Today I came across a leak/"leak" for the next 3D Super Mario game, which is allegedly dubbed Super Mario Titans. Here's part of the description being paired with some off-screen images;

"It’s called Super Mario Titans and it’s basically a full open world 3D Mario. every world you find a new ally and instead of them just following you around you actually level them up by doing platforming stages together. Once they’re strong enough they unlock this superhero Titan form and team up with Mario to take down that worlds boss and overcome platforming challengs (sic) in the open world."

And some of the images are majestic.

From what I can glean on the reddit threads and the GBA Temp forums, the vocal think it is fake, AI, blah, blah, blah. Then there is the other half of the vocal posters that are analyzing, defending, blah, blah, blah. I'm not here to really argue if this is a leak or a "leak." What I want to talk about is how I miss stories like this one.

Do you remember Sonic being unlockable in Melee? I'll never forget the "Grinch leak," so cleverly named for the Grinch ad in the periphery. I remember writing an analysis on the "leak" for The Last of Us Part II from E3 2016.

Okay, so all three of those examples were for fake leaks. There are classic leaks with larger implications than the next Smash roster, like the "adorably" all-digital Xbox Series X, or the infamous Insomniac leak, or the very real leaks for The Last of Us Part II. But there's something about these fake ones that I love and miss.

The fervor and discussion around leaks that may or may not be real? There's something far more enticing about blurry phone photos than a tweet from some prominent leaker. The are brazen—real or not! There's an audacity at both the person producing the photo and the information. In a way, the effort is much higher than just posting a thread and saying what you may or may not have heard.

If this is all fake, I say bravo! The ballsy craftsmanship on display is worth some applause. If it is real, I say bravo! The ballsy photography on display is worth similar applause. What is more impressive is that I find that big Nintendo games rarely leak in this fashion. I remember lauding the fact that the Switch 2 reveal may have had zero secrets for the hardware, but the game lineup was a mystery.

More impressive though is that the games haven't leaked. Perhaps the word is not "impressive," but rather that it is more exciting. If the Switch 2 is really due out in April (which feels shockingly soon and overdue at the same time), then the console is being manufactured right now. Of course the leaks are going to burst forth. Since all the first-party games are made, you know, in Nintendo, the control around the conversation is much more tight lipped. And why do we buy the hardware? To play the games!

When that control around the conversation breaks, it makes for a fun and speculative time. Oh, if we were still doing Millennial Gaming Speak, we'd have a fun time with this story.

Leaks have immense power to shape perspective. If you like the leak and it doesn't come to pass, you can become disappointed. Same happens when inverted. I think lots of folks forget to bring along their big chunks of salt to these conversations and revel in the fun of it.

This is not to say that leaks have devastating consequences. Look no further than horrific response to The Last of Us Part II leaking—those still haunt that studio to this day. Insomniac's entire business was laid bare. We know what that studio is doing for the next decade. If this Super Mario Titans is real, I know the team is crushed to have its surprise reveal have wind sucked out of its sails and not be able to respond.

But I'd be lying if I didn't say I had fun this afternoon poking around threads and gawking at the images. I had fun writing this very blog post! And now I will have more fun by leaning into conjecture mode and my two cents on this game if it is indeed real. Let's look at more of the supposed description of the game;

"Each world has warp portals that take you to more traditional tight platforming levels. Not like Odyssey’s quick little side rooms but more like full on 3D World style stages. You can instantly switch between Mario and your ally like the Lego games just by tapping a button. Beating these stages is how your ally levels up.
Some stages are locked until you have enough emblems so you have to explore the open world and collect them to unlock more levels.

Allies aren’t just for the stages. You use them all over the open world to reach hidden paths clear obstacles Mario can’t handle alone and open shortcuts."

Honestly, it sounds kinda sick. It's that nice fusion of Odyssey's transformations and Super Mario 3D World's multiplayer and character differences. Throw in a little Bowser's Fury's¹ kaiju boss battles and you got a neat sounding loop. I think the costumes and gimmicks look goofy, but feel inline with the costume element in Odyssey.

The main hook is the Titan superhero powers for Mario and the allies mostly used for bosses and big moments but the core of it is still classic Mario exploring worlds collecting emblems unlocking proper platforming stages powering up your crew and beating each world boss to grab the jewel.

I can see the multiplayer hook that Nintendo loves their Mario games to have. I see the evolution from the more recent titles. Beeg Koopa is clearly a successor to Beeg Yosh. I like it. I want to believe it. Only time will tell if it was all a hoax or a leak for the ages. Either way, I had a fun time and am looking forward to whatever the next 3D Mario game ends up being.

My buddy Tomas Franzese in his new newsletter—Remastered.

"Since the mid-2000s, each new live service success has enamored those with power in the video game industry, and investment in that kind of game increased. Yet, as new live services were being worked on, successful live service games continued to thrive, and their communities became ever more entrenched.

Each new challenger in the live service space faces a more daunting challenge than the last, and the threat of comparison to all the failures that have come before. I’ve seen people online jokingly refer to Highguard as 'Concord 2.' The next controversial live service game will likely be labeled 'the next Highguard,' and curse its chances at success in an already tumult-filled game industry."

When I talked about Highguard on Controlled Interests Gamecast #274 I described it as a game mode, not a game. I stand by that in the aftermath of its shutdown. The systems, world, and loop did not have the legs to stand amongst the Fortnites, Call of Duties, and Rainbow Six Sieges of the world. Sure, new games can enter and disrupt – I think Arc Raiders (and perhaps Marathon) – are doing that. There will always be those games that come along, but Highguard never was one of those and it was apparent from the moment you booted it up.

It closing the 2025 Game Awards just shown a spotlight on a mediocre/mid game. Now, to be fair, the wider gaming internet wildly overreacted and certainly did not help. But if you, ya know, played the game, you'd know it didn't have the sauce.

