Last weekend I went to a fun double feature screening of Appleseed (1988) and Black Magic M-66 (1987) here in Portland, and Dark Horse Comics had a booth set up where they were selling their new Appleseed Deluxe Edition hardcover a few weeks early, so I bought a copy.

I've never read Appleseed before, and it was my first time seeing the OVA, which I understand might be pretty different from the manga. I actually liked the Black Magic OVA a little bit more I think, but both were fun to see in a packed theater in 2026, especially in the midst of the Shirow Masamune renaissance brought about by the new Ghost in the Shell series.

The manga itself is really nice. I've only read a couple of pages due to having a busy week, but I like what I see so far and the hardcover is really nice and big, with fancy gold page edges.

Just thought I'd share since I've never had the opportunity to buy a manga pre-release before. I'm a sucker for large format hard covers...

Great song, great video.

Let me preface this by saying that I'm a longtime GTA fan, and so, to some extent, I don't blame people for being excited for the newest game in that franchise.

GTA 3 on the PS2 was a revolutionary game that changed the medium forever. Vice City and San Andreas built upon that same template and engine making games that were bigger in better in just about every way. I have mixed feelings about both GTA 4 and 5, both in terms of gameplay and story, but overall feel that they were good games with better shooting and driving than the PS2 era games. I never got into the online stuff outside of occasional racing, but I understand that it's hugely popular.

With that background, I don't doubt that GTA 6 will be a big seller, maybe even the biggest ever... But be that as it may, I think that it is riding on a big wave of unearned cultural hype:

• We have seen very little of what the game actually plays like, and almost nothing about what sets it apart from GTA 5 in terms of systems. The marketing leads me to believe this will be less sandbox and more story...
• All we have been told about the story of this game is that you play as Jason and Lucia, two lovers and ex-cons in Vice City. The trailers focus on their relationship, which is a unique angle for a GTA game, but we really don't get any insight into who these characters are as individuals or what makes them interesting.
• Despite the fact that GTA has always been something of a hit-or-miss parody of modern (usually American) life and culture, every piece of media I've seen surrounding this game has been totally devoid of any humor or commentary. There's a lot to make fun of in America (Florida especially) today, but based on the trailers, this is looking to be the least funny or satirical GTA game ever.
• This is the most expensive GTA game ever, and that's even without factoring in the paywalled features like premium car modding and character styling, but will it be the biggest? What does $80-100 get us?
• For better or worse, quite a few of the key people who made the GTA series what it was are now out of the picture, so the development team is going to be pretty different than past games. That could go either way, but I think it does invite a certain amount of skepticism.
• No initial PC release.
• No physical release for consoles.

So again, I really don't blame people for being hopeful or excited about a new GTA game coming out. If you're looking forward to this one then more power to you!

But I can't help feel that the levels of hype are way overblown for what we've seen of the gameplay, story and world building. If it wasn't part of the "GTA" franchise, I think this would be just another new release.

Final Update: My Steam Controller (2026) hardware seems to be fine after all!

There is something funky going on with some combination of Steam Controller, Bazzite, and Big Picture "Gaming" Mode, creating problems with inputs in the Steam menu itself... It's still a minor issue for me.

But I was able to open Ultra Street Fighter IV and give the controller a thorough test in training mode with visible inputs, and it acted as expected (without dropping or doubling inputs at all). It worked well in game, and I found the d-pad and track pad to be pretty solid for fighting games, too!

So, in short, something is causing it to bug out a little bit in the Bazzite HTPC Big Picture Mode, but it's working pretty well in games and I'm now confident that there isn't any hardware-related issue.

Turns out the Steam Controller doesn't suck afterall!

Original Post: After a long shipping process (and an even longer wait) I finally got my new Steam Controller (2026), only to find that... it sucks!?

It drops inputs in Steam Big Picture Mode (or rather, Bazzite's gaming mode). And when it's not dropping inputs, it's doubling them!

The puck is ~15ft (4.5m) away from me, on top of the TV stand with direct line of sight to me and it reports having a bad and unstable connection. To make matters worse, the input issues seem to happen regardless of whether it's a wireless or wired connection...

Finally, the pairing process is straight up laughable. Connect the controller to your puck to try to pair it, and it prompts you on screen to confirm? How am I supposed to agree to pair it if my controller isn't paired in the first place??

Am I the only one having a terrible experience with this controller so far? This was supposed to be an easy win for Valve...

I sure hope they have some kind of emergency patch in the works for this thing because right now I'm on the verge of asking for a refund.

The third trailer for the new GitS series by Science Saru.

A comic by ShenComix

President Donald Trump has fired his embattled Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and says he'll nominate in her place Oklahoma Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin.

This is a cool 1-hour documentary from Archipel covering the life, career and philosophy of Mahiro Maeda, an artist, animator and designer who has worked all over the anime and film industries.

Discord cut ties with its age-verification partner after exposed code fueled federal-reporting concerns, months after a breach hit 70,000 users.

Synth artist Look Mum No Computer is described as "a bold and brave choice" to represent the UK.

I kept my old phone (an AT&T-locked Samsung Galaxy S7) going for 10 years, replacing the battery midway through and using it well into unsupported territory. I like to keep things working as long as I can within reason, and I also know that this phone is destined to become e-waste as soon as I get rid of it.

But with more apps losing support, and electronics prices on the rise, it felt like now was finally the time to upgrade (to a refurbished Pixel 8 Pro). So I got a new phone...

Still, I don't want my old locked Galaxy S7 phone to go to waste just yet while it's still roughly working!

So does anyone have any idea of things that I can do to reuse or repurpose my old phone?

I have some ideas in mind myself, but I'm curious what you all think and if anyone has experience with repurposing old phones in interesting or useful ways.

Court records show that NVIDIA executives allegedly authorized the use of millions of pirated books from Anna's Archive to fuel its AI training.

I'm thinking about building a modest Bazzite HTPC with a bunch of spare parts lying around the house. Here's what I've got:

• Intel 4770k
• Asus Z87-A LGA 1150 Motherboard
• NVidia GTX 1060 3gb GPU
• 16GB DDR3 RAM
• 640W Corais PSU
• SilverStone Grandia GD09 HTPC case

I'm assuming that the Nvidia GPU with a lackluster 3gb VRAM is probably the weakest link of the whole system, but I don't know what a reasonable upgrade might be for an older system (that probably doesn't support stuff like resizable bar, which I think is needed to get optimal performance of newer GPUs?).

What do you think? What would be the best bang-for-the-buck upgrade to a system like this, assuming the main use case would be gaming and media consumption? What would you do if you happened to have this set of parts lying around in the spare parts bin?