I have been playing videogames for at least 30 years now and I have never experienced anything like Pokemon GO. I took the family over to downtown Kirkland yesterday to hunt for Pokemon and we had a blast. It was amazing to walk around the waterfront and meet so many other people doing the exact same thing. A group of boys who saw us playing ran up and told us about a Growlithe nearby. We stopped to get some ice cream and I could hear people outside shouting about an especially elusive Zubat. Everywhere we looked we saw people catching Pokemon and not just that but talking with complete strangers about Pokemon. It was one of the coolest experiences I have ever had.

The nefarious payload of Pokemon GO: one of health, has already begun to yolk and swell its hapless victims. I feel strongly that there's a way to bring Pokemon Gyms into this paragraph somehow. Just, like, the idea of them. I'll consider my options.

My experience with the launch of Pokemon GO has been kinda rocky; sometimes it only wants to be a loading screen and not a game. Obviously, I respect its decision. Freedom is the right of all sentient beings. But it does make it harder to play.

I knew that something strange was going on when I saw that Gabriel had slunk onto Xbox Live. What strange force could compel him? It was Playdead's Inside, and they made Limbo back in the Cretaceous, so, you know. It's a pretty fuckin' strange force.

Inside is one of the best games I have ever played. It is a stunning experience that you have to play for yourself. I am hesitant to talk about it too much because I don’t want to spoil even a second of it for you. I will tell you that it is beautiful, clever, and surprisingly powerful. Games this good do not come along all that often. Don’t miss this one.

In real life, this conversation was held between Gabriel and Gabriel the Younger, and bore the feral cast of that clan. It seemed liked Tycho's faux erudition - considered "erudiction," removed it - might deliver the proper framework. But my son was not impressed with this false witness, texting me thus:

We've had this strip in the queue for awhile, but wanted to wait until after the season finale to deliver it. I know there are those who wait until the end.

We had initially considered a comic where the device in question simply cooled the vomit, or stores it in tanks; I made a play for something like a Fremen Stillsuit, where it refracted the vomit in the manner of a prism, a vomit prism, into rich oils suitable for nourishing leather and Clif Bars. It not in the strip! That is your indication that I did not succeed in my noble mission.

So starved for grist are the infinite screens of the Entertainment Beast that it must churn up the icons of a distant age, consume them, and disgorge them anew. Most of the time, it doesn't work. They've fucked up something, or misunderstood something; they take an opportunity to make a tin can telephone between generations and jam it down the shitter. Occasionally, very occasionally, you get Voltron: Legendary Defender.

I am mostly Kojima adjacent as a gamer. I feel strongly that I need to be aware of his movement and current location, like when you see a spider in the house; it's worthwhile to reserve a few cycles to store this data. I love to watch other people play them, and the strangeness - whatever might be said in the strip - is important. Not just where it is in his work, in its own context, but because of the people it inspires to see the state of play and be like, you know what? Fuck all that.

I know you have them - Qs that burn for our unrelenting, precision As. If only there were some kind of form you could put those in. Hmm. Hmmmm.

I finally had the opportunity to try out the Microsoft HoloLens. I’ve played around in pretty much every consumer virtual reality rig available (with the exception of the PSVR) and I love the idea of VR but they all make me a little sick. It varies from device to device but no matter if it’s the Vive or the Gear VR, I can’t go for more than about 30 minutes without getting queasy. I’d love to play VR games all day but something about the experience just doesn’t sit right with my human body. I think “mixed reality” like the Hololens might end up being better for me as I didn’t feel any of the discomfort I get with straight VR.

I am the sort of person who tries to match the cheese I am serving to the movie I’m showing when I have friends over. Or when I watch an episode of How I Met Your Mother alone. So it should come as no surprise that, on the rare week that we’ve released two new products at the same time, they’d share something in common.

I did my best, people. I did my best! I don't develop things, really; not games, in any case. I develop film occasionally. But even with my rudimentary knowledge of the form, I can establish with clarity that city simulation is not a talent housed primarily in the neck.

Here's the third Episode, which has the best promo ever. Thanks, Pat:

It never occurred to me that I should turn the deathcam thing off, but I guess it's not surprising that you can; there's far more granular options clanking around in there. Just for my own purpose, to track this over time, I will say that it's getting to the point where my Zarya is no fucking joke and Genji ("Genjamin Franklin") and that in my hands Genji continues to be an inscrutable, ineffective roboman.