The Nintendo Entertainment System holds a special place in history. It marks Nintendo's first global console release, and is home to the first console entries of some of the most important franchises in video gaming, like Super Mario and The Legend of Zelda. While many of Nintendo's best games ever made came during later console generations, multiple foundational games are on this console. In addition to Nintendo, several third-party series also saw earlier entries on the NES, creating a massively influential console and library. But what games are the best? Well, many of the ten best games on the NES are deeply influential, which shouldn't be too surprising. After all, great games inspire great games, and with the NES, there are plenty of great games.

Since Windows Notepad was launched, its focus has always been on providing a straightforward, distraction-free environment for plain text. The application, which comes pre-installed on every Windows PC, has been around for nearly half a century now, and aside from a few updates here and there, it has remained largely unchanged.

Microsoft is adding text formatting to its Windows Notepad app. The significant Notepad update is available for Canary and Dev Channel testers on Windows 11, and introduces bold and italic styling, alongside hyperlinks and even Markdown support.The addition of text formatting in Notepad means there’s now a formatting toolbar at the top of the app, alongside the existing File, Edit, and View options. The toolbar includes access to bold, italic, and hyperlink options, but it also includes support for lists and headings.“The experience supports Markdown style input and files for users who prefer to work directly with the lightweight markup language,” explains Dave Grochocki, principal product manager lead for Microsoft’s Windows inbox apps. “You can switch between formatted Markdown and Markdown syntax views in the view menu or by selecting the toggle button in the status bar at the bottom of the window.”Since Notepad is usually used with plain text, you can also easily clear all formatting from the formatting toolbar or from the edit menu in the app. If you’re not a fan of the lightweight formatting options, you can also fully disable this new support in the Notepad app settings.This formatting addition to Notepad comes just a week after Microsoft started testing a new feature in the app that can generate text for you using AI. The new Write feature in Notepad can be used to “quickly draft text based on your prompt,” and alongside these formatting options Notepad is starting to look a lot more like Microsoft Word. Like I wrote in my Notepad newsletter earlier this week, it’s amazing that Microsoft barely touched Notepad for decades, and now it’s gone from basic log file reader to writing messages itself. A lot of Notepad’s new features have arrived since Microsoft decided to remove WordPad from Windows, after nearly 30 years.

Grindr has always excelled at helping its users find folks looking to spend some quality time together, but the hookup app is looking to speed up the “looking?” process even more with its latest feature.Today, Grindr announced that Right Now, its social media-like live feed feature, is rolling out to all of the platform’s users following a pilot test in select markets. Unlike Grindr’s traditional grid that shows you an array of other users’ profiles based on how far away they are, Right Now functions a bit more like X / Twitter and displays a stream of recent posts that can include both text and photos. Right Now posts disappear from the live feed after an hour, and while they don’t have to be used for hookup purposes, posters can hit a toggle specifying whether they’re looking to host (read: have someone over for fun.) At launch, Grindr says users in certain locations “will receive a number of free hour-long Right Now sessions per week (refreshed every Friday)” meaning that the feed will only be accessible in hour-long windows. Down the line, the company also plans to make more sessions available to purchase.In a press release about the new feature, Grindr’s chief product officer, AJ Balance, explained that Right Now was designed to help people “find exactly what they want, when they want it – without the guesswork.”“We built this intention-based feature based on feedback from our community so they can connect with like-minded people without wasting time on mismatched expectations,” Balance said. “The response to our initial March launch was so strong we accelerated the global rollout ahead of schedule because it’s clear people want this… well, right now.”Grindr is not the first app of its kind to introduce functionality clearly inspired by social media platforms. Sniffies, a more cruising-focused Grindr competitor that doesn’t require signing up for an account and allows users to post sexually explicit photos on their public profiles, has had a feature similar to Right Now for some time. But Right Now’s widespread launch is the latest phase of Grindr’s larger plan to roll out a series of new features — many of which are powered by generative artificial intelligence — meant to boost revenue and make users see the app as “the Global Gayborhood in Your Pocket™.” Previously, Grindr introduced A-List, a tool that uses Anthropic’s Claude Sonnet 3.7 model and Amazon Web Services’ Bedrock to summarize chats with the intention of helping users rekindle “meaningful past connections” and pursue “high-potential matches.” Bloomberg reports the same platform is now underpinning Grindr’s Wingman, a generative AI assistant that can draft chat responses for users who can’t think of things to say for themselves, provide sex tips, and give suggestions about places that might make for good dates. Some of Grindr’s AI features are free to try, but for continued access to them, the company requires users to sign up for its monthly subscription plans.All of the features are part of Grindr’s effort to bring in more money and staunch the financial bleeding that came following its initial public offering in 2022. As Platformer reported last year, Grindr’s stock price plummeted by 70 percent following its SPAC, and the company has been scrambling to establish new revenue streams amid employee unionization efforts and internal concerns that Grindr “was losing its progressive culture.”At the Wall Street Journal‘s Future of Everything conference this week, Grindr’s CEO George Arison spoke about how AI has changed his own productivity, and his desire for the company to start thinking about how the technology can be more deeply integrated into its services.“For all the new things that we build, I want them to be built as if we are an AI-native startup,” Arison said. “If you’re going to do marketing for this, great; start thinking with AI first and then go to people because that’s how I think companies are going to be built moving forward and that’s what we should be doing as a business as well.”

