Phil Hornshaw

@philhornshaw.com

1221 Followers 939 Following

Freelance games journalist and consultant, former game assessment analyst at NetEase. Bylines all over but mostly @GameSpot. My books THE TIME TRAVELER'S GUIDE TO TIME TRAVEL and THE SPACE HERO'S GUIDE TO GLORY are hilarious. https://www.philhornshaw.com

Sam Jackson in Black Snake Moan giving very intense eyes while wearing a white tank top and standing in front of a porch
A bing push notification for a news story that says "Trending story for you," and then, "Quadruple amputee cornhole champion facing murder charges in fatal shooting" and there's a tiny mugshot of a white guy.
A first-person photo of the game Marathon, featuring a robot hand in the foreground and a big green wall of weirdness called the Anomaly in the background, which is breaking through the ground and throwing up rocks and debris. Standing near the Anomaly is a humanoid figure in a white jumpsuit, seemingly a scientist, except their entire top half is covered in weird fleshy bubbles that completely obscure everything from the waist up.
A meatball wearing sunglasses is talking on a phone trying to make an observational humor joke as he works on his tight five, saying "Airplane food, am I right?" It's Meatwad from Aqua Teen Hunger Force talking to Carl.
Hudson from Aliens in battle armor looking at a screen sadly and saying "So far, zippo."
Laura Linney in The Truman Show, dressed as a nurse, standing in her kitchen and giving an incredibly unsubtle pitch for a product called Mococoa in the middle of a conversation.
A set of black machinery, pipes, and hoses connected to a column in Alien: isolation, which resembles the curving head and skeletal chest of a xenomorph and when I saw it I thought I was about to get murdered.
Another screenshot from Alien: Isolation, this time showing the space jockey from Alien, a big fossilized alien guy in a chair with a giant gun-looking device pointing up into the air away from its face, also as seen through a pressure suit helmet.
A screenshot from Alien: Isolation, showing the derelict alien ship from the first Alien movie, as seen through the interior of a pressure suit helmet.
Krusty the Klown from The Simpsons shown on a TV set leaning forward, smiling widely, and shouting "Vivi's dead!" This is from the Itchy and Scratchy and Poochie episode after it's revealed that Poochie died on his way back to his home planet but here we're talking about Vivi the broken Magic card who has been banned.
Bill Paxton as Hudson in Aliens (1986) with a backward ball cap on asking "how do I get out of this chickenshit outfit"
A panel from Junji Ito's Frankenstein adaptation, showing Victor Frankenstein looking down at the creature while he's working on him. The creature is a huge guy covered in bloody bandages and he's just ludicrously big, like if you saw that guy you would have a hard time with how big he is, no wonder everyone lost it when they saw him, he's way too big.
A still from Robocop, in which the titular robotic cop attempts to arrest OCP executive Dick Jones, who wears a suit and is grinning at Robocop writhes in pain because OCP has a "strong influence" over Robocop's ability to enforce the law.
The Scouting Report from a successful escape in the video game Peak, which says that I completed the game solo and earned some merit badges, and you can see my creepy little purple scout guy sitting in the helicopter. He looks like a zombie because he has weird eyes and intense cheek bones, and he's wearing a hawiian shirt and a dumb-ass hat with safari flaps in the back, I Think You Should Leave-style.
A shot from The Simpsons of Lenny and Carl in the nuclear plant, looking at a coworker who irradiated his band to make it huge.
Tim Robinson in Detroiters sitting on the table at the doctor's office for an exam, saying, "I had a hotdog bowl earlier today. Yes, I did.
A bunch of folks and stalls at the Night Market.
A screenshot from the game Riven, of a weird little wooden toy that is a fun children's game, kind of like reverse Hangman where two guys hanging from ropes are slowly lowered toward a big fish that will eat them if they get too close.
My receipt from the Steam Summer Sale, which includes Skin Deep, UFO 50, Signalis, and Riven.
Bruce Willis as John McClane in Die Hard 2, asking "How can the same shit happen to the same guy twice?"
