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Video games’ influence on popular culture has never been more prevalent. Their effect is visible and audible in today’s music, across the world of TV and cinema, and on the catwalk. Even your favourite language-learning and fitness apps feature progression systems and rewards popularised by games. To reflect the medium’s universal impact, ahead of the 21st BAFTA Games Awards, we asked the public a provocative question : what is the most influential video game of all time?

As more than one responder said, it’s unfair to have to choose just one. Do you pick the pioneers that shaped the early days of the medium, the innovators that were ahead of their time, the ones that proved formative to your own creative journey, or simply the ones that made you most emotional? As might be expected, among the extraordinary number of responses we received was a staggering variety of games — ranging from titles that launched the industry to contemporary giants released mere months ago. The top ten alone spans multiple genres, from platformers to shooters, sandbox adventures to simulations.

So, without further ado, here are the public’s top 21: each of which, it’s fair to say, has had a seismic impact on games and those who play them…

On March 31, workers, students, and allies rallied together on the steps of Johnston Hall, which contains the office of the University of Minnesota President Rebecca Cunningham’s, to protest what they criticize as the University’s failure to forcefully object to ICE’s recent abduction of a graduate student, and an onslaught of University policies limiting the freedom of speech across campus. By assembling in the hundreds, the crowd challenged the University’s policy that any gathering of more than 100 people must have a permit obtained two weeks in advance.

The rally was organized by AFSCME 3800, representing about 6,500 clerical workers across campus, and the Graduate Labor Union (GLU), representing about 4,000 graduate workers at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities campus. GLU, local 1105 of United Electrical, Radio and Machine Workers of America (UE), won its first union contract earlier this year.

The union presidents went on to list a series of demands from the two campus unions: an immediate meeting with AFSCME 3800 and GLU-UE Local 1105; a written policy supporting non-citizens students with legal representation and financial support in deportation proceedings; a declaration that the University of Minnesota campus is an official sanctuary campus; the halting of layoffs for one year; rapid expansion of know-your-rights trainings; good-faith negotiations with campus unions; the repeal of policies that limit freedom of speech and assembly on campus; the assurance of no cuts to cultural departments; and a policy of refusing to collaborate with immigration officials, including refusing to share information, names, or nationalities of students.

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Amazon has put in a last-minute bid to acquire all of TikTok, the popular video app, as it approaches an April deadline to be separated from its Chinese owner or face a ban in the United States, according to three people familiar with the bid.

Various parties who have been involved in the talks do not appear to be taking Amazon’s bid seriously, the people said. The bid came via an offer letter addressed to Vice President JD Vance and Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, according to a person briefed on the matter.

Amazon’s bid highlights the 11th-hour maneuvering in Washington over TikTok’s ownership. Policymakers in both parties have expressed deep national security concerns over the app’s Chinese ownership, and passed a law last year to force a sale of TikTok that was set to take effect in January.

Jury nullification is a term used to describe a situation when jurors decide to acquit a person of criminal charges even though the person on trial could technically be convicted based on the evidence. Jury nullification is a concrete, practical way that jurors can assert their values and stop people from going to jail or prison, and it is one approach that we can use, alongside many others, to disrupt the carceral state.

It is not unusual for people who are critical of the legal system, especially prison abolitionists, to actively try to avoid jury service and the discomfort of interacting with the criminal legal system. However, we urge people who care about abolition or decarceration to participate as jurors because serving as a juror and deciding to say “not guilty” provides a unique and concrete opportunity to put your values into practice.

As a juror, you have the power to single handedly say “not guilty” and get someone out of the grasp of the legal system. This toolkit offers suggestions of potential actions you can take as a juror to help keep people out of prisons and the carceral system now. One of those actions, and the main focus of this toolkit, is saying “not guilty” as a juror, also known as jury nullification. Jury nullification is a term used to describe a situation when jurors decide to acquit a person of criminal charges—say “not guilty”—even though the person on trial could technically be convicted under existing law, based on the “evidence” presented at trial.

Participating as a juror, and engaging in jury nullification, can prevent people from going to jail or prison. Drawing lessons and inspiration from a long lineage of social movements in support of Black liberation and to abolish the prison industrial complex, we offer this toolkit—and the tool of jury nullification—as one small way among many that individual people can show up for the freedom struggles of people targeted by the legal system.

The Trump/Musk regime is traumatizing the economy. It is abducting innocent people and deporting some without due process to a foreign torture prison. It is dismantling essential government agencies and purging good people who’ve served them well. It is extorting universities and law firms. It has upended our status in the world. It has attacked the rule of law.

And this weekend, there’s something you can do about it.

On Saturday, April 5, thousands – maybe even millions – of people will join together in cities and towns across the country in nonviolent protest.

It’s essential that you take part, if you can. Sign up now. Tell your neighbors. Tell your friends.