👋🏻

I've had a come to Jesus moment with myself and the balance of editing this Memento/TLOUPII essay. I've realized that I did not set a hard enough deadline and things with more urgency have come up. The video has to take a spot on the back burner while I clear the decks.

I know it sounds like an excuse or that I am complaining, but I'm not. The decks are good; even better—they are fun.

I haven't mentioned it elsewhere yet, but somehow, I ended up with a review code for Marathon. I have a wonderful obligation to review Bungie's latest. It doesn't hurt that it has awoken my long dormant Destiny-pilled brain. The itch to play hasn't been satisfied since launch.

Then, I've got episodes of Chapter Select to make about God of War: Sons of Sparta and Resident Evil Requiem. These take precedence due to a somewhat timely nature—not that our show is all that timely. RE9 is an honest-to-goodness wild ride and offers some of gaming's best kinds of moments. Sons of Sparta does not.

What a time to be me with my tastes in games!

It also bums me out though, because I have not been able to give this essay the time it deserves. I have given it some, but not all. And I don't think I can until these projects are complete. And I have been beating myself up over this for the past three weeks. My time does not feel managed well (see the fact it has taken three weeks to write this) and I was bumming myself out. I was feeling guilty for playing or preparing for a project that wasn't the essay.

And it just sort of dawned on me that I shouldn't be doing that. The video is gonna be great. And I have a strong drive to finish it. But, I didn't use the mighty tool that is a deadline to get it shipped out before these known incoming obligations/projects. When I accepted that, I felt better about everything everywhere all at once. I felt good about taking the time to complete runs in Marathon. I felt great about squeezing in a 90 minute session in RE9 last night, causing myself to stay up until midnight.

The decks will be cleared and my essay is waiting for me to come back in earnest. That's not to say I haven't done some editing. Last time, I was working on one of my favorite visuals and it involves Tenet and a PS3.

And, of course, I still suffer from the affliction that is "too many ideas to write about." Not sure what will be next, but I know I have good ideas. The challenge is turning them into a reality.

Until next time...

Grammarly turned me into an AI editor against my will and I hate it by Casey Newton

On one hand, it’s fine to suggest that writers incorporate more sensory details and scene-setting into their storytelling. On the other hand, though, why bother to launder such anodyne advice through the stolen persona of a writer like John Carreyrou?

The answer, of course, is that Carreyrou is a master craftsman whose authority as a writer speaks for itself. Grammarly, on the other hand, is a soulless machine-learning operation that is struggling to stay ahead of the further advances in AI that will make it irrelevant. Lots of people would love to write like Carreyrou; no one is striving to write like Grammarly.

Grammarly has since "disabled" the "feature."

This new debacle in the AI writing space reminds me of the superb video essay You are a better writer than AI. (Yes, you.).

I've never liked Grammarly. It never made sense to me when spellcheck and the like are so well integrated into operating systems. I recall one publication I wrote for requiring it be installed. The software was clunky, ugly, and invasive. I'm fairly sure I uninstalled it without telling them. This "expert" recommendation looks clunky, ugly, and invasive. I do find it hilarious that Grammarly would deploy recommendations from some of AI's biggest critics.

I would be more annoyed at Grammarly’s appropriation of my likeness, and the likeness of so many of my friends and other writers that I admire, if it weren’t for the sheer desperation evidenced by the move. A standalone writing assistant made for a fine business in 2009, when Grammarly launched; in 2026, it’s a commodity feature. Anyone with access to Claude, ChatGPT or Gemini can already get editing that makes Grammarly's core product look like a relic.

It's update day for the latest redesign of Max Frequency and I find myself thinking about this quote from Ben Thompson's announcement for Passport, his custom subscription software.¹

"Alan Kay famously said, 'People who are really serious about software should make their own hardware'; my variation is that creators who are really serious about building a career on the Internet should own their own software. I can now speak from experience when I say it’s one of the best feelings in the world."

While I didn't hire developers and spend ages building a custom tool for my business, I did have Claude Code build me a blog tailored to my needs and taste. It's the first time in my life that my blog is wholly my own.

It feels pretty great.

New CEO of Xbox Asha Sharma pushing the new messaging of "a renewed commitment to Xbox starting with the console..." out of the gate.

Great start to the morning with Team Xbox, where we talked about our commitment to the return of Xbox including Project Helix, the code name for our next generation console.

Project Helix will lead in performance and play your Xbox and PC games. Looking forward to chatting about this more with partners and studios at my first GDC next week!

The team also published a little logo teaser video.

Scorpio was a cooler name.

The takeaway here though is the confirmation that this will be some sort of hybrid machine to allow Xbox and PC gaming. My buddy Logan Moore pointed out to me though that this has the potential to paint themselves deeper in this corner. If Steam games work on this box, Steam gets the money from game sales, not Xbox. It's the same boat as Game Pass saying you don't need to buy our games, just subscribe for them.

But for me, the part I want to know is if this console will have a disc drive. The backward compatibility story that Xbox has written so well these last two gens is at risk if they offer no disc drive,

I'm getting more antsy about what Xbox's messaging will be this summer.

A new coat of paint is incoming to Max Frequency. Actually, it's a whole new chassis, and this time I figured it would be better to show it off first and then make the change. Behold, Max Frequency 5.0.

The blog roll is back baby!

And a little side-by-side for you.

Let me give you the tour this time before diving into the how this design came about.

Breaking Down the Redesign

Right away, the landing page style Home is gone. I never loved it. I "had" to use one given the nature of Obsidian Publish, my previous host. Since everything was launched out of markdown files in Obsidian, I needed a home page to anchor the digital garden approach that is core to the app. I suppose I could have done some huge long embedded note of all my other notes, but that'd be unwieldy and ugly.

To me, the core of a blog's presentation is the feed. ¹ It has been irksome to me to not have one. I tried workarounds like a dataview query that renders the 15 most recent posts and embedding that into the homepage. It's not the same. I think natural discoverability has been kneecapped for the last two years.

