iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Graham Smith

@grahamsmith.bsky.social

3K followers 318 following 202 posts

Studio manager/producer @suspicious.dev. Co-founder @jank.cool. Previously: RPS, PC Gamer, Crate & Crowbar, Eurogamer, Dicebreaker.

Posts Replies Media

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 06/10/2026

Not many people realise that Oshii's Angel's Egg is actually a lot darker than the original source material, The Angel's Egg

A perfectly normal image of Angel's Egg (but the colours are lurid and the eyes and mouth of the Major have been pasted on to the face. The Photoshop job is terrible.)

Another perfectly normal image of Angel's Egg (but the eyes and mouth are pasted from TGITS onto the guy's face.)

010

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 08/07/2026

We're putting the paywall on a handful of Jank posts so we're celebrating with a week of articles about walls which includes reviewing 2008 movie tie-in game Wall-E

"Honey, we're videogamesing. Its best levels showcase the sediment layers of game design practices over the preceding decades that have compacted to produce, finally, a semi-competent movie tie-in for nine year olds."

2323

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 16/05/2026

Xbox is my son. Call me...

A ventilation and heat recovery system in a closet. "MRXBOX" is written on the front in blue writing, above small grey writing that reads, "Manufactured in the UK to the highest quality."

0401

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 11/05/2026

mfw you try to talk to me about the MIxtape discourse Anyway here's my contribution to the Mixtape discourse

In mimicry of a famous meme, Cass from Mixtape stands with her arms folded, looking unimpressed, while a man leans too close to her ear and talks at her about something.

1375

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 16/04/2026

Chuckie from Good Will Hunting, played by Ben Affleck, asking "You know what the best part of my day is?"

Chuckie from Good Will Hunting, played by Ben Affleck, saying "It's for about ten seconds: from when I open BlueSky and it's broken and I'm waiting for it to load."

Chuckie from Good Will Hunting, played by Ben Affleck: "'Cause I think maybe it'll never load and they'll never fix it and you won't be there."

3576109

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 04/04/2026

Built a robit

A ping Gundam holding a shield and gun, standing on a cutting mat. It is a Bandai Gunpla Real Grade RG 1/144 Gundam Justice.

5461

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

This is from a booklet sent home by my kid's school. You can tell we're in England because only royalty are imagined to have self-worth

"I feel I count" written above a smiling boy in a crown

"I feel I do not count or belong" written above a sad boy.

080

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

me loading up the videogame vs me sitting through all the unskippable logos and copyright notices

"I feel in control" written above a boy holding a gamepad (or RC car control?), looking happy. The boy is wearing a green tshirt.

"I feel a lack of control" written above the same boy, who looks angry, and who is trapped inside a glass dome.

31019

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 21/12/2025

I don't typically like any genre you'd put it in, or any system it contains, and yet Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time would be on my top ten of the year. It dares to ask: what if Animal Crossing was a videogame? A daft, colourful, bountiful dopamine machine, and a lark to play with kids.

A blue bean-shaped character is tossed through the air on a boat towards a man in a top hat. "Hey! Waah! Aah!" he shouts.

A full beer glass with eyes sits on the floor. Cheery Wheat Juice is his name. He says, "I thought I'd go out for a drink and then... I became a Wheat Juice myself! Ridiculous! Ahahaha!".

The player character and a villager sit on a bench, beside a fire, cherry tree, pond and home, in the Animal Crossing ish bit of Fantasy Life i.

A group cut down a tree. "I pay for your victory!" says Hilda, a blonde lady staring nearby. It's a tree, Hilda.

0160

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 18/12/2025

The father of indie gaming

The cover of Klik & Play, the 1994 game making software.

16610

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 24/10/2025

Two men in bed look out the window, hearing classical music in a scene from Shawshank Redemption.

Two men in prison clothes look up and out of frame, hearing classical music in a scene from Shawshank Redemption.

A crowd of prisoners and wardens in a yard, look up, hearing music in Shawshank Redemption.

Morgan Freeman, from Shawshank Redemption, looks up and out of frame.

16818

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 04/09/2025

Floof.

A cocker spaniel curled up on a couch, looking soft.

0130

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 04/09/2025

Every video game industry presentation I saw circa 2009-2016 looked like this. "Consumers who were willing to spend more on games weren't able to". Oh no!!!!!

A slide from a GDC 2011 presentation explaining that traditional models of selling games "represented lost economic value".

2110

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 21/08/2025

I don't know what this is but it's the apex of technology

A photo of the box for the Casio Loopy, an old video games console. Most of the text is in Japanese except for "My Seal Computer". It has pictures of colourful games and lots of pink hearts.

A photo of the box for the Casio Loopy, an old video games console. It has Japanese writing, "My Seal Computer" in the corner, and lots of coloured hearts along the bottom.

4100

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 06/08/2025

when the reality is more like

Mr. Burns, glowing green, bringing people love in a drug-induced haze as Smithers reaches to stop him.

080

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 07/07/2025

I think what I love most about Nintendo consoles is how intuitive they are for families. [Spends four hours Googling for information Nintendo doesn't give you anywhere.]

A browser history list of Google searches for details related to Nintendo Switch Online, family memberships, virtual game cards, and child/supervised account restrictions.

1141

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 01/07/2025

This is exceptionally dumb. Handing the Crunchyroll app to a kid means handing them a menu with 100 buttons that don't work, and you can only tell which after clicking on each of them twice.

160

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 07/06/2025

going from watching Game Fest to watching Day Of The Devs

0395

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 31/05/2025

L.A. Noire requires you to read subtle facial cues to tell if someone is lying

2487

Graham Smith @grahamsmith.bsky.social · 05/12/2024

The Skeleton Crew poster but with Jude Law (badly) replaced with Simon Pegg's character from The World's End.

010