Marjorie Taylor Greene says she also lost access to Facebook, a day after Twitter banned her personal account. Unlike Twitter's suspension, which is permanent, Facebook's penalty will only last for 24 hours. According to The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, NBC News and other sources, Greene shared a screenshot on Telegram and Gettr (a social media platform for conservatives) showing a Facebook notification telling her that can't post or comment on the website for 24 hours. 

A spokesperson has confirmed to the publications that the social network removed one of her posts for violating its policies, but that "removing her account for this violation is beyond the scope of [its] policies." In particular, her post violated the Meta-owned platform's COVID-19 misinformation rules. It's worth noting that Facebook and Twitter have only suspended her personal accounts. Her verified government accounts remain active.

Greene reportedly posted about "extremely high amounts of COVID vaccine deaths" with unverified raw data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, or VAERS. The system is a government database managed by the CDC and the FDA, but it relies on individuals to send in reports of their experience. VAERS' website states that it's "not designed to determine if a vaccine caused a health problem" and that "additional work and evaluation [of its data] is necessary to further assess a possible safety concern." Facebook started taking a tougher stance against misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines and vaccines in general in early 2021.

Greene is known for questioning the public health measures put into place to prevent the further spread of COVID-19. In addition to opposing vaccine mandates, she also famously refuses to wear a mask on the House floor and has racked up tens of thousands of dollars in fines. Talking about her Facebook suspension on Telegram and Gettr, Greene wrote:

"Facebook has joined Twitter in censoring me... Who appointed Twitter and Facebook to be the authorities of information and misinformation? When Big Tech decides what political speech of elected Members is accepted and what’s not then they are working against our government and against the interest of our people."

Conservative politicians have long complained about being censored by the biggest social media platforms. Back in October, former President Donald Trump announced that he's planning to launch his own social network this year as part of his camp's efforts to fight back against "the Big Tech companies of Silicon Valley, which have used their unilateral power to silence opposing voices in America." 

Caution: Major 'Halo Infinite' story spoilers follow.

There's more to Halo Infinite's story than it appears — unofficially, at least. Windows Centralnotes fans have discovered an unfinished mid-credit cutscene hidden in the game's code. As you can see below, it's not just a throwaway moment, either. If anything, it's a strong hint at what might come next in a story add-on or sequel.

The cutscene shows Esparza, the pilot you meet at the start of Halo Infinite, alerting Master Chief to a friendly UNSC tag. While the short segment is mysterious, some have speculated the tag belongs to a character that wasn't present in the core campaign, such as Commander Palmer or Spartan Locke. You might have a 'new' ally when the story picks up.

It's not clear why 343 Industries left the cutscene code in the official release, or whether the clip reflects what you'll see in future content. We've asked for more information. Whatever the explanation, it's rare to see such potentially important material hiding in files a player could uncover. 

It was always Jinx and Vi. They’re the sisters at the heart of Riot Games’ hit Netflix series, Arcane, and they were picked for the spotlight out of a lineup of more than 150 League of Legends champions.

For Arcane creators Christian Linke and Alex Yee, the stars really couldn’t have been anyone else from League of Legends lore. Especially not Teemo. Linke and Yee have been preparing Jinx and Vi for their leading roles in a mature, mainstream, animated TV series for the past nine years, even if they didn’t know it the entire time.

Back in December 2012, Vi debuted and became the first League of Legends champion to receive a login screen complete with an original, lyrical song. A year later, Jinx joined the game’s ranks and starred in its first character-driven cinematic, a high-energy music video called Get Jinxed. Linke and Yee worked on both of these releases, flexing their creative muscles in music and narrative storyboarding, two aspects that didn’t get much attention in the core game-development process.

The Jinx cinematic was also the first time Riot partnered with Fortiche Production, the studio behind Arcane’s otherworldly animation style.

“They kind of got our special treatment already because we just really liked them,” Linke told Engadget. “And so, when we had to think about like, which characters do we want to stick with for many years to come? I think it was pretty obvious.”

Yee agreed and added, “Both of them were a bit of a milestone, I think, for our time at Riot.”

In-game, Jinx and Vi are sisters and bitter enemies, though this story fades into the background of the action, appearing only in small voice lines and character descriptions. As an online MOBA, narrative isn’t critical to the way League of Legends plays, but Riot has infused its champions with more lore over the years, focusing on expanding their universe beyond the game launcher.

Nowadays, Riot is a hub of creative development across multiple mediums, including short stories, graphic novels, cinematics, music videos and one truly fantastic K-pop group. Arcane is the studio’s biggest push onto a mainstream service, and Jinx and Vi carry the story, surrounded by a handful of other champions, including Caitlyn, Jayce and Viktor, and other original characters.

Jinx and Vi were always intriguing to Linke and Yee. They were grounded in a way that the game’s more fantastical champions weren’t, with distinct, opposing personalities and an unexplained rivalry that clearly cut both sisters to the core. Vi was a powerful, rigid Enforcer working for the prosperous city of Piltover, while Jinx was an anarchist with a belt full of bombs and no filter. Vi’s hair is short and pink, while Jinx’s is long and bright blue.

“If you just imagine those two characters together in a scene, whatever location, whatever they would be debating – you know, what kind of food they're going to get in the evening, or what kind of movie they're going to watch,” Linke said. “It's just always going to be fun, because they're always going to have these very different perspectives.”

There’s an inherent question in Jinx and Vi’s shared backstory, Yee said, and it’s a mystery that fans of the game and newcomers to the show would be able to grasp quickly: If they’re sisters, why do they hate each other so much? Arcane asks that question and slowly answers it, providing a rich, emotionally charged origin story for Jinx, Vi and their surrounding champions along the way.

“The fact that Jinx and Vi’s relationship is a bit of a mystery from the outset allows us to sort of satisfy both audiences,” Yee said.