Beneath that "Latest & Greatest" list was another list idea that I implemented last summer dubbed "Previously On Max Frequency." The premise is simple—show a list of articles published on the day you're visiting the site from the past. In Obsidian Publish, that requires updating said list every day for the info to be accurate.

Of course, the new blog's list updates automatically. With the return of the blog feed, I couldn't put that list at the bottom, so I opted to put it on the right-hand side. I think it balances out the menu on the left. Actually, I tried to balance all four corners. The menu and the memories up top. The "Now Playing" music status and the fun little emoji and links on the bottom.

Let's zero in on the articles themselves.

We got a headline, the date, and another long-desired feature—a lil permalink icon. A feature I’ve admired for years on other blogs is this ability to send folks to the source when they click the headline and they can go to your permalinked version of the article by clicking a little icon.

This functionality feels so core to the big "I" Internet and blogging. I don't know for sure, but it must be a pillar behind the ideas like "retweets" and share posting. I want to point people to the source, not just my thoughts on said source. A recent example is this review about Mario Tennis Fever. I want my audience to go read Jake Steinberg's piece and I hope my gawking at it will point them to it. I also know people online want as little friction as possible. It couldn't be any easier than just clicking the heading in the blog roll. If you want my link, I wager your can figure it out. I'm trusting my audience with that one.

That's the core reading experience—low friction, up front, simple. How about older stuff? What about the things buried by the feed? That's where the Archive comes in.

Yeah. This is much, much better. No more folder hierarchy and spelunking my organizational structure. I wanted to give you a list of years, articles, and a search. Speaking of the search, it just takes you to Google. Lean and snappy without a need for some sort of searchable database on my backend. Why not just let the company that does this for a living handle it?

The URL structure here is straightforward too. The whole deal is at /archive. You can zero in on a specific year by clicking the links at the top or just by adding it to the url, /archive/2020. Want the month? Add that too, archive/2020/06.

Moving on down to the Podcasts page, we see the same solution to the archive applied to The Max Frequency Podcast. I had to just render the ten most recent episodes. Now, you get a simple list of them all. These pages act like a hub of sorts. This hub mentality is crucial for my Game Library and Game Notes.

Before, Game Notes just existed inside a folder; no structure beyond being alphabetized. My thought was always that the Game Library would be a hub page of sorts for the game and you could find my notes there. The Game Library itself has been a slow process to be sure, but this new blog gives readers a much easier to navigate collection. It's so much more visually appealing too. The art I was already using renders nicely on these tiny cards.

The pages for Memory Card, Chasing the Stick, About. Gear, and Now are all the same. Those are fairly static pages or I had already designed them the way I wanted within Obsidian and I don't feel they need a refresh.

A new page in the menu though is Feeds. A few months ago, I made a sort of master RSS feed by combining all my Max Frequency related feeds into one with RSSRSSRSSRSS. This page offers up all of those feeds individually for those into RSS.

Now, another grievance I have had with Obsidian Publish (and a big spur to giddy up this redesign) was the RSS feed support for Publish is abysmal. It fetches only the title, no body content. If I move a file to a different folder, then Publish would flood the feed with "new" old articles.² When I was fireballed last year, I got quite a few requests for the RSS feed—so much so that I added it to the Home page—even though I was embarrassed by Publish's performance.

I no longer need to be embarrassed because this transition has given me a full and proper RSS feed that works exactly like an RSS feed should. It looks great inside Current and NetNewsWire, but the looks are all the developers. I am so pleased to have this functionality back and not shamefully share my RSS feed.

One element of the new blog experience I haven't touched on yet is mobile. I am biased, but it looks great there too.

The blog feed takes center stage, of course. Appearance controls and the menu are in the upper right. Opening the menu reveals, yes the menu, but also the Now Playing music indicator. I kept the nav anchored to the right, since your finger just pressed the menu button to open it. No sense in making you then stretch across to the other side of the screen. If you click into an article and reach the bottom, that is where you will find the "Previously On" list, emoji, etc. I think the reading and navigation experience really lend themselves to mobile.

I considered iPad as well, at least my pink iPad we just bought a few months ago. Browsing on iPad is a fusion of desktop and mobile, so I was sure to make sure both worked automatically on iPad depending on the device orientation.

And that's it. I think? One big unseen element is fixing 170~ broken links and recreating all my podcast transcripts into markdown from PDF; much faster and lighter. There's plenty of smaller things too, like those popup footnotes and integrating lite-youtube-embed. There may be a "hidden" page or two. Overall though, the presentation of Max Frequency is in alignment with my tastes. I hope it is in alignment with yours too.

But how did I make it?

The How

Claude Code. That's the how.

Been working on a site idea at work and using Claude Code for that. It feels like everyone is out here making apps and projects with these agentic AI coders. I wondered, "Can Claude Code build me my dream blog? The blog I've been envisioning for the last 13 years?" Obviously, the answer is yes.

That question hit me one afternoon and I decided to try it out in the most vibe code-y way possible—while cooking dinner.

I finally used my MacBook Pro as a laptop and took it inside to run Claude Code while I cooked dinner for my family. Since it was a pure test and I gave it a small sample size, I was basically pressing ⌘ + ⏎ every few minutes. No risk at all. The first result was recognizable, but broken. More importantly though, this convinced me it was doable.

The next day or two was a hyperfocused blur of tuning and getting the site dialed in. Fervent back and forth with Claude. After getting the shape of it, I decided to spend the following days, weeks co-publishing to the platform and Obsidian Publish. You notice missing elements and breaks this way. For example, the RSS feed was only sharing blog posts, not podcasts, newsletters, etc., or how callouts were jank and the Game Library entries weren't formatting correctly.

The living with the blog is vital. I went to grab a link for friend and went to my Publish blog since that was the most accessible—it felt outdated and clunky. That's when I knew I chose the right direction.

Before wrapping up, I wanted to highlight some gains and losses here.

All right, the table is jokey, but true. The way I write Max Frequency has not changed. I could flip Obsidian Publish back on in 5 minutes and the site would be back in business. I could move to a different static site generator. Right now, everything is running through GitHub and CloudFlare Pages all for $0 from my $96 per year from Obsidian, which by the way, is due here in April...

