“Is that Tom Waits?”

“Yeah. Do you like Tom Waits?”

“I love Tom Waits.”

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I am haunted by a childhood memory. Around age 13, my Little League coach and assistant coach had a falling out. Team practices were put on hold. For a kid unenthused about sports, you’d think this was a blessing. But the team was working well together and… winning!

We had a fantastic cast of characters resembling The Sandlot. There were Bennys, Hams, and Yeah-Yeahs. Maybe a Squints here and there. I myself felt like Smalls. We were a mixed bag, some with little to no skill, but we bonded. We helped each other. The loss of practice was arresting. Devastating.

Mike called me up. He was one of the leaders — very much a Benny type. He was organizing a practice and called me up to summon others. After we got off the phone, I had a thought: we should bring music. I loved doing any activity to music. I called Mike back.

He didn’t call it a stupid idea, but he suggest that we didn’t need it. I hung up and felt silly for the idea. I’ve never forgotten how embarrassed I felt for suggesting the idea.

In his fantastic book “The Cubs Way”, author Tom Verducci notes an immediate tactic new Chicago Cubs coach Joe Maddon took with his team at the opening of the 2015 spring training — his first spring training with the team:

After Maddon’s opening speech as Chicago manager, the Cubs took the field—actually, a wide swath of grass out in back of their training center—looking like a different team. The best way to measure the immediate change in the Cubs under Maddon was in decibels. As the team began its morning stretch, a huge speaker blasted “Voodoo Child” by Jimi Hendrix. What followed were more tunes from among Maddon’s rock-and-roll favorites, including “Brown Sugar” by the Rolling Stones, “Gimme Three Steps” by Lynyrd Skynyrd, and “Tom Sawyer” by Rush.

“I’m a product of the ’60s and ’70s,” he told his new team. “You’ll have to put up with that.”

After reading this passage, I felt vindicated. My 13-year-old self’s idea was not stupid. Joe Maddon plays music. It’s not that big of a deal. Scaling back a bit of focus for a bit of fun encourages free thinking and flow. (A big reminder that my 13-year-old self had shit for brains.)

I’ve recently taken on a new management role. It is challenging beyond belief. With these challenges, I’ve put lots of attention into how my manager runs his team. One of the simplest and subtlest tricks he uses is playing music during one-on-ones and meetings. At times, it can feel distracting, but more often than not, it lightens the mood and opens up conversations outside of work. In a recent case, we hit on our shared love of Tom Waits. (What’s he building in there? A team. I’ll stop.)

I’ve now applied music to my one-on-ones. Nothing too distracting. No early-’00s post-hardcore, ’80s pop, or ’70s prog rock. Mellow electronic, jazz, or my Apple Music Chill Mix do the trick. I think it’s helping. It’s lightened the mood. And — for me at least — makes me feel a bit more connected to my team.

Music can be an equalizer. Embrace it. There shouldn’t be rules to how you manage or run your team meetings. Find energy. Find flow. Find commonality. And while you’re at it, find a copy of “The Cubs Way”.

There is a house. In the house, there is a room. In the room, there is a closet. In the closet, there is a box. In the box, is 2013’s top-of-the-line consumer hardware technology — dusty and dormant.

I haven’t touched my PS4 since my Switch arrived. In fact, I removed it from the living room entertainment center completely, replacing it with the Switch’s dock — unnecessary seeing as the Switch functions without being connected to a TV at all. TV optional! Sure, bouts of Mario Kart 8 aren’t quite as great without a TV, but that doesn’t happen that often in our house. Still, I was inclined to remove a console dependent on a TV for the chance that I might play the Switch in docked mode.

That’s not to say I haven’t tried playing a home console since. I recently hooked up my Xbox One to a smaller TV in our office with the intention of playing Overwatch with some friends. But after a week with Overwatch, I canceled my Xbox Live account and haven’t touched the console on since.

A friend of mine recently picked up a 3DS. The 3DS has a deep catalog, but Pokémon was his draw. Meanwhile, the Switch was released. He eyed mine, but was reluctant to pick one up due to the limited gaming catalog. He’s now put 120+ hours into The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, completing the game and conquering all 120 shrines — a herculean feat. This friend and I have been going back and forth about Mario Kart, Zelda, and Splatoon 2. Should we get ARMS? How as Super Mario Odyssey at E3?

A colleague of mine took notice of my interest in video games. We got to talking and he let me in that he’d bought a Switch. A recent father, it was the perfect form-factor for him to use while nurturing his newborn. He completed Breath of the Wild long ago.

I’ve had more communication with friends and Twitter users regarding Switch experiences than I’ve ever had with PS4 or Xbox One. More than the gimmick of being able to play anywhere and with friends and family straight out of the box, people are investing in their experiences with the console and it’s reincarnating the schoolyard conversations of yore.

