I foolishly delayed this newsletter once because it was a bit too short for my liking, and then I had to keep waiting for some news... now that it's late it's quite a bit larger than average, like a baby. Anyways,

New From Me
I have two different trailer roundups ready for y'all, available free to view over on Patreon: one for a combination of the Gamescom Future of Play, Mini Indie, & MIX Next Showcases, and one for EEK3 2023. You can read them here and here, respectively.

I got a job! This was the big holdup, as I was waiting until everything was officially squared away to announce it. I'm going to be System Era Softworks's new Senior Social Media Manager (you may recognize them from their hit game, ASTRONEER). I don't yet know how much this will affect the stream or my schedule overall, but like I said, I expect to be a bit scarce on Twitch and will thus rely more on pre-recorded and written work; after all, my job at Fanbyte cut my streaming hours in half, and that was just a junior position. As a precaution, I'll be pausing billing on Patreon until the beginning of next year when I expect to have more to share. These scheduling changes will not, however, affect K-YOS.

Speaking of K-YOS, I'm so late that I have two monthly episodes to share with y'all again. The episodes for September and October releases are now available on Spotify. Just one more regular episode and then we're on to our annual Top 25 K-Pop Songs of the Year, when Azalea joins us for the pod! That episode is usually monstrously long, too, so please look forward to it.

Song of the Newsletter
SOTN was a little harder to decide this time around. Like I said, this newsletter is a bit delayed, and we're right in the middle of that hot autumn album release season. And yet, I find myself going back to an old favorite. C418 is best known for his contributions to the Minecraft soundtrack with Volume Alpha and Volume Beta, but I've grown fond of a more recent release of his: 2018's Excursions. The first and title track in particular has been on repeat lately as I've been waking up earlier and reading a bit while I try and manifest birds to appear at our meager balcony feeder setup. The nearly six minute song has been beautiful and calming company on these quiet mornings, with heavily layered, glistening strings interspersed with nature sounds like birdsong, crickets, and wind.

News & Recommendations
A bit late to the party, but I promised on stream I would provide y'all with some of the best Halloween costumes I saw on Instagram this year. Click each word to view them!

At TwitchCon, Twitch announced that all streamers without specific exclusivity agreements in place may now simulcast across multiple platforms — including YouTube. I may experiment with this to take some of the headache out of reuploading VODs and just branch out a bit; see what streaming on YouTube is like and whether or not it's a viable platform for my/our needs.

I really liked this piece, “Cyberpunk’s Critical Reevaluation Feels Rushed,” from NoEscape. We've all noticed how weird it is that the mainstream consensus is overwhelmingly complimentary of Cyberpunk 2077, lauding it as a labor of love, giving it multiple out-of-place Game Awards noms, likening it to No Man's Sky for its meteoric rise out of the legitimately harmful dumpster fire it launched as... right?

On a serious note, I would like to encourage everyone reading this to follow the official BDS boycott list. BDS (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions) is a Palestinian movement which promotes the aforementioned political actions against Israel. On the most basic level, they compile lists of companies and brands which act in direct support of and/or are owned by Israel and Israeli businesses. What's difficult about this on first glance — and something you might've come across, if you're still active on sites like Xitter — is that many large monopolies such as Nestle and Coca-Cola support Israel. I can't speak for other countries, but in America, it is virtually impossible to buy groceries, or even just to eat and drink, without purchasing something from these brands or one of their subsidiaries. This is why BDS calls for a focused effort in the form of targeted boycotts of specific companies for maximum impact. You might've seen a few different infographics and calls to action going around, but here's one of a few official BDS shortlists. Please download and share this around, though note that there are two notable omissions which are very easy to avoid: Starbucks and Sabra. For the Starbies lovers, there are many past instances of Starbucks employees posting official recipes so you can make them at home. If this Twitter thread of recipes ever goes down, know that that information is just a search away.

"In Guatemala, there was never a civil war. It was always an agreement between the United States and Israel. It never was a civil war in Guatemala. That is why we love, encourage, and care deeply for the people of Palestine. Life and freedom, freedom and life, long live Palestine! We love you sister, we love you! We are one people, people of the world!"