In Arcane, Linke and Yee were able to zoom in and focus on the small details that bring their characters to life, showing micro-expressions and all-consuming rage on Jinx’s face, or giving Vi a nuanced nervous tick, like bouncing her leg. Fortiche Production, the studio that handles animation duties for Arcane and other Riot projects, was a pivotal part of this development process. Animators there were given leeway to express themselves in the characters, Linke said, and this resulted in a unique visual style that flowed like motion-capture, even though it was completely hand-drawn.

“We also tried to really treat the animators like actors who can find their ways of expressing things, rather than just kind of saying, make Jinx or Vi do this,” Linke said. “But instead, just being like, here's what's going on in their head, how can we really make that feel real?”

Riot Games

After nearly 10 years of in-game development and cross-media projects, Jinx and Vi are still able to surprise Linke and Yee. Developing Arcane, for instance, marked the first time they’d seen any League of Legends champion actually speaking, mouth movements and all.

“When we did our first trial, or our first test animatic for the show, it was the first time we'd ever seen any of our champions talk,” Yee said. “We'd never – their mouths don't move in game, you know. So it was a very funny milestone to cross at that point.”

Given how well Arcane has been received by League of Legends fans and newcomers alike, there are plenty more creative milestones to come as Riot continues its ride into mainstream entertainment. Season two of Arcaneis in production as we — and Jinx and Vi — speak.

A comet is headed to Earth, and despite dire warnings from scientists, almost everyone fails to take it seriously. That's the basic premise of Don't Look Up, the latest film from Adam McKay which premieres on Netflix today. It balances the blunt social commentary from his most recent Oscar nominated films (The Big Short and Vice), with the comic absurdity from his early hits, like Anchorman and Talladega Nights. The result is somewhat uneven and a bit too long, but it's also a battlecry against the anti-science, fact-phobic reality we're living through today.

The comet is an obvious metaphor for climate change, an apocalyptic scenario we're hurtling towards while governments drag their heels, the fossil fuel industry feigns ignorance and most people go about their lives oblivious about what's to come. But Don't Look Up also describes humanity's bumbling response to the COVID-19 pandemic, a global disaster that's led to more than five million deaths. 

The film's title is a mantra used by a conservative president (Meryl Streep) to make her red-capped supporters look down at the ground, and not at the glowing comet in the sky they can easily see in the sky. It's hard not to be reminded of the politicization of COVID-19, which has led to people denying its existence and demonizing vaccines, all because of something they heard on Fox News or their family's Facebook group.

After two astronomers (played by a surprisingly nebbish Leonardo DiCaprio and a spunky Jennifer Lawrence) rush to the White House with news about Earth's impending destruction in six months, they're forced to wait. Streep's President Orlean is dealing with a potential scandal around a Supreme Court nominee, obviously that's more important. By the time they lay out Earth's impending doom, Orlean would rather wait and do nothing. "What's this going to cost me? What's the ask in place?" she says.

As the two scientists try to spread the word, first by leaking the doomsday scenario to the media, and then by becoming media personalities of their own, the film takes a scattershot aim at critiquing our modern society. The great Mark Rylance plays a Jobs-meets-Zuckerberg tech executive, the sort of mogul whose idea of innovation is a phone that'll constantly monitor you to fix negative emotions. (Feeling down? Bash Life will automatically book a nearby therapy session for you.) Cate Blanchett and Tyler Perry pop up as cable news hosts who can only speak to their audience with faux, upbeat banter—yes, even if that news is about humanity's imminent destruction.

Netflix

Don't Look Up sometimes feels like it's punching down, especially when it's focusing on the sheer stupidity of President Orlean's conservative followers. But the film isn't afraid to criticize everyone, even its scientist leads. Both characters have trouble properly conveying the significance of their discovery. And when DiCaprio's astronomer finds his media legs, he's fully a part of the government propaganda machine.

By the time the American government finally decides to do something about the comet — only because it benefits the President, of course — it's dressed up in patriotic showmanship, as if Michael Bay were directing George W. Bush's tone deaf 2003 Mission Accomplished speech. I won't spoil where the movie goes from there, but it's clearly spoofing Bay's Armageddon. One war hero and a big rocket is all it takes to stop a planet destroying threat, right?

Netflix

Don't Look Up isn't a complete success — the comedy is hit or miss, and it could seriously benefit from a shorter and more focused narrative. But the final act hits with a wallop, at times reenacting scenarios I've seen in far too many anxiety dreams. If the world were really ending in a few months, how would you react? What do we owe each other, as a civilization? And what will it take to protect this planet in the face of profit-seeking vampires, who would gladly risk humanity for a few more resources? Adam McKay doesn't have any answers. But his anger is something we can all understand.

This pandemic has dragged on longer than expected but hey, another 12 months in lockdown means another year to play lots of video games. And what a year it’s been, with new installments in storied franchises, remakes of forgotten classics and a game where you date your sword. As is tradition, the Engadget team gathered together to ruminate on their favorite titles released this year, extolling their virtues and sometimes drawbacks, but mostly explaining why we like them so much. We’ve also thrown in a few of our older faves that we played in 2021, because hey, a good game is always a good game. (Also, it helps when there are updates.)

Age of Empires IV

When people look back at Microsoft’s 2021, they’ll cite Halo: Infinite and the extra year the company gave 343 Industries to work on the game as one of its best recent decisions. But I think the company also deserves praise for taking a chance on Relic and Age of Empires IV.

Coming off the dismal Dawn of War III, fans had every right to be skeptical of whether the studio could pull off a sequel to one of the most-loved real-time strategy games in history. Relic had a nearly impossible task before it. And yet it found a way to respect the history and roots of the series while pushing it forward in new and interesting ways. The star of the show here are the eight civilizations. Mechanically, they’re far more unique than the factions you could play as in past games. Each has a handful of twists that make them fun to learn and interesting to play against. The studio also changed how you move between the ages to present the player with interesting choices.