The event, called “Hands Off!”, was launched by Indivisible, but now has over 200 organizational partners including MoveOn, the Working Families Party, 50501, Common Cause, Public Citizen, the ACLU, and the AFL-CIO.

Target saw foot traffic fall for the eighth consecutive week, extending a losing streak that began just a few days after the company announced it would end its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) program in late January.

For the week that began March 17, foot traffic fell 5.7% YoY for Target, according to data from Placer.ai. That's compared to the 7.1% it fell last week, and an average weekly decline over the last eight weeks of 6.2%.

In a March 4 earnings call, when it reported a 3.1% Q4 loss and a non-specified sales decline in February, Target executives were bullish about its Easter assortment boosting business. But if it has so far, it's not reflected in the foot-traffic data. What may have taken the spring out of the Easter Bunny's hop for Target is a 40-plus day boycott coinciding with Lent (so ending on Easter) spearheaded by Black clergy for which more than 150,000 have signed up, exceeding organizers' stated goal of 100,000.

Last year, researchers at Dublin City University released a report on a disturbing phenomenon: a surge of male supremacy videos in young men's social media feeds. It's the kind of report that should sound an alarm for parents, teachers and administrators. But as the gender divide widens and young men increasingly lean conservative amid Trump-era authoritarianism, it feels less like a future warning and more like a current diagnosis.

In the report, researchers created sock-puppet accounts — fake accounts registered as teenage boys — to determine how quickly misogynistic videos show up in users' TikTok and YouTube feeds. Alongside a control group, one group used male-coded search terms, such as "gaming" or "gym tips," while another searched for more extreme anti-feminist, male-supremacist content. The "manosphere," as it is often referred to, includes videos by Andrew and Tristan Tate, influencers who profit off the insecurities of young men. (The Tate brothers are embroiled in criminal and civil cases in Romania, Britain and the United States. They deny the allegations against them.)

It took under nine minutes for TikTok to offer troubling content to their fake 16-year-old boys, which later included explicitly anti-feminist and anti-L.G.B.T.Q. videos. Much of the content blamed women and trans people for the standing they believe men have lost in the world. More extreme content appeared within 23 minutes. Male supremacy videos intersected with reactionary right-wing punditry within two or three hours.

By the final phase of the experiment, accounts that showed even slight interest in the manosphere — for instance, accounts that watched a video all the way through — resulted in their For You feeds offering more than 78 percent alpha-male and anti-feminist content. Messages included: Feminism has gone too far, men are losing out on jobs to women and women prefer to stay at home rather than work.

Tonight, Democrats have their first chance to fight back against Donald Trump and reverse some of their party’s losses in the 2024 election — and Republicans have a shot to score a big judicial victory in a court currently controlled narrowly by liberals, and in a state that is key to the presidency and control of the U.S. House of Representatives. It’s a race everyone is watching and people are spending significant sums on. I’m talking of course about the Wisconsin Supreme Court race between liberal Susan Crawford and conservative Brad Schimel.

Odds are you have probably heard of the election from the coverage of Elon Musk’s involvement, which has included him spending $20 million in television and digital advertising as well as giving away checks for $1 million to random rally goers this weekend (which is, apparently and shockingly, not illegal). But the stakes are significant: The Wisconsin Supreme Court has recently decided cases on gerrymandering, campaign finance, and voting rights, and would have jurisdiction over a pending abortion case and important electoral cases before the 2028 presidential race. Across all parties, nearly $100 million has been spent on the race.

Prognosticators mostly expect Crawford to narrowly win the race, with room for uncertainty and a small Schimel victory. Crawford has led most of the polls conducted of the race, and the line at Split Ticket is that Republicans have an off-year turnout problem that tilts the scales against them. You can apply a similar logic from my ”dual electorates” piece and draw the conclusion that Schimel is likely to have a bad time, though a win is not impossible. The prediction market Kalshi (I know) gives Crawford an 84% chance (the markets tend to overestimate odds for losers, so her real odds might be higher than this).

Whatever the odds, what really matters is who votes, and here is how to watch the results like a nerd pro:

Florida, like other states in the South, is regularly dismissed as a “non-union” state, where decades of anti-union policies, and deep-rooted corporate and political resistance to unions have stunted and degraded the labor movement’s power.

Only about 6% of workers in Florida even have union representation, and just 5% are dues-paying union members — below the national average. But new organizing does happen here in the Sunshine State, maybe more often than you’d think.

In order to file a petition for a union election, at least 30% of workers need to sign what are known as showing-of-interest cards demonstrating their support for unionization (generally, organizers shoot for a higher percentage, in case the employer tries to water down support for the union ahead of the election). Unions can also seek certification through a voluntary recognition/card-check process, which requires showing that a majority (more than 50%) of workers support unionization.

Here’s a rundown of new organizing drives that launched last month and union election results: