Max Roberts' home on the internet.
In a slightly surprising move to me, KPop Demon Hunters is coming to the Criterion Collection this November. While familiar with the films' insane popularity, my only exposure to it was my buddy's daughter fast forwarding to the end to show me her favorite song one morning over breakfast. I haven't had a Netflix subscription in ages and never figured this one would be on my radar. Then I read the…
Tucked away at the bottom of Pokémon FireRed Version and Pokémon LeafGreen Version Link with Pokémon Home This October , The Pokémon Company and Game Freak has announced the end of Pokémon Bank : Pokémon Bank , a Nintendo 3DS application that lets players deposit or withdraw Pokémon they have befriended in Pokémon titles on that system from online Boxes, will be ending service on Thursday,…
After years of saying "I'll watch that some day," I finally committed to watching all 24~ some odd hours of Double Fine's and 2 Player Productions' doco series on the creation of Psychonauts 2 . Yes. It is essential viewing if you care at all about how games are made and the people behind the bits and bytes. Before I share my tiny list of tidbits, my biggest takeaway is this: Xbox saved Double…
I have beef with God of War: Ragnarök . I've been a fan of God of War for over 15 years, from way back when I sat in one of those curved GAMER chairs in a Best Buy and ripped Helios' head off in a demo for God of War III . I christened my seventeenth birthday by marching into a GameStop and purchasing three God of War games (and Animal Crossing: City Folk ). I have an entire season of Chapter…
John Gruber linked to a Q&A with Simon Willison about writing a blog from Cynthia Dunlop's " Write That Blog. " How's all that for a little blog linking soup? Links aside, I found the article and Gruber's commentary encouraging and timely. From Willison: "My number one tip for blogging is to lower your standards! Aim to hit publish while you are still actively unhappy with what you have…
Retraction: The App Store Rejection of the Week That Was, in Fact, a Correct Rejection by John Gruber To the best of my recollection, this is the first post I’ve retracted in the 24 years I’ve been writing Daring Fireball. I hope it’s the last. I was misled, both overtly and through omissions, in several ways, but what I publish is my responsibility, and I apologize for the error. This is how you…
Casimir Liberski has produced two of the finest The Legend of Zelda inspired jazz albums I have ever heard—and I listen to a lot of Zelda jazz and lo-fi. The Z Suites and Zelda Suites (The Live Album) are instant additions to the daily music and writing rotation. Thanks Kottke for the notice . Tangentially related: It's been a very good season for new music for me and my listening habits. We got…
Louie Zong with this sublime concept album. Not a surprise either since Louie made another favorite concept album of mine— It's Black Friday, Charlie Brown . Louie clearly understands the feel and sound of his banger ideas. You can download them on Bandcamp , but I definitely recommend checking out the video for Nintenhogs.
Tomas Franzese returns to the show to chat about his newsletter Remastered, being the weekend editor at Polygon, and help determine if Xbox or PlayStation is going to win the battle for "Which Company Can Be the Worst?" throughout 2026.
Not even a week and we got them there updates and lessons. Biggest lesson that I am sure all programmers learn in programmer school— Test your app on multiple machines . Aka my 1.0.1 didn't even run on other Mac computers. Doh. That was hastily fixed this morning with 1.02. And then the idea brain got thrumming again and I added a built-in way to check for updates and a proper and customizable…
The oddest Paper Mario of the series. The 2D to 3D mechanic is novel and was exciting as a kid, but the approach turned the core gameplay into an light action platformer and not a turn-based RPG. It's humor feels "meme-y" and contextual, not timeless.
Lost in Cult is publishing a 400+ page book diving deep into video game UI by Edd Coates, the brain behind the excellent Game UI Database . It looks pretty darn slick and like the perfect compliment to Arcade Game Typography: The Art of Pixel Type by Toshi Omigari. In the first half of The Game UI Bible , Coates discusses the foundations of UI and UX design. This section begins in the earliest…
The Video Game History Foundation has released a massive collection of E3 materials. It's remarkable and just the thing folks like me growing up longed to one day see in person. Now with E3 defunct, this is the closest we will ever get to that show floor magic. Donated by founding IDSA member Carolyn Rauch, this collection includes over 1000 pages of ephemera from the history of the Electronic…
Announcing an app to display, capture, and record footage from your modded 3DS console, built exclusively for macOS.
We are back in Greece, but it’s not what you think! A surprise 2D adventure takes Max Roberts and Logan Moore back to Kratos’ youth to explore, battle, and learn about an untold story. Does Kratos and Deimos' origin bring glory to Sparta or is it unworthy of the God of War?
Happy six year anniversary to the reveal of PS5 boxes! Who would have suspected that was going to be the last time ?
"Paper Plates is an unofficial, fan-made hardcover cookbook inspired by the fantastical world of Paper Mario, featuring 35 delicious, charming recipes and full-color art by Matthew Taranto, creator of Brawl in the Family ." This a seriously Max-coded product. I have vivid memories of printing off a 100% recipe guide for Zess T.'s cookbook in Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door as a kid. It's one…
Cibby is an app built for people who love physical games. Explore and rediscover your collection in stunning interactive 3D. If I wasn't building out my own personal collection database , I'd take a hard look at Cibby. This little teaser video does more for me than the apps I looked at years ago before settling on a spreadsheet.
👋🏻 My latest essay was not the one I envisioned writing or publishing next. I was in full swing on what you might think of as "mythical" Memento / TLOUPII essay and found out Abby and I were expecting a new baby. That turned into a miscarriage, right around when I was eager to distract myself from the essay and life. Marathon also came out and we all know how that went for me . In that season of…
A sneaky crew of thieves sets out to reclaim Sly Cooper's family tome—The Thievius Raccoonus. Slink and steal your way across the globe against a colorful cast of animal characters in this captivating 3D platformer. You ain't ever heard a bass line like those in the game. Warning Spoilers below! Stats Started Playing: 7/3/26 Beat: 7/6/26 Total Playtime: 7~8 hours Legacy Unique, suave, bold, and…
Nick "Woz" Wozniak of Yacht Club Games catches up with Max to share lessons from delays, restrictions, and new adventures hot off the heels of releasing Mina the Hollower.
👋🏻 I know it has been quite around these here newsletter parts. The reason why was I have been working through another pair of miscarriages with my wife and they drained my desire to create. Then I felt a call to write about them. And so I worked through a new essay called " Moments ." I hope you go give it a read. I'll share more about the process soon. I just wanted to poke my head up in your…
To those who wrote that we might read, to those who fell so we might walk, to those who came before so we might come after, gratitude.
This morning Sony decided to keep up with the Joneses over at Xbox and announce a double whammy of bad news—the PS3 and Vita PSN stores are shutting down for real this time and there will be no more physical games produced for PlayStation consoles starting in January 2028. Here's Sid Shuman on the PlayStation Blog : After nearly two decades of supporting the PS3 console generation, we wanted to…
We are going back to Raccoon City! So pack your zombie survival kits and uncover the mysteries with Max Roberts and Logan Moore alongside special guests Michael Ruiz and Ricky Frech! Can action and horror be perfectly balanced or are those ambitions better off buried like RC was nearly 30 years ago?