AoE4 isn’t perfect, but neither was Age of Empires II before its Age of Conquerors expansion. More than anything, I’m excited to see where Relic takes the series should Microsoft give the studio the chance to continue working on the series. — Igor Bonifacic, Contributing Editor

Boyfriend Dungeon

Boyfriend Dungeon is a perfect blend of sword-swinging action and insatiable horniness — but not, like, in a gross way. This is the dungeon crawler of your middle-school daydreams, offering eye candy in a variety of forms and art styles, plus a mall packed with monsters to slay. And sales! But mostly monsters.

Everything about Boyfriend Dungeon is playful, from the cell phone messaging system, to the bright character customization options and the library of 'zines that serve as power-ups. The most charming aspect of the game, though, is the arsenal of flirty, dateable weapons. Players, ahem, forge relationships with the personalities behind the blades and then bring them into battle, choosing which combat style (or dating tactic) feels right in the moment. Combat itself is fast-paced yet adorable, with TV sets, flying VHS tapes, bats and phones attacking from every corner of the mall. There are also opportunities for small dates in between the battles, keeping the hormonal vibes alive.

Not only do you get to date your weapons in Boyfriend Dungeon, but they’re all gorgeous and charming in their own way. Best of all, they’re not limited by the old-school definition of a boyfriend. There’s a sword for nearly every play style here. Wink. — Jessica Conditt, Senior Editor

Deathloop

To say I love Arkane Studio's Dishonored series is an understatement. I've spent countless hours extolling the virtues of that series' slick stealth gameplay, gorgeous steampunk art design and inventive level design. While the first game was successful enough to spawn a sequel and a standalone entry, Dishonored never reached the massive mainstream popularity it deserved. (You could say the same for Prey, another critical darling that sold poorly.)

Since we first saw a glimpse of Deathloop, it looked like an intriguing remix of some of Dishonored's best components. There were magical powers that let you teleport at will. It was a first-person stealth game that leaned heavily on both melee weapons and guns; and it looked absolutely beautiful. Personally, I was hoping that Arkane would be able to recreate the magic of Dishonored to make it more palatable to general players.

Well, Deathloop isn't that. Its time loop mechanics are hard to parse at first — in particular, it takes a while to learn what you should actually be doing to make any sort of progress. Even dealing with the game's menus can be migraine-inducing, especially when you're learning how to keep weapons between multiple loops.

But just like my colleague Jessica Conditt, I loved every minute of it. It’s a blast to play, so long as you’re attuned to its stealth mechanics. I seriously dug the multiplayer mode, which puts you in the shoes of the game’s main antagonist, Julianna, as she hunts down other players. It’s not as fleshed out as the single-player campaign, but it sure felt great ruining someone else’s loop.

While it's not quite the Dishonored 3 I really want, I can't help but applaud Arkane for the sheer amount of innovation packed within Deathloop. Sure, it's a time loop game like so many others; the day repeats itself like clockwork, and you're also pushed back to the beginning if you die. But, crucially, it also builds on that concept. If a similar temporal anomaly were discovered in our world, it likely wouldn't be too long before a bunch of elite technocrats started using it as a way to achieve something close to immortality. — Devindra Hardawar, Senior Editor

Death’s Door

Death’s Door was the best game I played in 2021. And that’s not because it did something different. To me, someone who loved Ocarina of Time and Majora’s Mask growing up, its familiar and comforting Zelda-like rhythms were exactly what I needed in a challenging year. Everything about Death’s Door is also perfect. From the music to the art style and gameplay, developer Acid Nerve has crafted one of the best adventures in recent memory. — I.B.

Famicom Detective Club

I’m a huge fan of visual novels — in my time at Engadget I’ve lauded games like Doki Doki Literature Club and Dream Daddy — so it’s no surprise that I enjoyed Famicom Detective Club when I played the pair of re-released games for the Nintendo Switch back in May. 

The stories, particularly The Missing Heir, are compelling while the characters are easy to like. The gameplay is a little simple compared to the complexities of modern titles, but that just made me appreciate the genre more. I preferred the first game to the second, The Girl Who Stands Behind, but who am I kidding, you can’t play just one; they’re that fun. I hear that developer MAGES is willing to do a third installment, and I’d like to see where the series goes with a more modern spin. — Kris Naudus, Buyer's Guide Editor

Forza Horizon 5

I’ve never been a huge fan of realistic racing games, mostly because of that one word: realistic. I don’t have the patience to tweak my car and master all the skills necessary to make the most out of those games. Forza Horizon 5 pulls off a great trick by making its racing just realistic enough while still being extremely approachable. The library of classic and modern vehicles means you can easily find your dream car(s), and the game makes it easy to auto-tune your collection for peak performance if you don't want to spend time picking out suspension systems, tires and so forth.

There’s also the brilliant “rewind” button: Taking tight corners at speed without wiping out (or going so slow around them that the entire field blows past you) is not easy, but rewinding means you can easily erase any big mistakes you make and take the corner all over again. It helped me learn faster than I would have if I ended up in last place every time I took a turn.

Beyond that, the world of Forza Horizon 5 simply looks amazing — the beautifully-rendered jungles, mountains and open roads of this fictionalized corner of Mexico make for a perfect driving backdrop. It’s beautiful to look at, and the variety of terrain means you’ll get a huge variety of terrain in the different races to try.

In a year when I’ve shied away from the narrative-heavy, single-player games that I typically prefer, Forza Horizon 5 has been a perfect escape over the last few months. It’s the kind of game you can sink hours into at a time, or just pick up and play for a few races. And between the variety of race types, different weather conditions, weekly challenges and much more, it’s a game I think I’ll be coming back to for a long time. — I.B.

Halo Infinite

In my review of the Halo Infinite campaign, I criticized the game for relying on tired narrative threads and repetitive mechanics. I found myself wanting more innovation out of a modern, open-world Halo, rather than a cramped map of overly familiar landscapes and a lineup of the best tricks taken from other successful franchises.