Protest continues in Pasadena
A ton of protesters at Colorado and Lake in Pasadena
Truth Social post by Donald Trump from June 12, 2025 at 6:43 am that reads: "Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with these jobs being almost impossible to replace. In many cases the Criminals allowed into our Country by the VERY Stupid Biden Open Borders Policy are applying for those jobs. This is not good. We must protect our Farmers, but get the CRIMINALS OUT OF THE USA. Changes are coming!" (All unhinged capitalizations are original.)
Tim Meadows in an I Think You Should Leave sketch, wearing a gray suit, pink shirt, and flowery tie, yelling at somebody. The caption text reads "Knowing about games isn't cool." I think about this one a lot.
David Clennon as Palmer in John Carpenter's The Thing, standing in the infirmary, making an incredulous face toward the camera. The caption reads, "You gotta be fucking kidding."
Jim Varney as Ernest P. Worrell looking surprised and worried, wearing his signature gray hat, gray shirt, and blue jean vest.
A cupcake with gray frosting with a flag sticking out that has a picture of a shot from an I Think You Should Leave sketch, set in a court room where a woman is reading a document out of focus on the foreground, while in the background Tim Robinson sits in the gallery, wearing a gray fedora with safari flaps, looking baffled that somehow he and his hat are being mentioned during the proceedings.
A cupcake with flag in it with a picture of Tim Meadows from an I Think You Should Leave sketch, wearing a suit on a pink background, with the text "Knowing about games isn't cool."
A LinkedIn post with the "this is fine" dog cartoon having coffee in a room that's on fire, from Henrique Olifiers, co-founder and gamer-in-chief at Bossa Studios, which reads: "Games industry media nowadays: Dev: Hey, here's our new game, would you want to talk about it? Journo: Nah, sorry, we're too busy covering CoD, Monster Hunter, Civ 7 and Pokemon. Dev: *going through rough times, downsizes studio* Journo: Oh my gawd, you guys are letting people go? I'll write an extensive piece on that!"
A screenshot from the 1995 RPG Chrono Trigger, in which protagonist Crono has entered a random house to speak with the people who live there. A woman sitting at her dining room table remarks, "Something tells me I'm as happy now as I'll ever be."
Bill Paxton in Aliens with a backward hat on, holding onto a chain, with the text "How do I get out of this chickenshit outfit?" That "chickenshit outfit" is the Colonial Marines in the movie, but in this case we're talking about the Democratic Party, which is always doing its best to be completely useless in the face of the country being systematically dismantled and sold for parts.
A picture of Marge Simpson in her kitchen holding a potato with the text "I just think they're neat!" Game designers in the 2000s also though block puzzles were neat, is the joke. The fuckin love block puzzles man it's nuts.
Biff Wiff, an older white guy with a long white beard, appearing in an I Think You Should Leave sketch as Santa Claus, who has become an actor in an action movie called Crashmore and is now sitting for a press junket, wearing a brown hat and leather jacket. The text quotes him saying "Even if I do a bad job, they've got to give me that other two mil."
Tim Robinson from I Think You Should Leave in the Sloppy Steaks sketch, looking down at the camera and smiling, with the text "I'm not a piece of shit." Not included is the following line, "I used to be," and the point of the sketch is that people can change. That's relevant to Myst 4 because the game is about Sirrus and Achenar, who did NOT die, but were imprisoned by their father at the end of the first Myst in two real shitty worlds because they were absolute dips, just real buttholes. Sirrus was super greedy and tried to destabilize civilizations so he could become their god-king and Achenar liked to hunt and torture people and do scary cult stuff, and both of them were such pieces of shit that the legendary Brad Dourif spent years plotting his revenge on them, and him attempting to take that revenge is the entire plot of Myst 3. Anyway at the end of Myst 1, Sirrus and Achenar's dad Atrus trapped them after they pulled some shit and in Myst 4 it's been like 20 years and Atrus decides to see what those guys are up to and if maybe they've somehow become less trash after living in isolation on a couple garbage worlds for decades. And then you solve puzzles for like 15 hours to figure that out. And, well, people can change. I used to be a piece of shit. But I'm not anymore.
A picture of Gonzo and Rizzo the Rat from A Muppet Christmas Carol, when they talk about how Tiny Tim did NOT die at the end, only with text that reads "And Sirrus and Achenar—who did NOT die," see because Sirrus and Achenar are villains from the first Myst game and at the end of that game it seems like they get extremely killed by their dad or maybe just banished forever but in Myst 4 somehow Sirrus and Achenar return, and this time with revelations, which is why it's called Myst 4: Revelation.
