It’s Always Sunny In Philabieldia (With Chris Plante)
On this week’s episode, Nathan and Chris are joined by an additional Chris (Plante) – and also, to complete the bit, Nathan has legally changed his name to Chris. We begin by discussing Plante’s life following his tenure as editor-in-chief at Polygon, which came to an abrupt halt earlier this year for reasons with which Aftermath readers and listeners are depressingly familiar. On the upside, he’s launched a new show, Post Games, and it’s very good! We discuss the whys and hows of his interview-focused podcast before delving into the big news of the week: Incensed by the removal of NSFW games on Itch and Steam following pressure from payment processors – which, in turn, were pressured by an activist group called Collective Shout – artists and fans have kicked off a mass call campaign of their own, targeting Visa, Mastercard, PayPal, and Stripe specifically. Will it work? And in what universe is it appropriate for bank companies and payment processors to even be making decisions about what we’re allowed to watch and play in the first place? Then Chris (Person) enthuses about Death Stranding 2 – which he recently finished – and Chris (Plante) tells the wildest story about a sandwich any of us have ever heard. Credits- Hosts: Nathan “Chris” Grayson, Chris Person, & special guest Chris Plante- Podcast Production & Ads: Multitude- Subscribe to Aftermath!About The ShowAftermath Hours is the flagship podcast of Aftermath, a worker-owned, subscription-based website covering video games, the internet, and everything that comes after from journalists who previously worked at Kotaku, Vice, and The Washington Post. Each week, games journalism veterans Luke Plunkett, Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, Riley MacLeod, and Gita Jackson – though not always all at once, because that’s too many people for a podcast – break down video game news, Remember Some Games, and learn about Chris’ frankly incredible number of special interests. Sometimes we even bring on guests from both inside and outside the video game industry! I don’t know what else to tell you; it’s a great time. Simply by reading this description, you’re already wasting time that you could be spending listening to the show. Head to aftermath.site for more info. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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1:50:32
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1:50:32
All’s Fair In Love And Warframe (With Isla Hinck)
On this week’s episode, Nathan and Chris are joined by Isla Hinck of Easy Allies, aka the Aftermath of YouTube. Nathan and Isla met just one week ago, at this year’s TennoCon, the official Warframe convention (yes, Warframe has an official convention), so they regale Chris with tales of their time at a refreshingly positive show attended by fans who just seem to… love a thing? In 2025? I’m as surprised as you are. They also got to explore developer Digital Extremes’ office inside a dead mall, which was a trip unto itself. Then we discuss a significantly more dispiriting piece of news: Payment processors, urged on by a militantly censorious group called Collective Shout, have brought their anti-porn crackdown to Steam and Itch.io, an attack on free speech that will almost certainly not end with porn. Finally, decide which kind of Hideo Kojima-created guy we’d like to be, and we tease what Aftermath has planned for the rest of the year. Credits- Hosts: Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, & special guest Isla Hinck- Podcast Production & Ads: Multitude- Subscribe to Aftermath!About The ShowAftermath Hours is the flagship podcast of Aftermath, a worker-owned, subscription-based website covering video games, the internet, and everything that comes after from journalists who previously worked at Kotaku, Vice, and The Washington Post. Each week, games journalism veterans Luke Plunkett, Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, Riley MacLeod, and Gita Jackson – though not always all at once, because that’s too many people for a podcast – break down video game news, Remember Some Games, and learn about Chris’ frankly incredible number of special interests. Sometimes we even bring on guests from both inside and outside the video game industry! I don’t know what else to tell you; it’s a great time. Simply by reading this description, you’re already wasting time that you could be spending listening to the show. Head to aftermath.site for more info. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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1:29:30
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1:29:30
Hay Is For Horse Girls
On this week’s episode, Nathan and Chris are joined by award-winning disability reporter Grant Stoner to discuss Disability Pride Month, as well as his own growing body of investigative work in the accessibility space. Not entirely in order, we draw a line from the early days of companies largely ignoring accessibility-related concerns to the moment they realized such options could serve as a marketing hook – and then up to the present, which Grant argues would be better served by journalism that goes beyond praising PR-friendly features. After that, we move on to the horse girl sensation that’s sweeping the nation: Umamusume. Chris, like the whole internet, is obsessed. He explains why this oddity speaks to him, and then we grapple with how this new fandom has impacted real horses and horse game researchers. Finally, we decide that anyone who pastes into a document (or email or what have you) with formatting is a deviant who deserves to be confined to the deepest reaches of hell. Credits- Hosts: Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, & special guest Grant Stoner- Podcast Production & Ads: Multitude- Subscribe to Aftermath!About The ShowAftermath Hours is the flagship podcast of Aftermath, a worker-owned, subscription-based website covering video games, the internet, and everything that comes after from journalists who previously worked at Kotaku, Vice, and The Washington Post. Each week, games journalism veterans Luke Plunkett, Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, Riley MacLeod, and Gita Jackson – though not always all at once, because that’s too many people for a podcast – break down video game news, Remember Some Games, and learn about Chris’ frankly incredible number of special interests. Sometimes we even bring on guests from both inside and outside the video game industry! I don’t know what else to tell you; it’s a great time. Simply by reading this description, you’re already wasting time that you could be spending listening to the show. Head to aftermath.site for more info. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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1:15:13