While I am not locked into a platform or a service provider. I am locked into Claude for changes, improvements, and troubleshooting. That is a form of lock in. As ubiquitous as AI is becoming, I don't think it's too rigid a form of lock in. At this moment, the capabilities it has given me far outweigh the lock in cage. With everything I write still be markdown, I am not worried about needing to pivot somewhere else some day should I need to abandon this custom site.

Conclusion

In all of this, I went back and read my old posts on previous redesigns of the site. Two quotes from The Max Frequency 2024 Redesign stand out to me;

"That Spring I reached out in the Relay FM Discord to see if I could hire someone. I knew what I wanted – some sort of hosting from a service like Linode or something. My issue was my web programming knowledge capped off at the basics of HTML and CSS. I knew the destination, I just didn't know how to get there."

Moving everything to Markdown and Publish has given me something I've never had in all my years of writing online.

Flexibility. Freedom.

I have the flexibility to make my site look the way I (currently) want, without the need of a $300 tier to access Wordpress plugins. I have the flexibility to write and publish how I want. I have the flexibility to use the tools I want—and ignore the tools I don't.

I have the freedom to leave Publish at any time without losing my articles, links, or data. I have the freedom to not worry about mega-corporate owners selling my work from under me. I have the freedom to write and publish what I want, when I want.

I probably could never have afforded a developer. I remember being pointed to solutions, but not to someone who could take my plain speech and turn it into a website. Claude is that for me now.

The move to markdown and Publish did give me freedom and flexibility. I did have the freedom to leave when I wanted. I'm doing it now. Over the next day or two, this whole switch is going to take place. Who am I kidding, it'll happen tomorrow. The RSS feed is the same - https://maxfrequency.net/rss.xml - so that should update seamlessly for all you current subscribers. I don't know what will break or hang up. It might be a bumpier launch than I expect: That's why I wanted to tell you all first. Thank you for your patience. Please be excited for the new design.

I hope you enjoy.

Last Friday, Ryan McCaffrey had the scoop of all scoops for Xbox—Phil Spencer and Sarah Bond are out: Matt Booty ascends and Asha Sharma enters as the new Xbox CEO from Microsoft's CoreAI division. My initial reaction was a bit like this...

I wanted to write that day or weekend, but life got in the way and I knew that more would come out in the following days. There is much to glean inside the company when this all went down. The mess that Xbox has made of itself this generation becomes more clear in the aftermath of the restructuring.

That Friday was full of people assuming Sarah Bond was sidelined for an AI exec by Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella. For years, many have assumed that Bond would be the replacement for Spencer, including myself. Emails were leaked and Bond was only mentioned in Spencer's. This all seemed fishy to me and I was right. This story was meant for the following Monday and McCaffrey got the leak.¹

"Spencer, in his email to Microsoft staff, said in part: 'Last fall, I shared with Satya that I was thinking about stepping back and starting the next chapter of my life. From that moment, we aligned on approaching this transition with intention, ensuring stability, and strengthening the foundation we’ve built. Xbox has always been more than a business. It’s a vibrant community of players, creators, and teams who care deeply about what we build and how we build it. And it deserves a thoughtful, deliberate plan for the road ahead. 

'Today marks an exciting new chapter for Microsoft Gaming as Asha Sharma steps into the role of CEO, and I want to be the first to welcome her to this incredible team. Working with her over the past several months has given me tremendous confidence. She brings genuine curiosity, clarity and a deep commitment to understanding players, creators, and the decisions that shape our future. We know this is an important moment for our fans, partners, and team, and we’re committed to getting it right. I’ll remain in an advisory role through the summer to support a smooth handoff.'

Tom Warren at The Verge got the back half of the scoop with the inside look at the shake up and the weekend that ensued following IGN's report.

"Spencer’s decision led to months of careful successor planning. It was announced to the world on Friday, but it was supposed to be today. Microsoft was forced to announce early because it started to leak and IGN was planning to run a story, according to sources familiar with the situation.

That kicked off a day of chaos..."

I remember a lot of heated discussion around Bond's LinkedIn post looking like she was out of the loop. I knew Bond doesn't manage her own LinkedIn (although she might be now), and this was just a casualty of reporting. I couldn't imagine a world where this succession wasn't planned and known by all major players involved and I was right.

In early 2024, there were departures at Xbox that caused the command chain to funnel more directly to Bond, herself recently promoted to the president of Xbox. This included the Chief Marketing Officer. Warren with the internal vibes;

"That meant the Xbox marketing team was now reporting directly to Bond. A month later, Microsoft delivered a marketing campaign that signalled people didn’t need to buy an Xbox console anymore. The message was that 'you don’t need an Xbox to play Xbox,' because games were available through Xbox Cloud Gaming on TVs.

This was all part of the 'Xbox everywhere' strategy that Bond had been pursuing, a vision to move the Xbox brand beyond its roots in console hardware. Months later the “This is an Xbox” campaign launched, with commercials that positioned a phone or a tablet as an Xbox instead of just a console. It was a confusing campaign, and I’m told it offended many Xbox employees internally."

It offended many people outside of Xbox. The writing was on the wall all gen though, as I have written about.

"The pivot away from console, led by Bond, under Spencer’s direction, hasn’t gone well for Xbox. Microsoft’s Xbox hardware revenue has declined for three financial years in a row, and it looks like those declining revenues are going to continue throughout fiscal 2026."

You don't say?

While focusing on Xbox as a publisher and service, instead of a console with a library of games, Xbox leadership's eye was off the ball with the supply chain and AI's rabid consumption of RAM, GPUs, and silicon—a rabid consumption that their parent company frenetically feeds.