All of that remains true, but hey — it’s still Halo.

When it comes to gameplay, Infinite is the best Halo’s been. It doesn’t thrust the series forward in any significant way, but it spit-shines the best features and presents everything in a polished environment that’s perfectly suited for floaty, fast-paced gun battles. The campaign evokes your warm-fuzzy nostalgic feelings and, even though it may not feel like a massive open world, offers a larger area to explore than ever before.

Infinite’s multiplayer matches benefit from the franchise improvements as well. There are tight and large-scale maps, a handful of new weapons with plenty of kick, and fan-favorite guns on offer like the Needler and Battle Rifle. This is the refreshing Halo experience we’ve been waiting (and waiting) for, driven by new tools like the Grappleshot, a hook that allows players to fly around the map like a short-range, hard sci-fi Spider-Man.

In comparison to other open-world action-adventure games and rapid-fire FPS titles, Halo Infinite doesn’t deliver anything particularly innovative, but it also doesn’t have any catastrophic failures. For a franchise in its 20th year, that’s a successful outcome. Especially in comparison to other Halo games, Infinite is an achievement that any fan should be happy to play. — J.C.

Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy

After the disappointment of last year's Avengers, I went into Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy with low expectations. I've rarely been so happy about being proved wrong.

Guardians is a blast. The story zips along, taking the crew from one gorgeous, colorful alien environment to the next as they try to save their skins and, inevitably, the galaxy.

You can only play as Peter Quill (aka Star-Lord), though you're rarely without at least one of your companions. The crew retains the quippy, rapid-fire dialogue from James Gunn's films and the characters talk almost constantly. Thankfully, the writing's the strongest part of the game, with a solid slate of jokes and story-centric lines. There are also dialogue choices (much like in a Telltale game) that can affect how a level plays out.

Eidos-Montréal had the chance to create a Guardians story that’s distinct from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The characters look, sound and act different from the MCU crew. It was initially a little jarring given how much I enjoy James Gunn’s movies, but I quickly grew to love them.

Unfortunately, the combat isn't great. Quill's guns are woefully underpowered at first, so fights are more about managing the rest of the team's more impactful abilities. A power-up mechanic that brings the team together in a seemingly inspiring huddle is annoying, while some of the enemy encounters feel extraneous. Still, the rest of the experience was so enjoyable that the mediocre combat wasn’t too bothersome.

In a landscape dominated by massive, never-ending games, Guardians of the Galaxy is a refreshing throwback. It's a single-player adventure that tells a streamlined story with great attention to detail. Best of all, in certain areas where Quill can't fire his pistols, he'll point finger guns and make "pew-pew" noises. I never get tired of that. — Kris Holt, Contributing Editor

Metroid Dread

As the first all-new, side-scrolling Metroid adventure since 2002, Metroid Dread had a lot to live up to. Nintendo has experimented both successfully (Metroid Prime Trilogy) and unsuccessfully (Metroid: Other M) with the basic formula, but Dread returns the series to its roots while adding enough new gameplay elements to keep things fresh.

However, with a series that had been dormant this long, new things weren’t what drew me to the game. I had never played a side-scrolling Metroid game all the way through, and this installment is a near-perfect modern interpretation of the “Metroidvania” genre the series helped invent. There’s lots of exploration, back-tracking, and new areas opening up when you get power-ups. It’s a simple formula executed with precision by developer MercurySteam.

The stealth elements, where Samus has to avoid detection from the powerful E.M.M.I. robots, are new to the series. Fortunately, they aren’t so frequent that they overpower the standard segments. And while they can be difficult, they’re not so tough that I ever got terribly frustrated – they’re just hard enough that finally getting the power you need to take down an E.M.M.I. is extremely satisfying.

The rest of the game is pretty classic Metroid, but the journey to regain all your lost powers, explore the varied worlds of Dread and take out truly epic boss monsters doesn’t feel like a retread at all. Instead, it reminded me of why Metroid is one of Nintendo’s most classic franchises. Metroid Dread showed Nintendo at its best of breathing new life into a series while still keeping it comfortingly familiar. — Nate Ingraham, Deputy Editor

New Pokémon Snap

Gamers have their holy grails, the titles they’ve love to see that may never get made, like Half-Life 3 and an official English translation of Mother 3. For years, the Nintendo 64's Pokémon Snap was one of those games on that list; I certainly remember people begging for a Wii or DS version back when I worked at The Pokémon Company over a decade ago. (The original got released on Wii Shop, but that’s about it.) So the announcement of New Pokémon Snap was a welcome surprise from last year, and the finished game certainly delivered.

The classic rail-shooter gameplay is back, but now with improved graphics. The Pokémon look amazing, and the ability to use motion controls really adds to the immersion. (Though I admittedly did get a bit motion sick.) I’m a fan of birdwatching, but not the best at bird photography. So New Pokémon Snap really scratched that itch, with all the fun of logging and collecting them. I loved playing this game, and not just because Todd Snap got a real glow-up. (But it certainly didn’t hurt.) — K.N.

Pikmin Bloom

Look, even I can see that Pokémon Go is the objectively better game. It just has more to do and a bigger community. But I prefer Pikmin Bloom because it just asks so little of me, and that’s perfect for my busy life. I don’t have time to be looking for Pokémon and tossing Poké Balls and going on Raids… but you know what I can do? Walk around and have cute little Pikmin plant flowers as I travel. There’s something impressive about opening the app to see all the flowers you and others have planted, and the Pikmin are just super cute. The little noises they make when they go on expeditions? Squee. — K.N.

The Vale: Shadow of the Crown

The protagonist of The Vale: Shadow of the Crown is Alex, a princess whose brother has just ascended to the throne and made her a warden of a small castle at the edge of their kingdom. On the way there, Alex survives an attack on her caravan, but she's stranded 500 miles from home and has to make her way back. What's more, Alex has been blind since birth.