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1:15:13
Kotaku Is So Back, Microsoft Not So Much
On this week’s episode, Nathan and Riley are joined by Ethan Gach of Kotaku dot com and Garrett Martin of the newly rechristened Endless Mode, two beneficiaries of the only good week for games media in the past century. The former finally managed to wriggle out from under G/O Media’s suffocating boot via a sale to the same seemingly benign company that bought Gizmodo, and the latter represents that rarest of unicorns: a new video game website with a functional budget in the year 2025. We talk to both Ethan and Garrett about the state of games journalism and their cautious optimism about the future now that MBA-brained business idiots seem to have moved on from blindly buying up websites for their ponzi schemes. Then we discuss decidedly less good news: Microsoft just laid off 9,000 more workers, many of them in games, resulting in cancellations of multiple promising projects as well as general industry brain drain. Finally, prompted by a mailbag question, we talk about the many cool world records we’ve broken, only some of which involve eating a waffle to discover a clue. Credits- Hosts: Nathan Grayson, Riley MacLeod, & special guests Ethan Gach and Garrett Martin- Podcast Production & Ads: Multitude- Subscribe to Aftermath!About The ShowAftermath Hours is the flagship podcast of Aftermath, a worker-owned, subscription-based website covering video games, the internet, and everything that comes after from journalists who previously worked at Kotaku, Vice, and The Washington Post. Each week, games journalism veterans Luke Plunkett, Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, Riley MacLeod, and Gita Jackson – though not always all at once, because that’s too many people for a podcast – break down video game news, Remember Some Games, and learn about Chris’ frankly incredible number of special interests. Sometimes we even bring on guests from both inside and outside the video game industry! I don’t know what else to tell you; it’s a great time. Simply by reading this description, you’re already wasting time that you could be spending listening to the show. Head to aftermath.site for more info. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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1:11:22
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1:11:22
Zohran Mamdani, Gamer Mayor
On this week’s episode, Nathan and Chris celebrate the NYC democratic mayoral primary victory of Zohran Mamdani by bringing on a whopping TWO guests: First, Max Rivlin-Nadler joins us to talk about how Hell Gate – a fellow worker-owned publication – punched well above its weight during this election, organizing a town hall that every candidate except Andrew Cuomo showed up for and hosting an election night livestream that aired in bars across the city. Then f ormer Kotaku writer turned professional Genshin Impact advocate turned laid off person (hire them!) Sisi Jiang comes on to share their experience knocking on over 1,000 doors for the Mamdani campaign – part of a wider canvassing effort that resulted in an unprecedented turnout for a leftist candidate. Lastly, using the scant information available, we attempt to divine what kind of gamer Mamdani is.Credits- Hosts: Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, & special guests Max Rivlin-Nadler and Sisi Jiang- Podcast Production & Ads: Multitude- Subscribe to Aftermath!About The ShowAftermath Hours is the flagship podcast of Aftermath, a worker-owned, subscription-based website covering video games, the internet, and everything that comes after from journalists who previously worked at Kotaku, Vice, and The Washington Post. Each week, games journalism veterans Luke Plunkett, Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, Riley MacLeod, and Gita Jackson – though not always all at once, because that’s too many people for a podcast – break down video game news, Remember Some Games, and learn about Chris’ frankly incredible number of special interests. Sometimes we even bring on guests from both inside and outside the video game industry! I don’t know what else to tell you; it’s a great time. Simply by reading this description, you’re already wasting time that you could be spending listening to the show. Head to aftermath.site for more info. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
The flagship podcast of Aftermath, a worker-owned, subscription-based website covering video games, the internet, and everything that comes after from journalists who previously worked at Kotaku, Vice, and The Washington Post. Each week, games journalism veterans Luke Plunkett, Nathan Grayson, Chris Person, Riley MacLeod, and Gita Jackson – though not always all at once, because that’s too many people for a podcast – break down video game news, Remember Some Games, and learn about Chris’ frankly incredible number of special interests. Sometimes we even bring on guests from both inside and outside the video game industry! I don’t know what else to tell you; it’s a great time. Simply by reading this description, you’re already wasting time that you could be spending listening to the show. Head to aftermath.site for more info.
Ireland