Warren's piece and quotes from folks inside put Bond as the muscle behind the push for cloud, mobile, etc. I believe it, but "the pivot away from console, led by Bond, under Spencer's direction..." is the key to me. She may have been the face, but Phil has for years championed cloud gaming, mobile, etc. I mean, this is the guy that green lit Gears Pop! and was no doubt looking at King and Candy Crush as sweet additions to the portfolio during the Activision Blizzard acquisition. Do not be fooled—the pivot away from console was Phil.

“I don’t think it’s ‘hardware agnostic’ as much as it’s ‘where you want to play,’”

Which makes Sharma's email to the team more striking. She says all the right things, top to bottom, with a top three of "great games," "the return of Xbox," and the "future of play."

"We will celebrate our roots with a renewed commitment to Xbox starting with console which has shaped who we are."

I mean, to be fair, there's at least one more Xbox console in the wings. It's been talked about and teased for years now. Last summer they announced the multi-year AMD deal for custom silicon, which is crucial in this day and age of consoles.

"This week, Xbox announced it is actively building its next-generation lineup across console, handheld, PC, cloud, and accessories. As part of this, Xbox unveiled that it has entered into a strategic, multi-year partnership with AMD to co-engineer silicon across a portfolio of devices, including future first-party consoles and cloud."

My favorite part of Sharma's email was this;

"To meet the moment, we will invent new business models and new ways to play by leaning into what we already have: iconic teams, characters, and worlds that people love. But we will not treat those worlds as static IP to milk and monetize. We will build a shared platform and tools that empower developers and players to create and share their own stories. 

"As monetization and AI evolve and influence this future, we will not chase short-term efficiency or flood our ecosystem with soulless AI slop. Games are and always will be art, crafted by humans, and created with the most innovative technology provided by us."

That last paragraph was clearly crafted to target the immediate backlash her previous position brought with it. Back to Warren with insider concerns;

"Some Xbox employees worry she’ll force AI into everything Xbox does, but Sharma was clearly ready for that reaction."

I mean, Microsoft is their parent company. A year ago Xbox announced a generative model for gameplay dubbed Muse that I have meant to write about now for apparently a year. AI is taking the technology and gaming industries, let alone the world, by storm. I will say, the gaming communities absolute total rejection of the technology is ridiculous. There are untold gains and benefits to be had with the capabilities that AI brings. The important element is to use it for what it is—a tool.

I think a prime example of this was last year's overhyped "indie" darling Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 where the use of AI in its development was revealed after it won hearts and awards. Doesn't make the game any less good knowing the dev team of 30~ people used some AI tools along the way. The community seemed to do a total 180 and bite back. Absolute ridiculousness.

Jez Corden over at Windows Central actually got to interview Sharma and Booty. The latter's statement to about AI and wrongly speculated "mandates" rings true to me.

"'Just as a group, game developers are always eager to adopt new technology. When Photoshop showed up, it took about one month for it to appear in every game studio on the planet because it was so useful,' Matt noted that Xbox's goal is for AI to be additive and supportive, rather than disruptive on its teams. 'What I hear throughout our studios: it is the people, our artists, our coders, the writers — they're doing the creative work. In my experience, any time there's a new technology, what happens is there's a need for more specialists, new specialists. It raises the bar on what the expectations are for the quality of the games.'"

Back to Sharma and her leadership sensibilities.

"Xbox notoriously ditched any form of exclusivity on its games, shifting units to PlayStation paying little mind to the criticisms that it reduces the need to actually buy an Xbox. Sharma told me that nothing is off the table when it comes to revising Xbox's strategy — but finalizing the strategy will take time, and data parsing...

"'...Right now, I need to learn, candidly. About the 'why' of these decisions, what we were optimizing for, and what the data says about the Xbox strategy today. That's the honest answer. I'm looking at lifetime value, not just what happened in a previous moment, or in short term efficiencies and things like that. The plan's the plan until it's not the plan.'"

One can only hope that this means the end of advertising everything is an Xbox. If you are a jack of all hardware, you are the master of none. It does make me wonder how the decisions for the next Xbox made back with Spencer and Bond will be compatible with the new leadership and however they decide to steer the ship. Perhaps the rumored "don't call it a delay" delays due to parts shortages will be a blessing in disguise—if the Series consoles can survive that long. Microsoft may need to eat crow to keep the new box price as low as possible.

Booty was even so bold as to claim that Xbox is committed to being a first-party developer and company, despite porting everything everywhere all at once.

"We're committed to being a first-party games publisher in partnership with our first-party platform team."

That I will believe when I see. But Sharma continues to say the right things, emphasis my own;

"I will listen, I will learn, I will communicate what we're seeing, and what we're doing. I think from here, the work is proof over promise. Matt and I are in it, every hour of every day of every night, I am fully in this thing. This team has brought it back before, and I'm here to help us do it again."

Xbox was dying on the vine before this shake up. It has been poisoned by decisions made to control the living room. It has been drowned by the billions of dollars poured out in acquisition. It has had studios—new and old—wither into oblivion.

The immediate future shows signs of life though. For the first time in ages, Halo, Gears, Forza, and Fable come out in the same year—from teams that make superb games to boot!² This change in leadership may just be fertile ground that Xbox the company, the brand, and the community need. It's a wake up call. Time to see how Sharma and Booty will answer.

I started building Current before I had the words for why.

The impulse was simpler than a philosophy: every RSS reader I tried made me feel bad. Not because the apps were ugly or broken (most were quite good) but because they all seemed to agree on something I didn't. That reading the internet was a task. That articles were items to be processed. That falling behind was a failure state.

I admit that I literally treat my RSS reader of choice—NetNewsWire—as a task list. I let the badge sit there on my home screen, pestering me with its shameful hue. Beneath lie articles I want to read or share here on the blog. I've let things sit for months before I finally have had enough of the guilt and confess to myself that I will never get around to that essay or that article or that story.

When I read Tyler Godier's essay about his new RSS reader Current, it resonated.

"The main screen is a river. Not a river that moves on its own. You're not watching content drift past like a screensaver. It's a river in the sense that matters: content arrives, lingers for a time, and then fades away."

