Evening Reading - January 27, 2023

Greetings, travelers. I am back, once again, to send you off into the blissful weekend. That means it's time for a fresh round of news, memes, and entertainment! It's the Friday edition of Evening Reading!

In case you missed it at Shacknews:

• Like A Dragon Ishin turns Kazuma Kiryu into the rugged samurai we've always wanted
• Battlefield 2042 devs tease return of the Class System next week
• XCOM director says no plans for the series while he's still working on Midnight Suns DLC
• The Last of Us renewed for Season 2 at HBO Max
• Skybound invests millions in WrestleQuest dev Mega Cat Studios
• Microsoft and ArcelorMittal invest in green Boston Steel startup spun out of MIT
• Tomb Raider series in the works from Phoebe Waller-Bridge at Amazon
• Shack Chat: What 2000s game deserves a remake?

And, because it's the weekend, go find yourself something to play!

• Weekend Console Download Deals for Jan. 27: Play Uno on Switch
• Weekend PC Download Deals for Jan. 27: Step into Hitman's World of Assassination

Around the gaming horn

Ubisoft has entered the dodge ball game with Oddballers. It's out today on PC and consoles.

Celebrate the Wonder of Encanto in #DisneyDreamlightValley 's 3rd update - "A Festival of Friendship"! 🕯️✨ Learn more about how we're celebrating alongside Disney here: https://t.co/B67QWoEnRn pic.twitter.com/y9y9T9cIK9

— Disney Dreamlight Valley (@DisneyDLV) January 27, 2023

Disney Dreamlight Valley is getting ready to celebrate the Festival of Friendship! Hope it goes better than this Festival of Friendship.

Take a look at one of the early tutorials for the upcoming Kerbal Space Program 2. It'll be out on Steam Early Access on February 24.

Warframe held its first Devstream of the new year and outlined what's next. For more on the Duviri Paradox, the Citrine's Last Wish update, and more, check out the Warframe website.

Here's a little glimpse of what #DontNodMontreal is brewing!
Does it bring back childhood memories?
We are looking for talents to join the team in Montréal on this new narrative game!
Find all our job openings here: https://t.co/IJi6njvHiJ pic.twitter.com/IFBAkGPGFW

— DON'T NOD (@DONTNOD_Ent) January 27, 2023

Lastly, Don't Nod appears to be working on its next narrative adventure and has offered a tease. Thanks for the lead, dognose!

And now... Other Stuff From The Internet!!!

Beast Mode

Marshawn Lynch got me crying bruh he dead wrong 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Marshawn put his camera crew through a workout at the beach & they had no idea he was doing this 😭😭😭 pic.twitter.com/RaaS7VK52Q

— Shannonnn sharpes Burner (PARODY Account) (@shannonsharpeee) January 26, 2023

This production team should be ready for the combine before Valentine's Day.

Genesis does...

If you missed out on Genesis 9, Coney's got your highlights... and a few other things to laugh about from his own co-stream of the event.

Plague Knight + Mona

🥹💚 pic.twitter.com/HtVtSuJfuK

— Yacht Club Games - Shovel Knight Dig is OUT NOW! (@YachtClubGames) January 28, 2023

Under the radar, one of my favorite couples in gaming.

Full Zangief

No one was ready for Rekka's Heavenly Buster. pic.twitter.com/eVQHwTVu6e

— Leon Tekashi (@LeonTekashi) January 26, 2023

Capcom has a new bar to aim for with Zangief. He needs to totally contort his opponents like this.

Hi-Fi Rush is out now on PC and Xbox Series X|S.

Nothing but the Hotfix

Let's look at a different corner of the Pokemon world by checking out this Pokemon FireRed Kaizo IronMON run, featuring SpikeVegeta.

GDQ's Hotfix shows air every week and you can catch them all at the Games Done Quick Twitch account.

Under the learning tree with Masahiro Sakurai

Masahiro Sakurai started a YouTube channel! Let's learn from his decades of experience together by looking at one of his latest videos. This week, Sakurai talks about surviving the arduous challenges of creating an artistic work and enjoying the fruits of your labor, which will endure. (Unless you put something on HBO Max.)

This week in Shaqnews

This seems like a waste of perfectly good peanut butter, I don't know about you all.

IT'S STILL REAL TO ME, DAMMIT!

We're double dipping on wrestling clips this week. First, it's that time of year again! It's time for the Royal Rumble! Here's the annual By the Numbers video to get you hyped up.

I'm a little cash-strapped this year, Chatty, but I'll do my best to have something to offer tomorrow. Stay tuned!

From that, we go to a rare and emotional scene in wrestling, as AEW hosts a special tribute main event for the departed Jay Briscoe. His brother, Mark, works against long-time friend Jay Lethal to pay tribute to Jay, who died in a tragic car accident last week.

Tonight in video game music

Over the next few weeks, I'll look to revisit some of the more fun sets from this year's MAGFest. Let's start with this performance from The OneUps.

That's it for the last Friday Evening Reading for the month of January! Be sure to keep the spirit of the classic Evening Reading alive by jumping into the comments about whatever you see here or whatever randomness you'd like to discuss. Join the conversation and dive into the Shacknews Chatty comment thread below. I'll see you all next week!

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?