You know Olaf. Before KPop Demon Hunters, before the Wicked movies, it was Disney's Frozen that blasted show tunes like "Let It Go" and "Into the Unknown" into our lives. My little girls loved belting those tunes.

So when I met Olaf, the Disney Imagineering robot, I kept thinking: I can't wait for my kids to meet him too.

It's a weird thought, really, because this Olaf isn't a "he" and can't carry on a conversation. Why do I keep thinking "I met him" when he's largely a remote-controlled puppet teleoperated by a Steam Deck gaming handheld?

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December 31st, 2025 is the deadline to save the Google Stadia controller. That's less than three weeks from today - but there's never been a better time. Last month, I discovered the controller is finally a first-class citizen in Steam and SteamOS.

The Stadia controller was originally designed to connect to your Wi-Fi network and remotely control games from Google's cloud servers. But when Stadia shut down in January 2023, the company did an amazing job shutting down the service: it offered full hardware refunds and let you rescue the Stadia Controller by turning it into a generic Bluetooth gamepad instead.

Read the full story at The Verge.

Hollow Knight: Silksong, one of the hottest games of the year with a reported five million players in its first week, didn't launch on smartphones. But that won't stop you from playing it on Android - because a new leap in Windows to Android emulation means you can easily install and run the Steam version on flagship phones like my Galaxy S25.

I'm talking about GameHub, the app from Chinese mobile gamepad manufacturer GameSir, which just launched version 5.0 with two key features that help it rise above the Windows-on-phone emulation scene.

Read the full story at The Verge.

It's always a risk betting on new video game hardware from a little-known company: what if game developers never show up? But the $50 Thumby Color, on sale this week, is an easier sell - the two-inch handheld is cute as a button, fits on your keychain, and lets aspiring programmers build and publish games right on the web, and I'm finding it so much easier to play than the tinier $30 original!

Here's my video comparing the two and showing off playable takes on Tetris, Connect 4, Minesweeper, Doom, Bust-A-Move, 2048, and more, as well as a cool 3D-printed watch holder for the Thumby Color by 3DSage!

Read the full story at The Verge.

Last May, I told you how 3D printers still aren't easy enough for the mass market, but Bambu Lab had built the easiest yet. Now, instead of making it easier, Bambu is building its biggest and most sophisticated model to date - a Swiss Army knife of 3D printers that can also cut, draw, and etch.

The new Bambu H2D, which starts at $1,899, has two 3D printing nozzles and a much bigger bed, but it also comes with a modular attachment system. Plug in a blade, and it dices through paper and vinyl. Plug in a pen, and it'll draw logos or schematics in a flash. You can even engrave and burn laser images into all sorts of materials.

With 10-watt an …

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Framework's mission is to "fix consumer electronics, one category at a time" by making them modular, repairable, and upgradable. It's the only laptop maker to ever truly succeed at that "upgradable" part. But desktop PCs are already modular, so why is Framework making one?

At first, I thought it saw a unique opportunity to make a cute yet badass tiny gaming PC with AMD's unusual Strix Halo processor and decided to shoot its shot. As you'll read below, I'm excited by the result. But I also have another idea I'll share with you afterward.

Let's start with the gadget part: yes, the tiny 4.5-liter gaming desktop that Framework announced yester …

Read the full story at The Verge.