I've bought Current and replaced NetNewsWire on my home screen to give it the proper test.

There is relief.

This is the feature I'm most proud of, and the one I spent the longest agonizing over.

Most RSS readers present sources as feed URLs in a sidebar. Daring Fireball. kottke.org. Hacker News. Just names in a list, undifferentiated from each other and from the content they produce.

But some of those aren't publications. They're people. A person writing from their blog is fundamentally different from a news organization publishing articles. The relationship is different. The expectation is different. The feeling should be different.

I find it rare to read about such thoughtful application design these days. Now in the midst of a proverbial tsunami of vibe coded, personal apps (which I am doing myself to great effect), Godier's essay sings with intention.

There is some finickiness, like having to toggle off fetch feed to enable fetching from the site or the mystery of summoning the feed settings on iOS (is it a long press? A double tap? I'm not quite sure.), iCloud syncing isn't working for me, and the macOS app has ye old harsh, hard corners, but all of that really doesn't bother me when it comes to the reading experience.

It's pure and simple. I can just scroll past the news articles from VGC that I don't care about. Those I do want to read, the fetch from site means I don't have to leave the app. That is seriously slick. Every bit of presentation and core functionality is thought out.

I am checking my RSS reader less and more intentionally. I'm actually reading the stuff I want to and "releasing" those I don't. If I leave an article and it goes away over time, I don't mind. If it is important, it will come back to me.

Give the essay a read and if it speaks to you like it did to me, then I think Current will be worth your $10.

I am not pleased to report that the Resident Evil franchise remains as horrifying as ever.

One may have watched John Linneman's excellent Resident Evil Requiem review yesterday and been flabbergasted by the gains the PS5 Pro had over all other consoles. Turns out that the secret sauce was the anticipated new version of PSSR.

Mark Cerny broke the news on the PlayStation Blog.

"We’ve been hard at work on a new version of PSSR, which takes a very different approach to not only the neural network but also the overall algorithm. We are happy to share that Resident Evil Requiem – shipping today – is the first title to use this more advanced PSSR, which is helping to keep both frame rate and image quality high."

While the blog post doesn't give much, there is an answer to prayers (and predictions) near the bottom.

"There will also be a system software update at that time; selecting “Enhance PSSR Image Quality” in Settings on PS5 Pro will allow you to experience the new PSSR with any PS5 Pro games that currently support PSSR!"

For a more detailed breakdown, you know the DF crew has you covered.

What stood out to me was how PSSR 2.0 sits in between FSR 4.0 and DLSS 4.5 in certain scenarios. When you remember that PSSR is being optimized for couch and console gaming, the trade-offs make more sense. To me, Resident Evil Requiem appears to be the first game that is a must play on PS5 Pro. If I didn't have one already, I'd do my darnedest to make it happen. I cannot wait to start it up tonight.

👋🏻

It has been quite the 10 days since my last letter to you all. The opening sections are getting tighter. I am feeling good about it. I think I am ready to record the next section and expand the timeline. I am enjoying this chapter by chapter approach to the edit. It's full of little wins, which I take any way in a project like this. Here's the timeline as of this morning.

That's a big improvement over last time.

I must confess though; I did not get as much done on the essay last week as I had hoped or planned. Mid-week, I became hyperfocused on redesigning my blog with Claude Code. The "brain hooked up with jumper cables to a car battery inside a dunk tank" kind of hyperfocus. It took over my mornings and evenings. But I have banged it into pretty remarkable shape in those few days. I'm going to live with it for a few weeks, bang out kinks, and flip a switch in March at some point.

I've talked about using AI as an intentional tool here before and this applies. It's at the point where I can write in plain English what I want and the robots can code the site for me. I've been able to pull in each little bit and idea I have wanted to implement for years, but have never been able to on Wordpress, Squarespace, or Obsidian Publish or been able to figure out on my own. It's sort of blogging dreams come true.

This diversion though has taken time away from The Thing™ and I feel pressures mounting. I just rewatched Everything Everywhere All At Once over the weekend with a movie club and it feels sorta like that. The surprise drop of a new God of War game and this weekend's release of Resident Evil Requiem having me diving into the extra episode deep end of Chapter Select. And don't get me started on Marathon launching a week later for which I have had a super compelling essay idea for and am getting the itch to write.¹ Of course, there's the whole blog tangent. Then and then and then and then...

It makes brains like mine ratchet up. One game at a time; one essay at a time; one podcast; one completely rewritten website. (Can I end two newsletters back to back with the same type of sentence?)

Until next time...

This is the best review I have read in ages. This one is going to stick in my brain like Kirk Hamilton's Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs review. Not because it leans into a comedic gimmick, but because Jake understands Mario Tennis Fever on a core level and communicates to those that do not in a profound manner.

Out of fear of quoting the entire thing, I have forced myself to pick one quote. Please go read the rest.

"Of course, not every player leans into traps. Some abandon them entirely in favor of rackets that extend reach, randomize bounces, or drive opponents deeper into the back of the court. They wager on pressure instead of obstruction. This choice is equally as expressive. These players refuse the flourish of obvious traps on the battlefield for something colder: they let you defeat yourself."

Toy Story 5 | Official Trailer

"The toys are back and this time, Buzz Lightyear, Woody, Jessie and the rest of the gang's jobs are challenged when they come face-to-face with Lilypad (voice of Greta Lee), a brand-new tablet device that arrives with her own disruptive ideas about what is best for their kid, Bonnie. Will playtime ever be the same?"

As the parent of a three-year-old and a husband of a middle schooler teacher, I know all too well the impact screens and devices have on young minds. It's a fitting subject for Toy Story to handle, I think.

And man, you gotta love seeing the gang back together. Toy Story 4 wrecks me in all the right ways. Heck, my sister-in-law asks for it any time I watch her because she know it makes me cry. She thinks that's funny.