The Vale attempts to replicate how Alex experiences the world in being almost entirely audio-based. Even though it's a first-person game, the only visuals to speak of, other than menus, are floating particles that offer the player some sense of the 3D environments and provide some contextual details like time of day.

Unlike many other RPGs, which usually offer a map that's spilling over with places to go and things to do, everything the player does is based on what they hear. The Vale uses spatial audio (headphones are essential for this one) to help players navigate the space, find other characters to interact with and receive guidance from Alex's companion. The sound design and voice acting are terrific. I rarely felt unsure about where I was or what was happening, unless that’s intended by the developer. It's important to listen carefully during combat too, as you'll aim your shield and weapon in one of three directions, depending on where you think an attacker is.

For a game that puts such an emphasis on accessibility for blind and vision-impaired players, it's disappointing that there are no subtitles or control remapping options for others. That said, developer Falling Squirrel has crafted a deeply immersive adventure you can explore with your eyes closed. The Vale: Shadow of the Crown is a remarkable, memorable experience which underscores that games can and should be for everyone. — K.H.

Bonus round

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Look, I know I talk aboutAnimal Crossing: New Horizons a lot. But when Nintendo announced the 2.0 update a few months ago I pretty much started to hyperventilate and I’ve been lightheaded ever since. Lots of long-requested features finally dropped, most notably the addition of a café, but also plenty of quality of life improvements. It’s almost like a whole new game in some ways, reinvigorating this nearly two-year-old title to the point where I’m playing daily again and I haven’t even tried all the new features. Just when I thought I was out… — K.N.

Control Ultimate Edition

I’m glad I waited for the PS5 version of Control. The wonderfully strange world is made even better by the console's capabilities. Whether it’s running in 4K with ray-tracing on or at 60fps, this is a beautiful game. The DualSense offers a satisfying click when the Service Weapon shape-shifts into another type of gun and the haptic feedback from each firing mode feels different. The 3D audio adds to the atmosphere, while the zippy fast traveling is very welcome.

Add in the DLC, and Control Ultimate Edition feels like the ideal way to explore The Oldest House. I'm already counting down the days until the next game in the series. — K.H.

Disco Elysium

This one could technically be in the 2021 category for two reasons. First, it’s timeless, and second, the Final Cut version of the game came out this year, adding full voice acting, new quests and general gameplay improvements to an already highly acclaimed title. It really doesn’t matter which category it goes in, though, as long as you do yourself a favor and play it.

Disco Elysium is a mature, densely detailed role-playing game with an incredible dialogue system, and a brilliant sense of player choice and expression. It stars an amnesiac, alcoholic detective and it’s set in a grimy open world filled with fascinating characters. This is a game that will make you think, laugh and recoil in horror time and time again — and oftentimes all at once. — J.C.

Star Trek: Discovery is taking an unscheduled break in the season after its next episode on December 30th, Gizmodo has reported. It'll be off for a month and a half until February 10th, essentially making way for the next season of the kids-oriented Star Trek Prodigy, set to return on January 6th. 

Discovery took a similar mid-season break in season one, but this time there's more content to fill the gap. After it returns in February and finishes its run, the second season of Picard should be about ready to launch. The idea of having enough Star Trek series to run them nearly continuously was Paramount's goal when Discoveryfirst launched in 2018. 

Discovery's fourth season has got off to a strong launch creatively, thanks in part to a more episodic format that will make it easier for casual fans to follow. From a content standpoint, however, the season started controversially when Paramount announced that the series would be pulled from Netflix in non-US territories. Season 4 is now streaming on Pluto TV in some countries in Europe, at least until Paramount+ can expand to those regions. 

The multibillion dollar industry of game streamers, beauty vloggers, podcast producers, fitness influencers, newsletter writers and other social media stars who make up the “creator economy,” began long before 2021. Yet 2021 saw more platforms throw more money and resources at independent content creators than ever before.

This year, companies that had previously shown little interest in courting “influencers” or building relationships with creators began to invest in building monetization tools for them. And even more established, creator-friendly companies significantly ramped up their investments with new funds and tools.

Twitter, which had previously only ever had a single monetization feature — a video centric tool used by publishers — opted to reorient its entire platform around creators. It built Super Follows, a Patreon-esque subscription service for influencers. It launched Ticketed Spaces, so people could make money from its burgeoning live audio feature. It launched in-app tripping, and started building a newsletter platform.

Snapchat, which at one time actively shunned the idea of influencers, just announced that it had funneled more than $250 million to creators via its Spotlight feature, which launched at the end of 2020. Some of the app’s biggest stars are even getting their own shows in Snapchat Discover.

Facebook also took a renewed interest in the influencers and content creators who had long asked for more opportunities from the platform. Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly labeled creators as one of the company's top priorities and announced a plan to invest $1 billion into tools for them by the end of 2022. Since then, Facebook and Instagram have launched a dizzying number of creator-focused updates and monetization features.

Platforms not traditionally associated with influencers also began throwing money at creators and monetization features. Pinterest launched a $500,000 creator fund and built its first monetization tools. LinkedIn — yes, that LinkedIn — announced a $25 million fund. Clubhouse added tipping. Tumblr, meanwhile, launched a subscription service for its bloggers.

Even YouTube, the most established platform for creators to make money, identified “growing the creator economy” as its top 2021 priority. It launched an all-new $100 million fund just for Shorts, its TikTok-like feature. TikTok itself, which started a $200 million fund in 2020, also launched new monetization features.

With all that money flowing in, it’s no surprise that the number of individual creators also boomed. One report from payments company Stripe, which powers payments for dozens of influencer platforms, found that the number of creators was up 48 percent in 2021, compared with 2020. And that’s just a “fraction” of the total ecosystem, according to the company.

“If the recent exponential growth of the creator economy keeps up, these 50 platforms could be supporting more than 15.5 million creators in five years,” the company wrote.

