e540 — Saucer Separation Button

Photo by Aneta Pawlik on Unsplash Published 26 January 2026 e540 with Michael, Andy and Michael – Stories and discussion on mobile controllers, AI playing Anchorhead, Zork & Roller Coaster Tycoon, an isometric NYC, human artistic creativity and a whole lot more. Michael, Andy and Michael get things clicking with some mobile controllers.  Starting with one of Andy’s latest technology acquisitions, the team enjoys hearing about Andy’s experience with the MCON.  And they especially like the “saucer separation” functionality.  The featured image from Unsplash was selected because there were very few TNG images – if you want to see the saucer separation that inspired this week’s show title, have a look at the YouTube video below.  After discussing the Anbernic controller, which has some interesting features like a screen and heart rate monitoring, the team moves forward with AI. Claude features in a couple of the stories – first with an article from Fernando Borretti who details how he hooked Claude into the text based adventure Anchorhead.  The co-hosts have been intrigued by this kind of thing for years, and were reminded of the recent open sourcing of Zork.  Ramp Labs also used Claude with Roller Coaster Tycoon, which struck the team as a great way to run optimization routines across a multitude of data points that make us the game.  Next up was a story about using AI to create a SimCity-style rendition of New York City (New York City!) with astounding detail.  There were a couple of jumping off points of note from this story – Nvidia’s Omniverse digital twin, traffic optimization routines and another being the language in SimCity called Simlish – and a translator is included below for the listeners to enjoy. After all the news on AI – it is refreshing though unsurprising that Hermès selected human creativity, complete with the imperfections that make the artwork more real.  Wrapping up the episode, the team closes with Netflix’s foray into social engagement. What game would you like to have AI set up to play?  Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @gamesatwork_biz@mastodon.social (our home for now) and let us know!  These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot.  All rights reserved.  That’s our story and we’re sticking to it. Selected Links Hardware: Mobile Controllers Kickstarter: MCON: The Switchblade of Mobile Controllers by Ohsnap The Verge article: Anbernic’s next wireless controller adds a screen and heart rate monitoring AI boretti.me blog post: Letting Claude Play Text Adventures Wikipedia article: Anchorhead Games at Work e534: Hiding in Plain Sight (for Microsoft’s open sourcing of Zork) Ramp Labs blog post: We Put Claude Code in Rollercoaster Tycoon atari.com Roller Coaster Tycoon cannoneyed.com Isometric NYC (click the ℹ️ in the upper right for description) PC Gamer article: Software engineer creates classic SimCity-style map of NYC—and argues that AI will be good for creatives, actually Nvidia’s Omniverse Games at Work e316: Omni Metaverse (for Nvidia’s Omniverse) The Sims Wiki: Simlish lingojam.com English to Simlish translator Inc article: Hermès Just Made a Bold Statement in the Age of AI acquired.fm Season 12, Episode 2: LVMH Art This is Colossal post: Pam Connolly Weaves Family Snapshots on Vintage Potholder Looms Everything is Social TechCrunch article: Netflix to redesign its app as it competes with social platforms for daily engagement Web 11.0 mashup junkie, and co-founder / co-host of the GamesAtWork.biz podcast. My views are my own. Michael Martine

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e540 — Saucer Separation Button is an episode from Games At Work dot Biz by Michael Rowe, Michael Martine, Andy Piper.

This episode is 35:29 long.

This episode was published on Jan 26, 2026.

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