Reconnect Recap - w/e 16th February

Reviewing the week that's been over on Reconnect

Kia Ora folks!

For many its been a week of Super Bowl and Olympics memes, for others its been a week of frantically getting two cats to fuck, but for me its been more packing for my move and doing my annual tradition of trying to find a specific type of game to scratch an itch.

I do this every year. I’m a sci fi fan but also like chill pick up and put down games. I’m basically looking for Fields of Mystria type game but set in space, with space things. It’s a pretty niche genre, and I undoubtedly always just end up reinstalling No Mans Sky and sinking a few hours into that, but until I give in, i’ll keep hunting.

As always, this is the Reconnect Recap, the companion newsletter to my website, Reconnect. A games writing aggregation platform, think Reddit, but it only has games articles written by real people about a variety of topics.

This week we’re talking about swear words, Bethesda, Sega, portable consoles and much much more!

Let’s dig in.

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• ⌛️ Hit up the archive to see older issues.

• 🧠 Read my occasional thoughts on the industry, here.

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• 🔗 Hit up my Linktree to see my other work

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Great Write Ups

• Secrets in Redemption: This Week In Video games follows the community hunting for the last hidden easter egg in Red Dead Redemption 2 and how Westworld their efforts are feeling.

• Tales from the Vault: The Game Business talks to the team running Fallout 76 and explores how the TV show is bringing new players into the franchise and the efforts they are making to flesh out the game.

• Reviewing anything at CEX: Scanlines claims they will review anything and that’s our fault, but this week they visited a Complete Entertainment Exchange and looked at all the retro games and consoles they had on offer.

• Cross Platform Profiling: AI and Games talks with three developers who made a plugin for the Snowdrop engine that uses AI to profile how games will work on devices of different specs.

• The swear jar: Crossplay dives into a new topic doing the rounds on the internet, could some games have an option for removing swear words?

• Chatting with Fang: TimeExtension interviews Shinichi "Touma" Higashi, the designer of Fang, from Sonic. They talk about his reverence for the forgotten character and his endeavours designing other characters like Batman.

• Stressed in the cold: SuperJump Magazine jumps back into playing Frostpunk and expresses what makes the game hard and pensive, still an enjoyable game by all means, just not a chill cozy vibe.

• Apples to Oranges: ObsoleteSony argues that comparing the PSP with the Vita isn’t a fair argument. If you are looking to buy one today, its not a case of getting the ‘newer’ or ‘better’ one its a case of understanding the different methodologies each handheld represented.

• Wishlist success: Its great to see more Game Analytics blogs starting up, no shade to those who were here on Substack first, but i’ve really been enjoying The Alinea Insight newsletter who is a recent entry into the space. This week they look at the most wish listed games for 2026.

• Prototyping Success: Maurice Klimek tells us the fastest way to get your game idea off the ground and into the hands of players who can give you real actionable feedback.

• Rise of Co-op: The GameDiscoverCo newsletter analysed the data of the most common words used in Steam Game Descriptions and there are some exciting keywords having a meteoric rise.

• Missed out on the money: Harrison Polites gives us an insight into Australia’s largest indie gam organisation and how they’ve been recently impacted by a lack of government funding.

• Back off, Bethesda: Trip Harrison argues that Bethesda doesn’t need to remaster Morrowind, the industry is feeling the fatigue of the constant recycling of old games, and that the community does a far better job than these companies could ever do.

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Fun Tidbits

• Sega Celebrates Its 65th Birthday With This Fancy Seiko Wristwatch

• Star Trek: Voyager - Across the Unknown demo upgraded with voice-over

• Check Your VHS Tapes - You Might Be In Line For A Small Reward If You Can Find This Elusive ‘Games World’ Footage

• In the deck-builder Voraxis you’re a parasite that eats through a living planet

• Terarin Games Celebrates Its 10th Anniversary With ‘Blaze Of Storm’, Coming To Steam & Switch Later This Month

• You can now add hardware details to Steam reviews, and give more feedback on Steam Deck Verified

• AYANEO’s Xperia Play Successor, The Pocket Play, Will Pack A MediaTek Chipset And 165Hz OLED Screen

• Toyota made a game engine

• “A Bit Insane” - Fan-Made Parodius Port For Genesis / Mega Drive Just Gets Better And Better

• ‘Gordon & Daxter’ Is A Ridiculous New Half-Life-Themed Mod For Jak & Daxter’s Unofficial PC Port