A screenshot from Myst 3: Exile of Brad Dourif, who plays the villain Saavedro, behind gnarled bars and looking incredibly distraught over the fact that I figured out all his puzzles and trapped him on this crappy planet, just acting the hell out of it, with Dark Souls-style text over it that reads "Brad Outsmarted".
A trending story notification from Bing that reads "Trending story for you: This Donald Trump Move Could Doom His 'Honeymoon Period,' Says CNN Data Reporter."
A big pile of power banks from video game preview events and a mess of USB cables.
A screenshot from the game Riven: The Sequel to Myst of a wooden toy. At the bottom is a round disc with the head of a fish sticking up with its mouth open, and hanging over it are two poles, one on each side, with little wooden men hanging by their feet, being lowered down for the fish to eat then like bait. There's a symbol on the disc. The game sits on a wood table. This shit is the neatest little thing possibly ever, it's simultaneously a little glimpse into the culture of the people who live in this place and an essential means of learning key info to solve puzzles you'll use for literally the entire rest of the game. Absolutely brilliant little piece of puzzle design and world-building.
Something on fire in the distance of our neighborhood
A screen from a Steam Replay labeled "How You Compare: Stack your year against the rest of the Steam Community," and which says I unlocked 524 achievements vs. Steam median 13, I played 63 games vs. Steam median 4, and my longest play streak was 40 days vs. Steam median 6.
Spotify Wrapped summary for Paradox: The Time Travel podcast, our podcast breaking down time travel movies, which I put on Spotify this year and which supposedly has received 999%+ growth, is the top podcast for 7 people, and has an average rating of 5 stars.
A weird six-armed dog guy and a red-haired kid I barely remember from Highlander: The Animated Series.
Sam Richardson and Tim Robinson in Detroiters, wearing their original slogan t-shirts reading "De2roit."
Famous dril tweet that reads "turning a big dial taht says "Racism" on it and constantly looking back at the audience for approval like a contestant on the price is right"
A bag of "Naturally Flavored" Stuffing Popcorn in an orange bag. The image on the front features photos of popcorn intermixed with a drawing of a big onion and of a bowl of stuffing but the stuffing is in cubes the size of like ice cubes, like 1. Is it too hard to draw popcorn? Maybe. Perhaps drawing popcorn is akin to hands on the sucks-to-draw scale. In which case okay I get the Photoshop here but you could have at least tried to match the vibe here. 2. Has this artist ever seen stuffing though, this looks like what you might draw if you were adapting the wikipedia entry, it looks like a big bowl of jello cubes but made out of a weird heterogenous yellow substance, was the artist not told that stuffing wet bread, did the food people not give notes on this thing before they shipped it.
A video of me playing Alien Isolation where the alien drops down out of a vent and I duck behind some smallish crates that look like they do nothing to hide me, and then spend a few minutes carefully scooting around the crates to keep them between me and the alien and it almost comically never sees me.
That number badge thing that says Phil Hornshaw was no. 233,947 joining Bluesky.
The lid of a Starbucks coffee with orange foam filling the little drinking part, the color in indication that herein is barely contained the unnatural twisting of chemicals and flavors that scientists have dubbed the Pumpkin Spice Latte.
A picture of dinosaurs watching a meteor fall from a national geographic.com article, with the headline, "We just learned where the asteroid that ended the dinosaurs came from." The deck head reads, "Geological clues suggest that the space rock that created Chicxulub crater was a carbonaceous" before cutting off.
Lionel Hutz's business card meme but I edited to say Donald Trump Esq. and then "Sell your house to who? Fucking Aquaman!"
A movie screen with the key art for Alien: Romulus denoting a press screening about to begin, with a person being attacked by a facehugger tinted red.
The orchestra setting up in front of a screen that reads Final Fantasy VII Rebirth Orchestra World Tour.
The words JD Vance Has A Burnt Monkey Testicle Problem rendered in the style of an It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia episode title. You gotta Imagine the music is playing yourself though.
A picture of a search result for a file labeled "Elden Ring Backup" with the created by note "April 11, 2022 by you"