Nintendo’s design mastery certainly make their games ripe for conversation, but the fact that players can play the Switch on a TV, in bed, on trains, on planes, at work, at the park, in hotels… you name it!… makes conversations fuller and more frequent.

Ben Lindbergh on the Achievement Oriented podcast recently entertained a question I imagine many Switch owners have asked themselves:

… As I was trying to make this journey home and failing for a day or so, I wanted to play Tacoma — because we had gotten our review codes for Xbox One and we knew that we were going to do a podcast about it — and I couldn’t because Xbox One is not a portable console. I never would have thought anything of this in the past, but now that I am a Switch owner this just seems backwards.

It’s like I can’t play Tacoma on the road? Now, of course you could get Tacoma for Steam, but I only had a netbook with me. I had no mouse or anything — I didn’t want to play it that way and it’s not quite the same — but what I’m wondering is, do you think future consoles will feel pressure to incorporate Switch functionality?

If they announce PS5 a year from now and it has all the new specs, the graphics look great and a big hard drive and processor and gigaflops out the wazoo, but it doesn’t have portability — it doesn’t do what the Switch does — would you be disappointed? Do you feel like this has to be a component of every console going forward?

The Switch should have been a no-brainer decision for consumers at announce. Tech shrinks. We’ve gone portable. Smart phones rule consumer tech. It was simply Nintendo’s strike out with the Wii U that made the public more weary of Nintendo’s execution on the promise than the promise itself.

The new PS4 Pro and Xbox One X tout teraflops, but they are still anchors. I’ve considered selling my PS4 and Xbox One not to upgrade, but to declutter. The Switch on the other hand is the perfect fit for my life. While I can’t say I won’t be buying home consoles in the future — hell, I purchased my Xbox One on the promise of Below, a game that has yet to see the light of day — unless new consoles offer the same portability as the Nintendo Switch, I will certainly be taking my time in purchasing one.

Brian Crecente:

So I wrapped things up at Kotaku and joined Grant and crew to help launch Polygon. Then somehow five years whipped by and before I knew it I went from covering presidential press conferences and breaking news on new games to spending my days writing about esoteric pinball machines or the state of gaming and game culture in Cuba.

When Rolling Stone contacted me about joining the magazine on its 50th anniversary, I simply couldn’t say no. I’ve spent more than a dozen years talking about how I wanted to build the Rolling Stone of gaming publications. Where better to do that then at Rolling Stone?

I’ve always looked forward to Brian’s work on Zero Counts was founded upon a very similar message.

Glixel (Rolling Stone’s gaming vertical) has been publishing some spectacular pieces as of late. I’m very excited to see how Brian’s legacy and institutional knowledge from Kotaku and Polygon bolster Glixel.

John Gruber, The Talk Show podcast, episode 195: ’I Do Like Throwing A Baby’, With Special Guest John Moltz:

Here’s my one word review:

It’s very fun and I like it.

Seconded.

Update:

The Nintendo Switch is a triumph.

Yahoo’s Ben Silverman and host Jeff Cannata on the DLC podcast:

Ben Silverman: I think the problem wasn’t that there were fans there, I just think that no one was prepared for this. The management of the [Los Angeles Convention Center] didn’t route people in ways that made sense. It was just like everyone go and charge through these gigantic halls. The booths weren’t set up to handle that crush of fans.

On the first night — Tuesday night — Nintendo furiously reorganized their booth so that Wednesday and Thursday it would make more sense.

Jeff Cannata: And kudos to them because they did a great job. Tuesday it was literally just a sea of people at the Nintendo booth. It was unmanageable, completely. And kudos to them for staying up late that night and figuring it out. They had structure that really worked for the rest of the show. I mean, it was a six hour line — I wouldn’t wish that on my worst enemy — but it still at least allowed movement through their booth.

My friend and I took note of Nintendo’s queue management restructure on Wednesday as well. It was very cool to see. However, the lines for Super Mario Odyssey remained completely insane, but at least there were lines.

I mentioned that my friend and I lucked out in playing Super Mario Odyssey. Wednesday morning, after being let into the LACC, we beelined it for Super Mario Odyssey, but were discouraged to find that the line was already three hours long. A Nintendo booth actor/temp — dressed in a New Donk City themed suit and fedora no less — whispered “a secret” that the attendees sitting on a bench behind us with Switches in handheld mode were actually partaking in the demo. To a passerby, they looked like attendees playing on their own consoles. We were none the wiser until the fedora-clad “Donkian” gave us the coat full of contraband treatment. (I don’t think he was in character, but it fit the bill.) We immediately formed a line next to the bench, sparking another lengthy queue.

In all fairness, the actor/temp should have informed those waiting in the longer line that the Switches on the bench were demo units as well, long before my friend and I arrived. On the flip side, the lengthy Super Mario Odyssey line was a for a docked Switch with headphones — the full console experience. The bench Switches were portable mode only and did not feature audio, one of my favorite elements of Mario games.