , Summer Wars , and One Piece 6: Baron Omatsuri and the Secret Island .
In the news, Amazon has ruined Comixology , Hayao Miyazaki's Shuna's Journey is being released in the US, and legendary mecha sesigner Kazutaka Miyatake needs help after suffering a tragic loss. In breaking and dire news, the governor of Texas has criminalized Trans children in a move that can be described as nothing less than openly fascist.

Tonight on GeekNights, we bring you the GeekNights Book Club: The Tale of Genji part 1. We have a lot to say, so we're splitting this one in two. The first episode covers our reactions to the work as fiction. This second episode covers the meta, structure, history, and anything else we had to say.

For those interested, the next book club book will be N. K. Jemisin's The City We Became .

Tonight on GeekNights, we bring you the GeekNights Book Club: The Tale of Genji part 1. We have a lot to say, so we're splitting this one in two. This first episode covers our reactions to the work as fiction. We'll save some of the meta conversation for a followup episode to come. You can use this handy chart to follow along.

For those interested, the next book club book will be N. K. Jemisin's The City We Became .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider anime music, particularly tv shows and OAVs. A good OST has more than just a rockin' opener or closer , it both enhances the show and stands alone. We cover some of the greatest, including Giant Robo , Initial D , Vision of Escaflowne , Revolutionary Girl Utena , Cowboy Bebop , and more. In the news, the under-appreciated and oddly prescient Dennou Coil comes to Netflix , and Scott has a geekbite on Ciguatera .

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Inscryption . It's worth the price of admission even if you don't know that it pulls a Frog Fractions . In the news, Rym beat Zelda II again for some reason, and Microsoft is acquiring Activision Blizzard for ~$70BB . Also remember to aggressively confront any company that even hints at supporting NFTs in any capacity. The pressure works. Poison that well .

Tonight on GeekNights, we talk about package managers . We've covered Linux package management specifically in the ancient past. In the news, Rym's gonna do the Tunnel Run once it's safe to travel again, Europe has better vaccination policies than the US , Canon reminds you that the chips in their printer ink cartridges are unnecessary , Zynga was worth $12.7 BB , a nefarious developer set off a logic bomb in two popular NPM packages , and the James Webb Space Telescope is extremely important .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider the science and the art of Sports Commentating . In the news, legendary sports commentator John Madden has died, The New York Times is buying The Athletic , a sports commentator made a terrible mistake that is somehow distantly related to this ridiculous nonsense , and United States President Joe Biden calls out the fascist coup attempt by Donald Trump and the American Republican Party directly.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review The Summit of the Gods (Le sommet des dieux). Directed by Patrick Imbert, it's a French adaptation of a Japanese manga written and illustrated by Jiro Taniguchi . A photojournalist's obsessive quest for the truth about the first expedition to Mt. Everest leads him to search for an esteemed climber who went missing. In the news, Naoki Urasawa is bringing several of his works to digital (in Japan only), Disney's Encanto (2021) is a fantastic musical, and Centaurworld is strangely compelling (and also a musical).

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss software libraries . Most of you are probably too old to remember DLL Hell , but you probably don't want to be proving how square roots are calculated just to calculate them in your program. In the news, Amazon has had multiple outages , the log4j zero-day is a nightmare , and VR is edging into the mainstream with its first real consumer maturity milestone.

Tonight on GeekNights, we bring you our Holiday Animation and Comics Gift Giving Guide 2021! What should you buy for that animation, comics, anime, or manga fan friend of yours? Not Funkopops: they've released something that's just vile in a long line of vile things . Arcane is one of the best cartoons Rym's seen in a long time. Makoto Shinkai's next film will be Suzume no Tojimari, and it involves clouds, sky, and doors. George Pérez is tragically at the end of his life . Macross Plus was in theaters , introducing a younger generation of fans to its particular dystopian nightmare.