Stripe

Growth wasn’t limited just to the major platforms, either. Startups catering to content makers and their needs also surged, with more than $3.7 billion in funding going toward “startups focused on creators,” according to a report in The Information.

One of the main drivers of this surge in activity was the pandemic. While creators were making money long before the pandemic, the industry was almost perfectly primed to absorb many of the changes brought on by it.

“I think the pandemic definitely turbocharged the creator economy through both necessity and through choice,” Li Jin, founder of Atelier Ventures, a venture capital firm that invests in the creator economy, said in an interview earlier this year.

“Necessity meaning a lot of people were left without offline alternatives for work and income and had to turn to online platforms in order to continue their creative careers. And choice in the sense that obviously we had a lot of free time during the pandemic where we were just kind of stuck at home. I think a lot of people took that time and they started creating content.”

At the same time, the pandemic also seems to have shifted the way that many people think about work itself. While this year was full of hand-wringing about labor shortages and whether or not people want to go back to work, it’s not difficult to understand why some, particularly younger people, might opt for a different path. Zuckerberg described the shift as “​​people being able to make a living by expressing their creativity and by doing things they want to do, rather than things they have to.” Creators, he has said, deserve to be “rewarded” for their work,

But as Jin and others have pointed out, major platforms aren’t suddenly embracing creators just because they care about helping them create sustainable independent businesses. The economics are ultimately weighted in their favor as well.

Creators are responsible for a significant amount of engagement on their platforms of choice. If enough of an app’s biggest stars leave, they could take large chunks of users with them. Revenue from creators could also one day help Facebook generate income beyond advertising. Zuckerberg has pledged not to take a cut of their earnings until 2023, but even a relatively small commission could eventually add up to a significant amount. Likewise, Twitter has said it plans to take a 20 percent cut of Super Follow subscriptions from its highest-earning creators, though it could still be some time before the feature makes serious cash for anyone.

Creators are also crucial to drawing in new users and keeping platforms’ existing ones entertained. For Facebook, they could help the company avoid, or at least dampen, the “existential threat” of declining teen users. Snapchat has touted Spotlight as a key source of growth. Even LinkedIn has said creators can help their users get “better at what they do.”

Ultimately, though, it’s the platforms that will benefit most from creators, according to Jin. “Nothing is done purely altruistically,” she said. “It's to strengthen the company and their profitability.”

The following contains minor spoilers for season four, episode six of 'Star Trek: Discovery' (and vague discussion of episode seven).

There’s a bit of a trend or tradition among Star Trek shows, starting with The Next Generation. Somewhere around season three or four the show finds its way and actually becomes good, if not great. This isn’t a phenomenon limited to Trek, of course, but only Trek has a specific name for it: growing the beard. This is in reference to commanders William Riker and Benjamin Sisko, who both started their respective shows clean-shaven but grew beards around the time The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine got noticeably better. And Discovery might finally be ready to do its own metamorphosis, but instead of a beard it’s a change of format that has fans talking.

One of the complaints about Discovery’s first three seasons — besides the grimdark tone, the infallibility of Michael Burnham and all the crying — was that it largely embraced a more serial format, where each episode was another installment in one long ongoing storyline. Sure, there were occasional one-off adventures, but each episode was still firmly focused on the larger story.

CBS

Season four started off in the same manner, with the season premiere and second episode dedicated to setting up the new status quo of rebuilding the United Federation of Planets and introducing this season’s big threat: the Dark Matter Anomaly (DMA). However, unlike previous seasons where each episode would have been focused on one step toward finding a solution, the problem-solving has taken a back seat to a largely standalone A-plot.

The shift could be first seen in episode three, where Burnham and her crew are tasked with tracking down a rogue member of the Qowat Milat (as I described them to my editor: ninja nuns). The DMA is more of a C-plot in this episode, with the B-plot position occupied by the story of Gray Tal and his new android body. Episode four was Tilly trying to train and keep a group of Starfleet cadets alive (in a plot reminiscent of Voyager episodes ‘Learning Curve’ and ‘Good Shepherd’). Episode five saw the crew tasked with evacuating a planet threatened by the DMA. The anomaly may have been the instigating force in the episode, but it was in fact interchangeable with pretty much any other planetary threat since the episode was focused more on Michael’s struggle to free six prisoners on the surface.

CBS

This week’s episode finds Discovery traveling into a subspace rift created by the DMA and becoming stranded, with the ship’s newly sentient AI Zora unable to lead the crew to safety. However, while the anomaly is once again the cause of Discovery’s problems it’s also, once again, an interchangeable threat. The real drive of the episode is the problem-solving to get the crew out, and the personal struggles of characters like Zora and Cleveland Booker.

Next week will bring the Dark Matter Anomaly back to the forefront, but that’s only logical since the seventh episode marks the rough midpoint of the 13-episode season as well as the end of our calendar year. It’s not unusual for many television shows to use this time to “check in” on their major storylines and advance those plots to the next phase. But it is unusual for Discovery in that it doesn’t represent as clean a divide as in previous seasons: season one went from the Klingon War to the Mirror Universe, season two went from the mystery of the Red Angel to battling the evil AI Control. Next week’s episode represents a smoother transition than previously.

CBS

That smoothness is mostly due to the fact that the ongoing storyline hasn’t been given as much time to openly flourish, instead bubbling in the background while the show instead focuses on character-building single-shot adventures. Standalone episodes might feel outdated in an era of streaming and binging, where viewers can get their answers right away so there’s no need to make each individual chapter feel “complete.” There’s no chance to become unsatisfied by the content of an episode when the next one is merely seconds away. Even shows that premiere week by week have fallen into the trap, assuming that most viewers will binge the show later on anyway, with only the diehards watching each installment as it drops.

