My Perfect Console with Simon Parkin

My guest today is the English stand-up comedian Sarah Keyworth. Born in Nottingham in 1993 they studied drama at De Montfort University, where they became an active member of the university's comedy club. After graduating, my guest then worked for the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, while performing on the circuit. Their first show, Dark Horse, was nominated for best newcomer at the 2018 Edinburgh Comedy Awards, and included on the second season of Soho Theatre Live on Amazon Prime. They soon became a fixture on television and radio, appearing on Mock the Week, 8 Out of 10 Cats, Richard Osman's House of Games and, in 2021, Live at the Apollo. Now, my guest is returning to the stage with a new tour titled, My Eyes Are Up Here, described by the Guardian as “engaging and touching”. https://www.sarahkeyworth.co.uk/ Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is John Johanas, creative director at the Tokyo-based studio Tango Gameworks. Born on Long Island, New York, he played in a Radiohead covers band while in High School. After graduating with a degree in East Asia studies from Brandeis University, he moved to Japan to work as an English teacher.He started translating Japanese books into English in his spare time. A keen player of video games, in 2010 my guest applied to work at Tango Gameworks, the studio founded by the legendary horror director Shinji Mikami. He joined, and there worked first as a translator, then as a designer on The Evil Within, before assuming the role of director on the game’s two DLC episodes and full sequel.In 2023 he directed the studio’s innovative music-combat game Hi-Fi Rush, which has just launched for PlayStation 5. [Photograph Game Informer/ Alex Van Aken]. Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is Siobhan Reddy, a video game executive and the co-deputy chair of BAFTA. Born in South African to Irish and Australian parents, at the age of four she moved to Campbelltown, New South Wales in Australia. There as a student she became interested in filmmaking and technology. At eighteen she moved to the UK and began working for Perfect Entertainment, the independent game studio behind Terry Pratchett’s DiscWorld series of game adaptations.In 1999 she joined Criterion Games and there worked on a string of racing games, including Burnout 3 and 4, then left in 2006 to help set up production within the newly formed Media Molecule. In 2009 she was named studio director, helping to oversee the production of the LittleBigPlanet series, Tearaway, and, most recently, Dreams.In 2013 was named one of the 100 most powerful women in the UK by BBC's Woman's Hour and, in 2021, was given the BAFTA Fellowship award for her pioneering work in the games industry. She now serves as BAFTA’s deputy chair, helping to oversee the delivery of the academy’s mission to empower and spotlight the screen industries and the talented people within them.[Photograph: Sam Hendel/Media Molecule] Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this special correspondence edition, host Simon Parkin explores feedback from the recent episode with Jack Thompson, reads out listeners' correspondence, answers questions, and offers at least one reveal about a forthcoming special guest... Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is Wes Fenlon, a San Francisco-based writer and senior editor at the video game publication PC Gamer. Having graduated from The University of Georgia with a degree in journalism and magazines, my guest freelanced for The Wirecutter –– the product review website now owned by the New York Times –– and Tested.com where he reviewed and recommended PC hardware.In January 2014 he joined PC Gamer Magazine as features and hardware editor. There he has written dozens of investigative pieces, highlighting specific video game communities, publishing stories of how video games affect our lives and culture, and revealing how games and the hardware they run on are made. He is also the author of Read Only Memo, a newsletter all about video game emulation.Twitter: https://twitter.com/wesleyfenlonRead Only Memo newsletter: https://www.readonlymemo.com/ Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is former lawyer who gained recognition in the late nineties and early 2000s as an "anti-video game activist", criticizing the content of violent video games and their alleged effects on children. Via a series of high-profile lawsuits, including several against Rockstar, the creator of the Grand Theft Auto series, he claimed that Mature-rated games are marketed and sold to children, and that their content has played a contributing role in deadly school shootings and other tragic events in the U.S. In a 2015 a BBC dramatization of the conflict between my guest and Rockstar, he was played by Bill Paxton. By then, however, he was no longer a practicing attorney. In 2008 the Supreme Court of Florida permanently disbarred him from practicing law. Now seventy-two years old and keen golfer, my guest retains the beliefs that animated his zealous pursuit of video game companies. Last year he told me, via email: “I was right and I would do it all over again.” Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is a game developer and founder of Visai Games. At the age of twelve he moved to Canada from Southern India, then, hoping to enter the games industry, studied Computer Science at the University of Toronto. After graduating, my guest took a programming job at the mobile games studio, Uken Games. In his spare time he and an artist friend started working on a project of their own, a narrative cooking game about an Indian mother who comes to Canada with her family in the 1980s. In the game, players cook various dishes and restore lost recipes, exploring the role that food can play in enabling immigrant families connect to their heritage. Venba launched in 2023 to widespread acclaim. The L.A. Times described it as “alternately heart-breaking and heart-warming.”  Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is a Scottish crime writer. Born into a working-class family in Fife, she studied English at St Hilda’s College Oxford, where she was the first student to be admitted from a Scottish state school. She first worked as a journalist, then a dramatist and, in 1987, published her first novel, Report for Murder. Since then, my guest has released dozens of books, many of which have been adapted for television. She has sold more than 19 million books, and won numerous awards too, including the L.A. Times Book of the Year, and the Diamond Dagger, awarded by the Crime Writers' Association for her lifetime contribution to crime writing in the English language. She has also performed at Glastonbury, in a band composed of authors called ‘The Fun Lovin' Crime Writers’. Welcome Val McDermid. Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is an American neuroscientist and writer. Born in New York, he earned his Ph.D. in neuroscience from Stanford University in 2014, researching Toxoplasma gondii, the single-celled feline parasite that infects mouse brains and may––or may not––mess with their fear of cats. As well as studying ancient genetics – specifically conducting tests on Egyptian cat mummies –– my guest is an accomplished science writer. He regularly contributes to the New Yorker, Slate, and Nautil.us. His recent book “Nineteen Ways of Looking at Consciousness” explores a single moment in neuroscience translated through nineteen different modern theories of consciousness. A reviewer for the Wall Street Journal described it as “Stylish, witty, and insightful.” He is also a keen follower of video games. In a recent piece for the L.A. Review of Books he wrote: ‘I am convinced that, were Isaac Newton alive today, he would be a video game speedrunner.’  Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is a Japanese video-game director, producer, and executive officer of Square-Enix. Born in 1966 in Fussa City in the suburbs of Tokyo, he studied filmmaking at Nihon University. After graduating, he was working at an animation studio when he first played Final Fantasy on the Famicom, and immediately saw the dramatic potential of the video game medium. Despite having no technical skills, he joined Square in 1990, to work as an “event planner”, involved in level design for Seiken Densetsu (Final Fantasy Adventure) for the Game Boy. Four years later he directed Final Fantasy VI, a game widely considered a classic. A protégée of the company’s founder, Hironobu Sakaguchi, my guest subsequently worked on many of the company’s best-loved titles, and now serves as Brand Manager for the Final Fantasy series. “My father would complain that he had no idea what was going on when I played RPGs at home after school,” he once told me. “This made me want to make games that those watching the screen beside the player might also find interesting.”  Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is Senior Vice-President of Blizzard Entertainment and General Manager of the Diablo video game series. After attending the University of Ottawa for Computer Science, my guest joined Microsoft as a Microsoft Consultant, before he moved to the company’s games division to work titles including Microsoft Train Simulator, then the Xbox version of Counter-Strike.In 2005 he joined Epic Games where, as a producer, he helped steer the delayed Gears of War back on track. After working on the second and third games in that series, Bulletstorm and Infinity Blade, he soon gained a reputation as a “closer”, someone able to get a blockbuster out of the door.My guest then moved to Irrational Games to help finish the troubled BioShock Infinite. In 2020, he joined Blizzard to oversee development of the Diablo series, the fourth entry to which launched to widespread acclaim in 2023. Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guests today are co-authors of the techno-thriller novel Prophet. Helen Macdonald is an English writer, naturalist, and an affiliated research scholar at the University of Cambridge. Their 2014 book “H is for Hawk” tells the true story of a year spent training a northern goshawk while grieving. The book won, among many other things, the Samuel Johnson Prize for literature. Sin Blaché is an American Irish musician and writer. The pair became friends on social media where they bonded over nerdish things. Then they arranged to meet in a remote Airbnb in rural Ireland, and began work on a collaborative novel. The result, Prophet, was released in late 2023 to widespread acclaim. A reviewer for The Guardian described it as “a work of exceptional storytelling skill and stylistic panache,” suggesting an alternative title might be ‘H Is for High-Octane Adventure.”  Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is an English broadcaster, writer, television presenter and stand-up comedian. Born in Slough, he began working as a comic in the early nineties, soon landing a gig as co-host of Channel 4’s The 11 O’clock Show, the satirical comedy programme that launched the careers of Sacha Baron Cohen and Ricky Gervais. A slew of high-profile TV and radio presenting gigs followed, including for Channel 4’s video game-related show Thumb Bandits. During that time my guest often used drugs to cope with the stress of his burgeoning career, before becoming sober in 2005. Since then he has openly talked about his ongoing struggles with substance abuse and mental health, including on the seventeenth series of I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!, in which he came third. As well as writing a regular column for Retro Gamer magazine, and hosting the Random Access Memories podcast, all about 8-bit computers, my guest recently became a trained counsellor, drawing upon his first-hand experiences to help others. Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is a British author and screenwriter for film and video games. Born in London, he began his career as a writer for the games magazine Commodore User, then joined the team that founded PC Gamer, of which he later became editor-in-chief. In 2010, my guest found success in Hollywood as the writer of The Book of Eli, a post-apocalyptic neo-Western film starring Denzel Washington. In 2013 he co-wrote After Earth with the director M. Night Shyamalan, then co-wrote the story for Star Wars: Rogue One. He has also contributed writing to blockbuster video games, including Duke Nukem: Forever, Prey, Gears of War and The Walking Dead, for which he won a BAFTA. Since becoming a US citizen, he now resides in California with his family. Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Another selection of some of our favourite clips from My Perfect Console's amazing line-up of guests from 2023.Cast in Order of AppearanceHenk RogersDylan CuthbertCharles CecilJörg TittelEllie GibsonDanny PudiJoseph MackertichJosh WardleDan VecchittoTarn AdamsKelsey LewinStella WisdomTetsuya MizuguchiNolan BushnellThanks for listening. Back soon with Year Two. Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's been a thrilling first year for My Perfect Console. Here are some of our favourite clips from 2023.Cast in Order of AppearanceDara Ó BriainHeather Ann CampbellPierre NovelliAshly BurchJennifer HaleDominic ArmatoPhil WangJason SchreierLucas PopeMeghan JayanthPeter MolyneuxRonan FarrowNaomi AldermanMike RoseSusan CalmanJosh ScherrMarie Le ConteTom Bissell Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A special episode announcing the winner of the My Perfect Console of the Year (2023) Tournament.It's time. Fifty-two consoles have now been whittled down to two final machines. It's an all-North American final, as the U.S.A.'s Heather Anne-Campbell takes on Canada's Phil Fish. Both machines are spectacular, potential best-sellers:Heather Anne-Campbell's "The Only Play". Tetris. Street Fighter III. The Last of Us. Fortnite. Disco Elysium.Phil Fish's "Fez II". Ridge Racer Type IV. Rez. Dishonored. Hitman: World of Assassination. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.Listen to the result of the final face-off, as voted by you the listeners. Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is an American scientist, entrepreneur, and a founding father of the video game industry. Born in 1943, he grew up in Utah, in a Mormon family, before leaving to study engineering and business at Utah State University. While a student he played Spacewar!, one of the earliest digital games designed for the PDP-1 computer. After graduation he joined an electronics company, and there met Ted Dabney, with whom he founded a start-up company with the aim of creating a commercial version of Spacewar! for the arcades. In 1972 the pair changed the company name to Atari, a term taken from my guest’s favourite board game, Go. Together with another engineer, Al Alcorn, the trio produced Pong and, in 1976, the Atari 2600 console – which together birthed the modern games industry. Throughout the seventies my guest hired dozens of young engineers, including Steve Jobs who later co-founded Apple. Since then, he has founded more than twenty companies, received the BAFTA fellowship, and has been named one of Newsweek's “50 Men Who Changed America".Thank you for listening to My Perfect Console. Please consider becoming a Patreon supporter; your small monthly subscription will help to make the podcast sustainable for the long term, and you'll receive bonus content, and access to the My Perfect Console community: https://www.patreon.com/myperfectconsole  Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is an American writer and narrative designer for video games. After graduating from the USC School of Cinematic Arts with an MFA in Animation, he worked as an animator in Hollywood, contributing to an early version of Shrek at DreamWorks, Dinosaur at Disney, and to the music video Californication by the Red Hot Chili Peppers. In 2001 my guest joined the video game studio Naughty Dog and worked as the cinematics animation lead on seven titles including Jak and Daxter and the first three Uncharted games, a series for which he also helped to develop the storylines. He then became a staff writer and narrative designer on Uncharted IV: A Thief’s End, Uncharted: The Lost Legacy, and the recent blockbuster The Last of Us: Part II. In 2020 he left Naughty Dog after more than two decades and joined Crop Circle Games as narrative director on the studio’s first, as yet unannounced title. Play the console:A Mind Forever Voyaging.Rez.Ico.Bloodborne.Outer Wilds.Thank you for listening to My Perfect Console. Please consider becoming a Patreon supporter; your small monthly subscription will help to make the podcast sustainable for the long term, and you'll receive bonus content, and access to the My Perfect Console community: https://www.patreon.com/myperfectconsole Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

My guest today is a Scottish comedian, writer, television presenter, narrator, and Twitch streamer. It was during his final year studying law at the University of Edinburgh, the city in which he grew up, that my guest first tried stand-up comedy.At the Edinburgh Fringe Festival that year he reached the final of the Chortle Student Comedian of the Year, taking second place to Joe Lycett. After being spotted at a gig, my guest then became one of the main presenters for CBBC, working alongside various puppet sidekicks – an experience that later formed the basis for his sitcom, Buffering.After writing and presenting shows for the channel, in 2014 he was nominated as Best Children's Presenter by BAFTA. The following year, my guest’s voice became familiar to millions, when he became the narrator of ITV2’s reality show Love Island. As well as appearing as a contestant on the eighth series of Taskmater, my guest also hosts a popular Twitch channel, on which he plays video games. Play the console:Last of Us Remastered FIFA 17 A Way Out The White Door Hogwarts Legacy Thank you for listening to My Perfect Console. Please consider becoming a Patreon supporter; your small monthly subscription will help to make the podcast sustainable for the long term, and you'll receive bonus content, and access to the My Perfect Console community: https://www.patreon.com/myperfectconsole Be attitude for gains. https://plus.acast.com/s/my-perfect-console. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.