Tonight on GeekNights, we present our 2021 GeekNights holiday technology gift guide! You can refer to our recent gaming gift guide as a companion to this. In the news, COVID vaccine boosters are fantastic , take heed as the Omicron variant poses a "very high" global risk , Streamlabs agrees to rename SLOBS after public outcry, we're running out of quarters , and we're running out of Twitter CEOs .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider our final thoughts on the Rebuild of Evangelion . Spoilers. Just tons of spoilers. Be warned. If you have never seen Evangelion, check out our review and our final thoughts on the original Neon Genesis Evangelion, as well as our (no spoilers) review of Rebuild of Evangelion . There are no more Evangelions.
In the news, Anime NYC is happening , and there are mixed reviews of the live action Cowboy Bebop thus far.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider Home HVAC: Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning . We've previously covered server room cooling , and the show is interrupted at the end by a classic . In the news, New York is taking some action on robocalls (though it's honestly too late at this point), people are upset that Microsoft is forcing Edge on Start Menu web search results , and Unity acquires Weta Digital .

Tonight on GeekNights, we review WarioWare: Get It Together! on the Nintendo Switch. The last time we talked about a WarioWare on GeekNights was back in 2007 when we reviewed the awful WarioWare Smooth Moves on the Wii. In the news, Konami lost the rights to some archival video they licensed, forcing them to take a number of Metal Gear Solid games down (contributing to the hellscape that is the intersection of copyright and gaming ), and Unpacking is a pretty cool game .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider documentation. Client documentation, user guides, service runbooks, developer notes, and the like. We've previously covered Documentation Systems , as well as in a game design lecture on game rules .
In the news, Rym finally dressed up as Zed from Zardoz , Facebook's name change to "Meta" isn't fooling anyone, a theoretical unicode-based attack on compilers is being patched, Roblox had a massive outage , and the LIRR is now able to run trains into Grand Central Terminal , a feat of engineering in the making since 1963.

This is also the 16th anniversary episode of GeekNights! We started on October 31 2005 , and we made "beta" episodes well before that !

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Denis Villeneuve's Dune (part 1). It's Dune. It's hard to imagine doing better at Duning on the big screen than this. Recall that we discussed Dune extensively on the GeekNights Book Club.
In the news, the Shiba Inu shitcoin is in the news due to a high volatility situation, you can buy 1/1000 of a Warhol for $250 after some clever people literally attempt to destroy its provenance , Facebook flees is toxic brand with a new name , Queens successfully opposed an upgraded fossil fuel power plant, and the NAACP is urging professional athletes to boycott Texas sports teams due to the extreme threat Texas has put American democracy under.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review the portal-inspired multiplayer FPS Splitgate . It's free to play, not pay to win, and if you ignore the non-game-affecting skinz and lootz it's definitely worth trying . In the news, the Advance Wars remaster is delayed , BlizzCon is canceled to be re-imagined , and you don't need a rumble pack for your N64 Controller . Also, the OLED Switch doesn't appear to be selling well , but that's not actually a problem for Nintendo.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider upgrades of and migrations between Operating Systems . We may need to consider that the concept of an Operating System has changed and continues to evolve as computer technology matures. In the news, Apple Day told us about new MacBook Pros and AirPods (plus how people apparently aren't actually using Siri), and a kid accidentally shot himself immediately after assembling a 3D printed gun .

Tonight on GeekNights, we discuss aliens and UFOs and such. The 90s were a wild time with alien autopsies and The X-Files . Nevermind real alien topics like the Drake equation , the Rare Earth hypothesis , or the Great Filter . In the news, avoid using computers in Missouri , IATSE will strike on October 18th unless their (extremely reasonable) demands are met, Kellog's workers and John Deere workers also strike as a new labor movement comes alive in America.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider a game design topic in the number of players a game supports. For this exercise, we only consider orthogames . We've talked about two player games before. The reality is that one player, two player, and three+ player games are fundamentally and formally distinct. A game that supports more than one of these groups is actually multiple different games for all practical purposes.
In the news, NIBCARD Games wins the Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming , the Diana Jones Award trophy is missing , the Actraiser remake is more than you probably expect, Metroid Dread is solid, and it's hard to imagine PAX South happening in Texas in January considering the state has now banned vaccine mandates in a manner that very likely includes events in the convention center.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider the Leopard that is social media. It is difficult to summarize the myriad ways that social media has materially harmed society despite its great promise. From Orkut to Facebook to Twitter, it's been a destabilizing force. In the (possibly too on-the-nose) news, Facebook had a major global outage today (see our episode on outages ), Facebook has a whistleblower revealing terrible revelations about the harm Facebook causes, a new tool can reveal who actually owns companies , and Europe is looking to (rightly) standardize on USB-C for charging electronic devices (much to Apple's discomfort).