Sony Shuts Down Video-Game Studio Bluepoint by Jason Schreier for Bloomberg

Sony Group Corp. is shutting down Bluepoint Games, the PlayStation subsidiary responsible for developing remakes of video games such as Demon's Souls.

Roughly 70 employees will lose their jobs amid the studio closure, a PlayStation spokesperson said, writing in a statement that the decision was made "following a recent business review." Bluepoint will officially shutter next month.

And a little follow up from Jason's Bluesky account;

Bluepoint was working on a God of War live-service game until it was canceled early last year. The studio then spent the last year pitching and trying to determine what it would do next.

Bluepoint was the best to ever do it—and by it I mean remaster and remake the classics.

Looking at their Wikipedia page, I am surprised at how few games they worked on, but the pedigree of the titles is unparalleled. You got God of War, Metal Gear Solid, Uncharted, Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, Demon's Souls. not to mention support and ports for Titanfall, Flower, PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale, and God of War: Ragnarök.

It is such a shame that Sony bought them back in 2021 just to send them off on a live-service ghost hunt and then axe their project and the studio five years later. This whole live service ghost is going to be the haunt behind Jim Ryan and Hermen Hulst's tenure at the head of PlayStation.

Pour one out for Bluepoint tonight and put on this banger as you drink the sorrow away.

Well, 2026 is shaping up to be a good year for Chapter Select. We just wrapped Season 7 - Metroid Prime not long ago, which is a win in and of itself. We were about to dive into Rondo of Blood for Season 8 - Castlevania, but then Sony made some announcements. Let's dive into the podcast specific ones and how the show is going to look in the short term.

Going Back to Greece and Raccoon City

Now, our plan was always to dive straight into Resident Evil Requiem and play that for Season 5 - Resident Evil. Thankfully, knowing its date for so long has prepared us. The shake up we didn't foresee was the shadow drop of God of War: Sons of Sparta, the new 2D "Metroidvania" God of War prequel.

So we've gone back to Greece and are trying to beat that before Requiem. You'll get those special episodes as soon as they are done. And then we will dive into Rondo of Blood.

What about Pokémon?

We do suspect that the next generation of Pokémon will be announced here at the end of the month with a release window of this fall/winter. We will of course dive into those as well. Logan is trying to will a Paper Mario game in the year too and I don't know if I can handle all this madness. 😅

Will We Ever Play Castlevania?

Yes! I promise! We have been encouraged by finishing Metroid Prime and the average play time of these games. It doesn't hurt that a brand-new game was just announced for the first time in 12 years too. Selfishly, I'd like to get cooking and release as close to the 40th anniversary as possible, but I don't want to count wall turkeys before they are cooked.

Where is the Behind The Scenes article for Season 7?

You caught me. I haven't written it yet. I do have a rough rough outline, but honestly, I don't feel like writing it. Is that a bad thing to admit? I really didn't take the greatest notes over the course of the two years this season took to produce. Memories have faded. I'm not sure how valuable this would be. Perhaps I will roll up my sleeves and write something—I do hate the idea of break tradition—but it might take a slightly different shape. We shall see.

Rules for Indie Filmmakers, according to NIRVANNA THE BAND THE SHOW | TIFF

I have seriously jacked up my YouTube algorithm by falling down the Nirvanna the Band The Show rabbit hole before seeing Nirvanna The Band The Show The Movie last week. I'm kind of okay with it though.

This show and the run and gun approach reminds me of making videos and movies as a kid. There's something ethereal there that tickles a nostalgic part of my brain without being commercial. These lads have the sauce.

I like this interview though. Their energy and dynamic is contagious. Creativity comes out of restraint, know the rules to "break" them, and use what you got.

Also, happy Update Day everyone.

Apple Podcasts – Spotify – YouTube – Direct Download

"In this episode, Jerrad and his guests recap the brand new PlayStation State of Play, discussing what the highlights and lowlights of the presentation were. The topic of the show centers on gaming blindspots as the guys discuss which games or franchises they haven’t touched, for one reason or another. Lastly, covering what they played this week, Max and Mike discuss their experience with Highguard and how they’re feeling after learning that almost the entire development team was laid off earlier this week. Jerrad quickly provides impressions and explanations of Drop Duchy, Winter Burrow, and the newly released critical darling, Mewgenics."

Always a pleasure to chat with Jerrad and nice to have essentially back-to-back chats with him. It was a total surprise to me that my dear friend Michael Ruiz would also be on the show.

We had a great time chatting about the State of Play hours after it aired. I loved our discussion about Highguard too, which things are not looking great for these days. Give the show a listen and if you want more thoughts on the State of Play, here you go.

Well, Sony's February 2026 State of Play was slammed. Before talking about the announcements that hit home for me, we must focus on the biggest news—my PlayStation 2026 predictions remain intact.

"Saros from Housemarque, Marvel's Wolverine from Insomniac, Marathon from Bungie, and MLB The Show are the only first-party PlayStation Studios developed games released in 2026."

I won't lie, that Horizon Hunters Gathering announcement last week had me nervous.¹ No commitment there though makes me feel slightly better. I wonder if and when Sony decided to cut the reveal from the State of Play.

The opening slate of reveals were decent, a strong start for a wider audience with the likes of a Kena sequel, Ghost of Yōtei Legends, and maybe 4:Loop, but I locked in for yet another Resident Evil Requiem trailer. Capcom is on the verge of spoiling too much before launch in two weeks, but man does that game look incredible.

Some more strong, diverse titles filled the next chunk. It's both unbelievable and believable that Dead or Alive 6 Last Round has jiggle physics in photo mode.

Control Resonant looks weird and wild. The Inception-style walls and being able to walk on buildings seems like a super daunting mechanic to create. Feels like a mind bender for sure. I need to hurry up and play Quantum Break...

Even more stuff that appeals to people other than me. It is strange to see Game Freak make a super stylized 3D action game, but go them. That Shinobi Ops game has a unique camera perspective, but that's about it as far as I can tell. I want nothing to do with that chicken man game. Star Wars: Galactic Racer looks neat. It's cool to see them go back to racing in a very Motorstorm / Burnout sort of way. 007 First Light looks more and more polished. I hope IOI sticks the landing.

