Published 12 January 2026
e538 with Michael M and Andy – Stories and discussion on CES2026, EuroTech, PhoneTech, AI playing your games for you so you can watch and a whole lot more.
Andy, Michael and Michael take a look at many of the announcements from CES, and share a few of their favorites. CES is the annual Consumer Electronics Show held in Las Vegas, Nevada. In the phone technology arena, there are several MagSafe examples that magnetically snap onto an iPhone, such as charger that looks kind of like a floppy disk. Another example is a keyboard, with tactile buttons you can type with in portrait or landscape mode. The keyboard creates a form factor that is reminiscent of the Danger Hiptop / Sidekick. Between these examples and others (like a second screen e-reader that snaps to the back of a phone), the cohosts mull what it would be like to stack several of them in sequence.
After discussing the Punkt phone, and the Proton suite enabled by the AphyOS, the team turns their attention to several other innovations shared at CES. Lollypops that play music, a vibrating chef’s knife, and the Lepro AMI AI companion all caught their eye. The Lepro AMI seems similar, at least in the form factor, to the Gatebox, which was first discussed on Games at Work back in 2017.
Next, the team takes a look at a fork of a decompilation of SuperMario 64, where the developer added a physical coin slot and updated the code to allow for micro transactions with physical money. Then, following on a post from Mike Elgan, the co-hosts consider an article about Sony’s patent to take over a player’s avatar in case they get stuck and want help to continue their game. It’s kind of like your own personal AI Twitch channel. The Games at Work team considered a similar story about Microsoft’s gaming Copilot in 2025.
Speaking of Microsoft, Michael M got excited about the potential triumphant return of Clippy, only to realize that it was clickbait.
Would you like to have an AI show you how to get past a tricky game boss, or play through it for you? Have your bots 🤖 drop our bots 🤖 a line at @gamesatwork_biz (our home for now) and let us know!
These show notes were lovingly hand crafted by a real human, and not by a bot. All rights reserved. That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.
Selected Links
CES2026
www.ces.tech The Consumer Electronics Show
Retrododo article: This Adorable Floppy Disk MagSafe Battery Pack Is My New EDC Fave
KBDcraft.store Kit Shamshel Mouse
Liliputing article: Clicks Power Keyboard is a magnetic thumb keyboard & wireless power bank for your phone
ohsnap.com: MCON, the magnetic transforming gaming controller
Vice article: The Sidekick Was Pop Culture’s Most Stylish and Innovative Cellphone
Belkin iPhone Mount with MagSafe for Mac Notebooks
punkt.ch blog post: Punkt. unveils MC03, latest version of its unique smartphone offering giving users full control over personal data and usage.
Mashable article: The weirdest tech of CES: It gets very weird, very fast
Games at Work e520: Cold Fusion Gaming (for the Gatebox virtual companion)
tech.eu article: CES 2026 showcases Europe’s hardware renaissance
Reverse Engineering Microtransactions into Retro Games
Hackaday article: Super Mario 64, Now With Microtransactions
AI
Sony AI plays video games, so you don't have to! https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/sony-patents-ai-plays-video-games
WIPO Patentscope : WO2025080356 – AI GENERATED GHOST PLAYER
Games at Work e530: Vibe It! Ready Player Chum (for Microsoft’s Gaming Copilot)
PCWorld article: Microsoft pushes huge Copilot update with features like Clippy 2.0
Microsoft blog: Meet Copilot Mode in Edge: Your AI browser
Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 30:47 — 43.0MB) | Embed
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Amazon Music | Android | Podcast Index | Youtube Music | RSS | More
[…] « e526 — Beans and Bricks […]