The White House says a “formatting issue” was behind the citation errors. | Image: Demetrius Freeman / Getty ImagesThere are some questionable sources underpinning Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s controversial “Make America Healthy Again” commission report. Signs point to AI tomfoolery, and the use of ChatGPT specifically, which calls into question the veracity of the White House report meant to address reasons for the decline in US life expectancy.An investigation by NOTUS found dozens of errors in the MAHA report, including broken links, wrong issue numbers, and missing or incorrect authors. Some studies were misstated to back up the report’s conclusions, or more damningly, didn’t exist at all. At least seven of the cited sources were entirely fictitious, according to NOTUS.Another investigation by The Washington Post found that at least 37 of the 522 citations appeared multiple times throughout the report. Notably, the URLs of several references included “oaicite,” a marker that OpenAI applies to responses provided by artificial intelligence models like ChatGPT, which strongly suggests its use to develop the reportGenerative AI tools have a tendency to spit out false or incorrect information, known as “hallucinations.” That would certainly explain the various errors throughout the report — chatbots have been found responsible for similar citation issues in legal filings submitted by AI experts and even the companies building the models. Nevertheless, RFK Jr has long advocated for the “AI Revolution,” and announced during a House Committee meeting in May that “we are already using these new technologies to manage health care data more efficiently and securely.”In a briefing on Thursday, press secretary Karoline Leavitt responded to concerns about the accuracy of the citations while evading any mention of AI tools. Leavitt described the errors as “formatting issues” and defended the health report for being “backed on good science that has never been recognized by the federal government.” The Washington Post notes that the MAHA report file was updated on Thursday to remove some of the oaicite markers and replace some of the non-existent sources with alternative citations. In a statement given to the publication, Department of Health and Human Services spokesman Andrew Nixon said “minor citation and formatting errors have been corrected, but the substance of the MAHA report remains the same — a historic and transformative assessment by the federal government to understand the chronic disease epidemic afflicting our nation’s children.”

Have you been enjoying Elden Ring Nightreign? Whether you got the game or you've been checking out a Twitch stream of it (the top three streamers I follow are all playing it right now), people are tucking into the newest entry in the Elden Ring series, which adds roguelike elements into the mix.

Two years after legal proceedings began, the SEC has formally dropped its lawsuit against Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange. It was one of the US government’s final ongoing actions against crypto companies.Lawyers for the SEC and Binance jointly moved to dismiss the case in a filing on Thursday. It follows a 60-day pause requested by both parties in February. The case has been dismissed with prejudice, meaning the SEC can’t pursue it again. “We’re deeply grateful to [SEC] Chairman Paul Atkins and the Trump administration for recognizing that innovation can’t thrive under regulation by enforcement,” Binance told Reuters in a statement, calling the dismissal “a landmark moment.”The SEC sued Binance in 2023, accusing it, and founder Changpeng Zhao, of operating an illegal exchange in the US and defrauding investors, along with a string of other offenses. Binance settled a separate case with the Department of Justice in 2023, which saw the company agree to pay $4.3 billion in fines. Zhao himself stepped down from the company and pled guilty to breaking anti-money-laundering laws, paying $50 million in personal fines and serving a four-month prison sentence.The SEC dismissal is the latest sign of the Trump administration’s embrace of the cryptocurrency industry. In April it disbanded a DOJ unit dedicated to enforcing cryptocurrency fraud, and already this year the SEC has dropped investigations into both Coinbase and Robinhood. Meanwhile Trump has bolstered the crypto industry by launching a Crypto Strategic Reserve and hosting a private dinner for those willing to back (or short) his own $TRUMP meme coin.

