New week new links! This one is a bit late since I was busy all weekend, but all my links are from Friday or earlier!

Bruno Dias: A Compleat History of the Magic: the Gathering Metagame, Supplemental: Commander's Road to Hell

I never really got Commander. I had a brief period where I lived in Grand Rapids, Michigan because I ran away from home, and the person I was staying with there was a huge magic fan. He would offer to pay me to sort his cards for him, which I never really succeeded at. During this time he tried to get me to play Commander with him at his local game store, and I didn't really get what was fun about it? To be fair, I didn't know Magic cards well enough to know what was going on. (I still don't.) But I also didn't vibe with the social aspect of it. I got into card games through Hearthstone, and my favorite part of Hearthstone was carefully sequencing your actions to maximize the amount of value you could get out of a turn. This could be social if you played with a friend, but the game took a backseat to the conversation as opposed to being the vehicle that facilitates the…

I’m in the middle of moving, so I’ll try to keep this one short, but here’s links!

Mikhail Klimentov: Kill the CEO in your head

Genuinely though. I’ve read so much writing about games that just feels like a press release.

Os Keyes: Beyond Trans Archives, Beyond Trans Medicine

Please, if you only read one thing this week, let it be this. I found it in my read later pile, saved from a recommendation from probably god knows where. It’s a deep and loving look at archival practices, trans joy, and our relationship with academics. It will leave you in tears.

Laura Michet: It's okay to be a certain kind of hooligan

I do not "understand" getting that mad about having to drive slowly behind cyclists for a minute. I never will. It's deranged, murderous behavior. I'm glad to call it criminal.

I love basically everything Laura Michet writes, and this is no different. Read her stuff! It’s good!

jergling: 2026: A Tech Odyssey

You are awakened by a digital chime at exactly 4:00 a.m. Peeling your eyes open, you see the walls begin to shine in a rainbow of RGB waves. Your handheld greets you in Scarlett Johansson’s voice, through the bedside speaker…

A short story about the hell…