Then, out of seemingly nowhere, Konami comes in and takes this State of Play to a whole new plane of hype starting off with the confirmation that Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is finally, finally free from the prison of the PS3 and its Cell Processor. I replayed the game six years ago (gosh how has it been that long already?) during that COVID-furloughed spring. Skimming through that article, I do wonder how the iconic loading/installation screen will be handled or if we will have lost it in the aged of SSDs. Peace Walker is here too, but even more exciting is the inclusion of Metal Gear Solid: Ghost Babel. I do wish there was one more game in here, especially considering how packed Vol. 1 is—something like Rising Revengence or even just round it out with Ground Zeroes and Phantom Pain. The Acid titles would have been neat.

Be still my heart because Konami revealed the first new Castlevania game in 12 years, and it is 2D from the folks behind Rogue Prince of Persia and Dead Cells. Belmont's Curse looks slick as all get out and, once again, procrastination pays off for Chapter Select.

Silent Hill: Townfall looks spooky. I get Alien Isolation vibes from the little handheld CRT. The fog looks good bathed in red light. The Silent Hill franchise is a huge blindspot for me. I own a copy of the Silent Hill 2 remake, but that's it and still in the shrink wrap. Konami is in the midst of a renaissance with Silent Hill it seems and I don't hear anyone asking them to stop.

Saber Interactive has the rights to a John Wick game. I liked the trailer and hope the game takes heavy inspiration from Sifu, which has always screamed John Wick to me.

Marathon's launch trailer and "server slam" announcement are pure hype.

I missed this bit in the stream due to issues, but Panic and House House's Big Walk played their original gameplay trailer from 8 months ago. I guess the announcement was that the game is coming to PlayStation? While a bit disappointing, I think the game itself is interesting. Reminds me of The Witness but for friends. I don't think this is a surprising take, but proximity chat is having quite the moment in the gaming space lately. I am curious about the mechanic and suppose my first exposure will be Marathon here at the end of the month.

Marvel Tōkon Fighters gave us sweet, sweet X-Men footage and a date. Too many fighting games are out that seem super cool to a guy who never plays them outside of a Mortal Kombat game with his wife every few years.

The whole State of Play wrapped up with a pair of God of War announcements and, upon reflection, I'm not sure they were the slam dunk most people felt they were. Sony Santa Monica revealed that they have begun development on a God of War remake of the original trilogy. That's cool and all, but with not even a lick of footage or concept art, all we are left with is speculation. Is it going to adopt the camera and combat of the PS4/5 games or stick with the top down camera? Is TC Carson, who was in charge of this whole closer, re-recording the lines? What's going to be the approach to Kratos' attitude and violence? In all seriousness, will the sex mini-games and flagrant scenes be redone or axed? The industry has shifted so far from that type of presentation that I actually think it would feel out of place these days.

Sure, in the Valhalla DLC, SSM got to play with Greek architecture and enemies. I loved the look and music. The franchise is one of my all time favorites—and you don't have to go far to hear why. I find it difficult to get excited without knowing and seeing more.

More concerning is, why is Sony Santa Monica announcing that this trilogy is entering development now? Where is Cory Barlog's new game? What about the assumed new God of War game because surely there is more given how well the last game sold and that the studio has not stopped making these games for 20 years? I feel like they got the order of the announcements wrong. I want more than a logo.

That wasn't all though. A brand new 2D, metroidvania God of War prequel was shadow dropped called God of War: Sons of Sparta, which I seem to always want to type as "Songs of Sparta." It's made by Mega Cat Studios, who I want to call "Mad Cat Studios." The game's story was written by the team behind God of War (2018) and Ragnarök. I don't dig the art style, at least up close. I booted the game up last night and it looked better from my couch. The game feels a bit odd to me, like something that would have come out in the PS3 era. The last time Kratos was in 2D was in Shovel Knight and before that was a mobile Java game–God of War Betrayal–which is canon. I am reminded of when Metroid Fusion and Metroid Prime came out at the same time, except the classic title in this scenario is just a JPEG and probably 4-5 years away.

The State of Play was good stuff with the proper ups and downs of an E3 press conference. It was much bigger than I think anyone anticipated, certainly myself. Somehow, 2026 is poppin' off more and I am here for it. My biggest takeaways are Marathon looking like absolute fire, a brand new 2D Castlevania game from a studio that seems to understand the genre, and that God of War finds itself stuck in the Asphodel Meadows.

👋🏻

You ever just stare at a timeline and think "How am I going to fill this up? There is so much to do. Maybe I'm not cut out for this..." That was me a couple of days ago.

I see all that blank space as a daunting wall to scale or an amorphous digitized bonsai tree and I have no clue how to trim it up into the shape it is meant to be. A big hangup for me this go around is all the film footage. It feels like it requires an entirely different style and structure than a game essay. I've watched countless film essays, but how do I make one? Not to mention the DMCA dance...

The creative process is fraught with doubt and distraction. My mind wanders, suggests completely unrelated tasks that must be done now for surely they are more important than the time I carved out to edit a video. All matters are more pressing than making The Thing™ in the dawn of the day.

But you just stare at the screen for some amount of time that is never as long as it feels and then you make a decision. "Well, I need a title here. Let's do that." "Oh, this is where the interview clip will go. Plop it in and tighten it up later."

I know I've been on an Anne Lamott kick thanks to Bird By Bird. It's what I do. I fixate. I see said fixation everywhere. Just take it as a sign to read the book. Or a sign that I am cracked. The namesake of the book though is this story about Lamott's older brother cramming an assignment about birds he had a month to work on in one night. Been there. Done that. The story is the excerpt on the back of the book.

"We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead."

Sounds familiar.

"Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother's shoulder, and said 'Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird."

Bit by bit; bird by bird; clip by clip—it's all the same.

It's not much more, but it is more.

Until next time...