But for most of its existence at this point, Star Trek has been a franchise for the die-hards. The people who can’t wait for the next episode, the people who will read and write recaps on their favorite pop culture sites and those who share theories on social media. Paramount+ has put a lot of its chips on the strength of this die-hard base, stacking its production schedule with five different Star Trek shows that rarely overlap, meaning a fan who wants to see everything as soon as possible will need to maintain their Paramount+ subscription all-year-round.

CBS

While fan complaints may have played a big role in Discovery’s decision to switch to a more episodic format, it’s likely that the desire to keep fans on the hook for the show’s entire run played an even bigger part. When Discovery was the only Star Trek show, and one of the few Paramount+ offerings period, it was common for viewers to only sign up for a subscription when they wanted to binge something — sometimes even within the free week the service offers to new customers. Shows like Lower Decks, Prodigy and the upcoming Strange New Worlds already operate with a more episodic format, meaning Discovery could have created a “hole” in an ongoing subscription for viewers, a chance for them to take a break from Star Trek and from paying $6 a month.

With an episodic show it’s a lot harder to ignore it while it’s running; each episode represents a complete viewing experience, making the wait between episodes less excruciating. And when Discovery encounters new worlds and new adventures every week, it gives the fans something new to talk about, instead of rehashing the same old theories about the ongoing storyline again and again until the season ends. Star Trek was just made for episodic viewing, and embracing the format will make it easier for Discovery to hold fan interest over time.

It's been a surprisingly solid year for television. Partially because many major film releases ended up hitting streaming services early. (Don't forget about Warner Bros. unprecedented decision to stream their releases on HBO Max when they hit theaters.) Film and TV productions that were delayed due to the pandemic in 2020 also managed to cross the finish line thanks to safer shooting schedules and vaccines. The result was a wealth of content for couch potatoes.

As you settle in for holiday celebrations, here are a few selections that you may have missed during the year. (And be sure to check out our recommendations from last year!)

Netflix

Arcane

I'll be honest: I didn't expect much from a League of Legends TV show. But Arcane surprised me with its well-written characters, wonderfully realized fantasy world and luscious animation. While there are some killer action sequences, what really makes Arcane work is its commitment to mature storytelling. Characters you love will die. Villains are never one-note and heroes are never perfect. It's not only a solid video game adaptation, it's one of the best TV shows to debut this year.

Midnight Mass

Religious-focused horror may seem more like anti-holiday programming, but that's not going to stop us from recommending Midnight Mass. The show is an exploration of dogma, fanaticism, our connection to the cosmos and another compelling series from the rising horror master Mike Flanagan. Unlike his previous haunted house entries (The Haunting of Hill House and Bly Manor), Midnight Mass focuses on a small island community off the coast of Massachusetts, the sort of place that has its own demons festering under the surface. I won't spoil what happens, but it's the sort of thing that fans of Stephen King will eat up.

Also on Netflix:

The Power of the Dog: Jane Campion returns to feature films with a hauntingly beautiful Western. Benedict Cumberbatch steals the show as a monstrous cowboy poisoned by the spell of toxic masculinity.

Voir: The latest Netflix project from director David Fincher is a series of visual essays about the power of cinema from some of the best critics and thinkers today.

Gabby's Dollhouse: An adorable cat-themed show about a young girl who goes on the occasional dollhouse adventure.

HBO Max

Hacks

A once-legendary comedian (Jean Smart) is forced to team up with a young, semi-cancelled writer (Hannah Einbinder) to whip her act into shape. Hilarity ensues. Hacks takes this simple sitcom premise and elevates it with Smart's ferocious performance. On the face of it, it's a story about two creative generations learning to coexist. But really, it's the story of lost people finding direction in each other. It's the sort of genius comedy and drama we'd expect from the folks behind Broad City.

Starstruck

A lost twenty-something (Rose Matafeo) accidentally has a one-night stand with a movie star (Nikesh Patel). Again, hilarity ensues. (HBO Max really has a knack for collecting great show premises!) Starstruck is the rare season of TV that you can easily binge all at once—it's just six twenty-two minute episodes. But I'd recommend taking your time. Matafeo is uproariously funny, but there's also a romantic undercurrent that makes you root for these crazy kids.

Also on HBO:

The White Lotus: Rich resort-goers vs. the people who are forced to cater to them. It's great to see another funny, yet deeply human, show from Mike White.

Search Party: This former TBS show (now an HBO Max original) is the best hipster murder mystery you'll ever see.

Succession: There are plenty of shows about rich blowhards these days, but Succession stands out as a sharply written dark comedy filled with characters you love to hate.

Hulu

Reservation Dogs

Stories about the everyday lives of Native Americans are far too rare, so it's refreshing to see a dramedy like Reservation Dogs. Set in a rural Oklahoma reservation, it follows a group of teenagers as they get into trouble, help their community, and pursue their dream of moving to the promised land of California. It's the first TV series to feature an entirely Indigenous crew of writers and directors (it was co-created by the ever-delightful Taiki Waititi), and it's a reminder of how the push for better on-screen representation can lead to fresh storytelling.

Also on Hulu:

Top of the Lake: If you're looking for a smart crime thriller, don't sleep on this Jane Campion series. It stars Elisabeth Moss as an Australian detective who, across two seasons, investigates cases focusing on missing and murdered women.

Y: The Last Man: The rare adaptation that manages to improve on its source material, Y is a compelling portrait of a world where almost every person with a Y chromosome dies, leaving women in charge.

Apple TV+

For All Mankind

One of the first Apple TV+ series has evolved from being a mildly intriguing alternative history tale — what if the Soviet Union landed on the Moon first? — to one of the best dramas ever made about space travel. My advice? Get past the rocky first two episodes to find the show's true genius: NASA's push to get more women, and eventually people of color, into space. If it miraculously lasts several seasons, I wouldn't be surprised if For All Mankind shows us how something like Star Trek's space-faring society could be formed.

