This month, the AE team is bringing you our Pop Culture Picks from our home offices and, as things begin to reopen here, our office office too! This month we’re focusing on things that make us laugh or bring us joy. Keep scrolling to find out what’s helping us through these challenging times – we hope they can help you too!

Annabel’s Pick

Tiny View (app on iOS and Google Play)

In short: Bite-sized comics for your phone!

My joyful pick this month is Tiny View. Tiny View is a comic reader app that formats comics into a scrolling format instead of your old school zig-zag order. It’s one of those tiny innovations that makes the biggest difference.

I originally discovered the app reading Gemma Correll’s comics. Her comic on “How to Practice Worrier Pose” made me giggle and was my gateway to other authors like Matt Bors’ political cartoons that explore America’s journey into a dystopian future. And as a parent myself I’m partial to F*wl Language: Comics For Imperfect Parents by Brian Gordon because we can all relate to “The New Homework”.

So many of us are experiencing anxiety and feelings of helplessness right now. Tiny View is bringing me joy because I love seeing how the authors explore the things we’re all struggling with in different ways. Enjoy the comics!

Jeff’s Pick

Hades (video game on Nintendo Switch, PC and Mac)

TL;DR: Hades is a fun, fast-paced dungeon crawler with a great story and excellent gameplay.

My pick this time around is the “rogue-like action role-playing video game” Hades. Hades is published by Supergiant Games, the developer behind other popular indie titles such as Bastion and Pyre. Hades has just come out for full release, but I have been playing via early access since the beginning of the summer and it’s been a staple of my game time since.

You play as Zagreus, the son of Hades, who is attempting to break free in search of his mother Persephone. Each run sees Zagreus take his weapon of choice (sword, bow, shield, spear, gauntlets, or gun) and make is way through the various levels of hell as he tries to make it to the surface. The room order is randomly generated, and will be full of a random collection of enemies that must all be defeated in order to receive the reward for that room and to progress to the next. The player is usually presented with two or more choices of exit from each room with the reward for each indicated.

As Zagreus progresses he will gain more and more power and abilities, as well as collecting differing currencies that can be used for later upgrades. One of the main types of abilities are ‘boons’, these are special granted abilities provided by the differing Greek gods, such as Zeus, Poseidon, Aphrodite, etc. to help Zagreus on his quest.

If he dies, he is regenerated from the River Styx at the beginning ‘lobby area’ and must start his journey again, although he can use some of the spoils acquired during the run to upgrade.

This may sounds repetitive, but I have to say it is very hard to resist that ‘just one more time’ pull of doing another run. Each one presents a new experience. As mentioned the rooms and monsters are randomized, but furthermore, the weapon chosen by Zagreus combined with differing boons creates a unique ‘build’ or gameplay experience. The boon choices per God are random as well, so I don’t think I have even had the exact same combination twice.

Overlaying the gameplay just described is an engaging story with a collection of great characters and fantastic, humorous dialogue. Another mechanism of each run is uncovering new layers to the story (multiple stories really). I have been really impressed at the lack of repetitive dialogue, it seems like almost every interaction with a Greek God or other character presents different dialogue with superb voice acting.

If you are looking for a game that is easy to jump in and out of, has a great story combined with fun fast-paced arcade action then give Hades a try.

Jenn’s Pick

Radio Garden (app on iOS and Google Play)

TL;DR: Access over 10,000 radio stations from around the world!