Hello, it's Gita here, fresh from the doctor who finally got me a referral to get my fucked up back checked out! On the off chance that any of you are under 30, my recomendation is that start stretching now. This sucks!
What doesn't suck is the weekly Aftermath newsletter. Thanks for subscribing! If you'd like to be able to read all our stories, as well as take part in our comments, Discord, or other perks, you can check out our subscription tiers by clicking the button below. We depend on reader support to keep this thing going, so if you like what you see here, we'd love to have you. | I Still Want Nice Things A pre-production Deus Ex game has been cancelled and 97 employees have been laid off, Bloomberg reported Monday. It will not surprise you that Embracer Group had a hand in this, as its purchasing of and then destroying the video game industry continues apace. Embracer purchased Eidos Montreal, Square Enix Montreal, and Crystal Dynamics in 2022, giving it ownership of popular series like Tomb Raider and Deus Ex. As a long-time Deus Ex fan, I was hopeful this could lead to more Deus Ex. Bloomberg wrote today that "Eidos, the Montreal, Canada-based studio
behind the game, will instead focus on an original franchise," so I
guess there's my answer. |  | You Could Just Keep Doing Dry January Today's the last day of Dry January, a month where folks who usually drink don't drink, but also talk about not drinking a lot. As someone who's been sober nearly five years, I'm definitely ready to stop hearing people moan about how much they miss drinking. (I feel you, buddy!) But if you're not counting the hours until midnight, if you're not sure what to do next, here's an option: you don't have to start drinking again. |  | Sony Forces Rebrand Of Bloodborne Fan Game From Creator It Had Already Allowed To Release A Bloodborne Fan Game "Welp, it happened," developer Lilith Walther said on Twitter late last week. "Sony contacted me." Walther has spent the past two years working on Bloodborne Kart – a meme turned Mario-Kart-esque racing game featuring Bloodborne characters and locations with 12 racers, 16 maps, and a full campaign – and was gearing up to release it on January 31. Now Walther and her team have to delay the game and change its whole identity. Fun fact: Prior to the two years she spent on Bloodborne Kart, Walther dedicated a whole additional year of her life to a free PlayStation 1-style demake of Bloodborne that launched in 2022 without issue. | From our Discord server, where they were discussing the Sony's State of Play presentation. I did not watch this, but I immediately knew this had to be about the confusingly sexy Stellar Blade: |  |  | Question of the Week
If your Twitter feed is anything like mine, then you're probably well acquainted with how much Nicki Minaj hates Megan Thee Stallion. As a connoisseur of celebrity gossip, this whole situation is catnip to me: in her new single, "Hiss," Megan rapped a bar that Nicki interpreted as a diss. In return, after twenty four hours straight of talking shit about Meg online, Nicki responded with her own fairly weak diss track, "Big Foot." "Hiss" debuted at #1 on the charts, while "Big Foot" has dropped off the charts, which is unsurprising because it's a song where Nicki Minaj mostly takes aim at the fact that Megan Thee Stallion's mother passed away.
I could talk about this for days, but it makes me wonder: what your favorite celebrity rivalry? Are you hankering for the old days of Blur and Oasis? Still thinking about what could have been with Uncle Tupelo? Still bumping "Ether"? Send us an email and you could be featured in the next newsletter (seriously, please do it, the questions were my idea and I wanna hear what everyone is thinking!). | We (finally) have a new podcast, Aftermath Hours! It'll sound familiar if you've been joining us on our Twitch channel on Thursdays, but if you'd like to hear Aftermath staff and sometimes guests discuss the week's news, now you can do that wherever you get your podcasts! You can find it alongside our other pod, 52 Pickup, on our podcast page. | I'm off to do some gentle yoga. Have a great weekend! | | | | |