Also on Apple TV+:

Dr. Brain: Apple's first Korean series, from visionary director Kim Jee-woon, explores the possibility of downloading and reliving someone else's memories. Strap in – it’s a lot.

Disney+

Hawkeye

Even if you're tired of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Hawkeye is worth a watch simply because it's fun. Clint Barton has never been the most interesting Avenger, but he's fantastic as the foil to Kate Bishop, a plucky arrow-slinging protege. It may not reach the heights of Loki or Wandavision, but it's miles ahead of the supremely disappointing Falcon v. Winter Soldier.

Also on Disney+:

The Beatles: Get Back: An astounding fly-on-the-wall documentary featuring some previously unseen Beatles footage.

Star Wars: Visions: The anime spin on Star Wars I've always dreamed of.

Bluey: Hands down the best kids show on TV.

Other things to watch

Yellowjackets (Showtime): An elite girls' soccer team gets stranded in the woods after a plane crash. How did they manage to stay alive for over a year? Yellowjackets follows the surviving adults as they try to figure out who's digging into their traumatic past.

Star Trek Prodigy (Paramount+): What happens when a group of alien kids get their hands on an Enterprise starship? Something we’ve never seen in the Star Trek universe before: how people outside of the affluent Federation live. Prodigy features some genuinely fun characters and gorgeous animation in a kid-friendly package.

"Nothing comforts anxiety like a little nostalgia," Morpheus says in The Matrix Resurrections. That's a not-so-subtle dig at the onslaught of reboots and remakes dominating our culture — revisiting characters and stories we already know is, well, safe. Audiences know what to expect, and it's a better bet for risk-averse studios. Of course, Morpheus (now played by Yahya Abdul-Mateen) is also commenting on the film he's in.

More than twenty years after The Matrix fundamentally reshaped genre cinema, director Lana Wachowski is finally diving back into the universe that made her and co-director Lilly Wachowski renowned. After all that time, is it really worth going back down the rabbit hole, or is this just another easy franchise cash-grab?

The answer to that question depends on what you want from a Matrix sequel. Like The Matrix Reloaded and Revolutions before it, Wachowski (along with co-writers David Mitchell and Aleksander Hemon) isn't interested in merely retreading the past with Resurrections. Instead, it's a film that's keenly aware of its legacy, our relationship with its characters, and the lofty expectations that fans (and studios!) have when rebooting a beloved property.

Warner Bros.

As someone who adored the original film, and found plenty to respect in the much-maligned sequels, Resurrections feels made just for me. It's intoxicating, thrilling and unabashedly romantic. But judging from the polarizing early critical responses, it's clearly not for everyone.

Minor spoilers ahead.

It's hard to talk about what The Matrix Resurrections is without describing its basic setup, most of which you can gather from the film's trailers. Keanu Reeves returns as Thomas Anderson, a programmer adrift in a world that doesn't quite make sense to him. He meets a woman played by Carrie-Anne Moss, but this time she's not the Agent-whupping bad-ass Trinity, she's just your typical (albeit, strikingly beautiful) mom. The two feel an instant connection. Thomas eventually gets ripped out of the world he's in thanks to a plucky new character named Bugs (Jessica Henwick), he finds the real world, and yadda yadda, you get the picture.

Now, you might be asking yourself, "Didn't Neo and Trinity die in The Matrix Revolutions?" All I can do is point at the title of the movie — what did you expect? This time, Anderson is a renowned game developer known for creating an popular trilogy of games that retell the entire Matrix story. When we first meet him, he's faced with a new challenge: making a fourth entry. He approaches it with the same sense of dread the Wachowskis likely felt about tackling a potential Matrix 4. A series of brainstorming scenes feel as if they're pulled directly from their own hellish meetings with Warner Bros. Anderson's team can only focus on the surface — How do they go beyond bullet time? What if they just focus on more mindless action? — rather than anything truly substantive.

As the film unfolds (and don't worry, I'm not revealing any  major surprises), it's  impressive how Lana Wachowski elegantly avoids the traps most reboots fall into, as if she were in the Matrix herself, deftly avoiding all of the bullets aimed right at her. Sure, Resurrections brings some new special effects toys to the party, and it has the requisite action scenes you'd expect. But in many ways it's more reminiscent of the Wachowski's recent works, like the time-hopping epic Cloud Atlas, and the unabashedly humanistic Sense8.

The Matrix Resurrections wears its heart on its sleeve. It's far more interested in the transcendental possibilities of love than it is in laying the groundwork for a new trilogy of films. The fact that Wachowski is practically refusing to play by the current rules of Hollywood – set up the sequel by any means necessary! – feels almost revolutionary. She has one story to tell, and it means a lot to her. That’s it.

Warner Bros.

Strangely enough, the movie Resurrections reminds me of most is Wes Craven’s A New Nightmare, a groundbreaking attempt at wrestling with a hugely popular genre franchise. That film – the seventh A Nightmare on Elm Street entry – brought Freddy Krueger into the real world to reclaim what made him terrifying. Throughout The Matrix Resurrections, it feels as if Wachowski is also ready to break the fourth wall with her sheer contempt for reboots, fan service and watered-down sequels. “The sheeple want control, certainty,” a villain says at one point. (At that moment, I couldn’t help but think of the utter failure of The Rise of Skywalker. Yes, the wound is still fresh.)

Warner Bros.

And this is where I come back to saying this movie isn’t for everyone. But that just makes it a Matrix sequel. Sure, Reloaded and Revolutions were a bit overstuffed and convoluted, but they were also  singular visions that took some major swings. (I’m still chasing the high of seeing Reloaded’s sprawling highway chase for the first time.)

Geek cinema has taken over the world, yet aside from Christopher Nolan’s work, it’s rare to see big-budget filmmaking that isn’t beholden to some major corporation’s franchise rules (and at this point, that’s usually just Disney). The Matrix Resurrections says “to hell with the rules!”, and I applaud it.