The Sunday Papers

Sundays are for watching a delivery van reverse into a bollard. Before you hear the crunch, let's read this week's best writing about games (and game related things).

Over on BuzzFeed News, Sarah Emerson wrote about how someone stole Seth Green's Bored Ape which was supposed to star in his new show. Actor and producer (and Normandy pilot) Green succumbed to a phishing scam, and his ape jpeg was kidnapped. A very funny read.

“I bought that ape in July 2021, and have spent the last several months developing and exploiting the IP to make it into the star of this show,” Green told Vaynerchuk. “Then days before — his name is Fred by the way — days before he’s set to make his world debut, he’s literally kidnapped.” Green did not respond to a tweet from BuzzFeed News regarding the show.

For Kotaku, Claire Jackson wrote about why the Steam Deck needs a better screen. The Steam Deck could improve readability, but it's also an interesting look at how influential a change of device can be. For instance, I bounced off Hollow Knight on PC, but took to it straight away on Switch.

I was also curious how a device in my hands would influence my interaction with games such as Cyberpunk 2077, 2017’s Prey, Control, and Fallout 4, games with a lot of in-world documents to sift through. Previously in Fallout, I would always sigh a bit when I’d encountered a terminal. I wanted to appreciate the writing and world-building in these instances, but slowing down the pace of exploration wasn’t something I was as willing to do. On the Deck, sitting down with these terminals now feels much more native to the experience in a way that I think has to be felt to be really understood. Reading no longer feels like a break from the flow of the game.

James Vincent wrote about his visit to a factory that makes sophisticated humanoid robots on The Verge. Reminded me of the novel Klara And The Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro. Another great read by the way!

It’s these facial expressions that encapsulate Engineered Arts’ ambitions. “The human face is this massive bandwidth communication tool,” says Jackson. “You have a physical interface that people recognize.” As a species, we’re hard-wired to identify faces, but Ameca is so lifelike that it takes barely any effort to project intelligence where there is none. As Jackson prompts the robot to trot out some pre-programmed phrases, I reach up to see what the face feels like — and hesitate. Jackson reassures me that it’s not dangerous, but my worry was that it was disrespectful.

Over on PC Gamer, Christopher Livingstone wrote about Farming Simulator being a shockingly good esport. I've always heard good things about Farming Sim's esports scene, so this is the motivation I needed to give it a watch.

One of my favorite parts of the sport is that the two teams compete on separate maps, but they can still have an effect on the other team's progress. If one team uses the bridge that leads to the barn, that same bridge goes up on the other team's map for a few seconds, forcing them to either use another path or try jumping the bridge before it rises too high. If you didn't think watching a tractor cross a bridge could make your heart leap into your throat, and if you've never watched in awe as someone flings a couple bales of wheat through the upper window of a barn, then you've never watched farming esports before.

Music this week is HONEYMOON by Jo Hill. Here's the YouTube link and Spotify link. A summer bop that I'm totally obssessed with right now.

That's it for now, catch you next week folks!