🎮 Today's secret word: 'Ford'

Efforts to save video game history, passionate football fandom, and so much more.

Mornin’. The five-day, 40-hour work week has been the norm since at least 1926, when the Ford Motor Co. instituted the practice (though calls for it stretch back even further). It was made law in 1938 as part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s “New Deal.”

More importantly, it created “Hump Day,” and gave Wednesday a personality.

During the pandemic, however, more and more companies began toying with the idea of moving to a four-day work week, and studies showed it would have positive impact.

But what would become of Hump Day? Would it be just Tuesday afternoon, like a “Hump Happy Hour”? Should we declare Wednesday a globally accepted day off in the middle of a Monday/Tuesday-Thursday/Friday work schedule, thereby enshrining Hump Day as an official holiday?

What do you think? What else do you have to really think about on a Wednesday anyway?

—Eric Alt, Andrew Nusca, Tim Leong, Marques Edge

Buffed/Nerfed

What’s up and down in the world rn.

Buffed: Climate activism. A group of young Montana residents recently took their state to court for allegedly violating their right to a “clean and healthful environment” by promoting fossil fuel use—and a judge just ruled in their favor. The future is bright…

Nerfed: Feel good movies. Remember the warm and fuzzies you got from the 2009 Sandra Bullock movie The Blind Side? Well, NFL star Michael Oher, whose life story was used as the basis for the film, claims it was all a lie. You might say that news…caught people by surprise.

Buffed: Movie nerd scientists. Researchers in Peru discovered a new species of snake, and named it after Harrison Ford. We’re sure he was super psyched.

Nerfed: Netflix and chill. Subscribers in Canada and the U.K. will be the first to test out Netflix’s new video game-streaming options. As if you didn’t already waste entire evenings scrolling indecisively through the menu trying to make a choice…

Buffed: In-game diversity. FIFA 23 just updated and added Moroccan player Nouhaila Benzina’s hijab to her in-game character model, marking the first time the traditional headwear has been included in the game. Huzzah! —EA

Burning Questions: Are video games going extinct?

Asked and answered.

Photo illustration by Tim Leong; Photo by Roqueta Rivero

Video games have always been about moving forward. More powerful computers and consoles. More innovative gameplay. Updates, retools, and revamps. It’s what makes the industry so exciting, and the release of new titles so highly anticipated.

While we can (and should) appreciate this drive at the heart of video games, it’s also important to make sure we don’t lose our collective history in the process. Contributing writer Danny Gallagher takes a look at the challenges facing the archiving and preservation of old games.

Insert coin.

Extractor: Welcome to America, Wrexham!

Investigations of interest.

Photo by Caspar Benson via Getty Images

Thanks to the popularity of their FX docuseries Welcome to Wrexham (and co-owners Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney), the Wrexham AFC squad toured the U.S. with unprecedented fanfare.

The lower tier soccer club joined giants Manchester United and Chelsea FC playing four matches across American soil in front of humongous crowds.

Contributing writer Bernie Wilson spoke with players and fans to get a behind the scenes look on what why this underdog squad has become such a global sensation.

Join us on the pitch.

Wayback Wednesday

For a brief moment between the rise of the internet and the proliferation of user-generated video platforms like YouTube and Twitch, there was Attack of the Show!

All you have to do is drop the words “DVDuesday,” “Gems of the Internet,” or “Gadget Pr0n” and gamers of a certain age will nod knowingly.

Originally launched in 2005, AOTS was a gamer-centric show that defied characterization—it featured news, game reviews, gear recommendations, celebrity interviews, comedy skits, field reports, and even musical guests. It was a way for gamers and other citizens of the early internet to connect over content made for them by people who were them. Original host Kevin Pereira was a former G4TV.com intern barely in his 20s, and he would end up being the show’s anchor amid an evolving host lineup that would include the likes of future Digg founder Kevin Rose and actress Olivia Munn.

Full disclosure: I was hired as the show’s first writer as it was transitioning from The Screen Savers (an unscripted call-in tech help show) to the more involved (and scripted) Attack of the Show!—a name that was the result of internal crowd-sourcing. Producer Mike Shaw won the naming rights after penning a manifesto passionately defending his choice, and it was the right way to go. My suggestions, on the other hand, were likely mostly bad puns best lost to history.

Alongside X-Play, Attack of the Show! would be the face of the G4 Network, and would be a cable TV haven for the game-obsessed for the first decade of the 2000s. If you were there, you get it. —EA

Wormhole

Click the following image and…well, we don’t want to ruin the surprise.

Share the ABK Edit

Share this newsletter with your friends. C’mon, they’ll love it.

About us

The Edit is a thrice-weekly newsletter exploring the intersection of gaming and life. Our love letter to millions of gamers around the globe, it is written and published by the Activision Blizzard King global editorial team.