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider gaming magazines. Notable mentions include Electronic Games , Nintendo Power , Dragon Magazine , Dungeon Magazine , Scrye (for those MTG prices), InQuest , GamePro , Game Informer , PC Gamer , Games Magazine , and more.
In the news, Asmodee is for sale for €2 BB , SEGA Genesis games are coming to the Switch (but you won't get the good controller in the US ), Activision Blizzard is still in deep shit including an $18 MM settlement , and they released their Diablo 2 remake during all of this.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider anime and comic magazines, including relics from an ancient past such as Newtype USA , Wizard, Animerica, and the like. In the news, Rym is enjoying Star Trek: Lower Decks (and you may too if you have even a passing interest in Star Trek), the live action Cowboy Bebop might be OK, and the monkey's paw has given us a hockey anime with Puraore! Pride of Orange .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider the archaic "computer magazine" that you may have heard old people talking about. From PC Gamer to Maximum PC to Computer Shopper, the pre-Internet was a wild time. In the news, Western Digital "My Book" users had all their data deleted in a convoluted story , Western Digital tried to trick people into buying inferior drives , Google's internal dysfunction led briefly to Google News failing for all Google Workspaces users , and Sir Clive Sinclair has passed away at 81 . Also Rym was nearly attacked by a crazy driver biking from Poughkeepsie to Queens on Sunday.

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Oath: Chronicles of Empire and Exile . It's a solid legacy game that's worth taking a look at. In the news, Rym finally played West of Loathing and is sorting out if we'll play Aliens: Fireteam Elite , The CEO of Broken Token steps down (but still owns the company...) after abuse and harassment allegations, the CEO of Tripwire steps down due to his abhorrent statements on abortion rights, and Twitch sues two individuals over ongoing racist and bigoted harassment rampant on their platform.

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider Superman . The Superman. Supes. This character casts a long shadow on global popular culture and storytelling, a modern myth. In the news, the Harley Quinn show is great, Lupin III Part 6 has Mamoru Oshii as a guest writer, Adventure Time: Distant Lands concludes with Wizard City , Keiichi Arawi has a new manga coming , and (spoilers) Lex Luthor finally gets it .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider Deathmatch games , particularly FPS deathmatches. Ostensibly beginning with Doom and Quake, the "genre" began already extremely refined, and frankly Quake 1 Deathmatch is literally worth playing today. In the news, Rym biked to Poughkeepsie again , Quake 1 got an update that makes multiplayer "just work" on modern PCs, China effectively bans minors playing online games , and tabletop game prices are going to skyrocket .

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider Apple, CSAM, and Privacy . Apple is under fire for its solution here, some have warned of its dangers , and other companies already do similar things . (It's worth noting that Apple is already doing this on iCloud Mail).
In the news, OnlyFans sells out its core user base , though the situation is more complex than it appears and other similar entities have complied with the rules that they ran afoul of . Meanwhile, Twitch is doing essentially nothing to curtail a massive wave of targeted attacks on minority and marginalized streamers, leaving them to use inadequate tools to solve a problem that Twitch is 100% responsible for. Join the boycott of Twitch on September 1st !

Tonight on GeekNights, we review Pokémon UNITE: the Pokémon MOBA. It's actually pretty fun, and it's a shame that it's microtransactional pay-to-win garbage . Only play it if you can play with friends who agree to never spend money, never grind, and never use any items.
In the news, the NHL Expansion Draft has released the Kraken, Activision Blizzard is rightly sued by the state of California for sexual harassment and discrimination , we join other games media in a complete blackout of all reviews or coverage of their games of any kind, as well as support their employees striking tomorrow , and Valve has released the Game Gear 2 (which they promise will run "the entire Steam library " at 30+fps)

Tonight on GeekNights, we consider the cartoons of Hanna-Barbera Productions , which were a staple of our 80s childhoods despite being largely from the 60s and 70s. From The Roman Holidays to Fantastic Max , they were a recycled staple of our youth. (Some, like The Good, the Bad, and Huckleberry Hound , are best forgotten entirely). In the news, Belle might be extremely good , Mamoru Hosoda has some thoughts on Miyazaki (and also worked on Utena credited as Katsuyo Hashimoto ), and the official Popeye twitter account is fantastic. Also Scott didn't know there was a live action Popeye movie staring Robin Williams and Shelly Duvall .