Nebraska Governor Jim Pillen has signed a bill that cracks down on social platforms’ features that could keep kids online for longer. Under the Age-Appropriate Online Design Code Act (LB504), major platforms must let users choose to see a chronological feed, rather than one provided by a recommendation algorithm, which experts have found could negatively affect children’s mental health and development. In addition to pausing potentially disruptive notifications at nighttime and during school days, platforms must offer users the option to voluntarily limit how much time they spend on the services. Online services are required to let users limit certain categories of content from getting recommended, too.The law also places several limitations on user tracking and requires platforms to apply strict privacy settings to users identified as minors by default. These settings allow platforms to only collect the “minimum” amount of data from young users, block targeted advertising, and limit the use of dark patterns.Though California and Maryland have passed similar laws, NetChoice is fighting them in court over claims they violate the First Amendment. NetChoice is a technology trade group that includes Meta, Google, Amazon, Reddit, X, Snap, and other tech giants. In February, NetChoice sued Maryland to block its Age-Appropriate Design Code Act, while a judge sided with NetChoice in a ruling that blocked California’s version of the rule in March.Amy Bos, NetChoice’s director of state and federal affairs, wrote in a letter to Governor Pillen that Nebraska’s design code law could impose age verification requirements “on most websites available to Nebraska users, including news sites, popular blogs, and certain online retailers,” potentially posing a security risk. Bos also argues that tracking requirements conflict with existing requirements under the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). NetChoice similarly believes that Nebraska’s design code law violates the First Amendment, though this particular bill doesn’t include limits on the types of content children can access.States that have more recently introduced design code laws have overhauled the legislation in an attempt to harden it against potential lawsuits from such trade groups and companies. Nebraska’s design code law goes into effect on January 1st, 2026. Companies that violate the law could face an up to $50,000 fine for each violation starting July 1st, 2026.

Xbox Game Pass is a fantastic service, offering a massive library of games for a monthly subscription, including new releases on the highest tier, Game Pass Ultimate. Game Pass has a massive lineup for 2025, including one of the best JRPGs from 2024, but a recent addition to the service has added over 50 games. Those games are Activision classics, although probably older games from Activision than you might have expected. The new collection is called Retro Classics, marking a collaboration between Xbox and Antstream Arcade. Here's what you need to know about the new collection.

Elon Musk appeared in the White House with a black eye he said he got from rough-housing with his young son.Elon Musk appeared alongside President Trump for a press conference in the Oval Office Friday, perhaps for the last time, with a noticeable black eye that he says he got from his young son. "I said, 'Go ahead, punch me in the face.' And he did," he said. Musk is emerging from his five-month stint as head of DOGE, or Department of Government Efficiency, with more than just a shiner. His company, Tesla, is hemorrhaging market share in key countries around the globe and recorded its first year-over-year quarterly sales decrease in almost five years. His reputation has plummeted, with a majority of US residents saying they dislike him. And his claims to have saved the government a trillion dollars by slashing "waste, fraud and abuse" seem to have mostly been a failure. One researcher tied Musk's elimination of humanitarian aid funding to 300,000 deaths overseas, mostly children.Musk has been feeling the blows, too. Sources in the Trump administration told Reuters that the billionaire has been "exhausted and exasperated," especially by the blowback against his companies. Tesla's board reportedly initiated a search for a replacement CEO, a claim the directors have denied.But in …Read the full story at The Verge.

For as much that has changed over the last few years regarding Windows, there's also so much that has stayed exactly the same. Windows' underlying architecture has remained mostly the same, sticking with the monolithic NT construction.

There's one device I truly couldn't live without, and that's my Steam Deck. I was in the first round of shipments for the original device, I upgraded to the OLED immediately, and even among tempting competitors like the ROG Ally X, Valve's handheld is still the one I reach for. A big reason for that is how much you can do with the Steam Deck, as it shapeshifts between a handheld, a desktop, and with enough console commands, even a server.