Jeremy Peel

Jeremy Peel is an award-nominated writer, podcaster and videogame consultant of 15 years' experience, which makes him an old fart in journalist years. He loves Deus Ex with all his heart and tends to side with Tracer Tong at the end these days.

22 Jun 2026 By Jeremy Peel Feature

Saying goodbye isn't easy

How do you let go of game characters you adore - especially when developers won't let you

Your final session with a game rarely registers as such. A new release turns your head and eventually you notice that months have gone by since you last pressed the big green button on Steam. By which point, any muscle memory has atrophied, or been muddled by different sets of keyboard shortcuts. Playing that game again will be difficult and, really, how good was it in the first place? This is the most common kind of gaming goodbye: an apathetic drift towards other distractions.

But there's another type: the goodbye to the game you've fallen in love with, in which the characters are fond companions and trustworthy accomplices. At a certain point, the rhythms of their conversation tapped their way into your brain, becoming a song you're happy to have stuck in your head. A welcome and soothing accompaniment to everyday life. Bidding adieu to characters like that takes careful management.

On the one hand, you value their company, and don't want to part too soon. On the other, they deserve proper closure, and that typically comes with the developer-mandated ending to the game in question. Spend too much time mopping up side-quests and

19 May 2026 By Jeremy Peel Bits

Grenades never got better than in Halo: Combat Evolved

Hot potato? Don’t mind if I do

When I heard that grenade-spamming was becoming a dominant strategy in Marathon, I was shocked. Mainly because, for the first 50 hours or so in Bungie’s extraction shooter, I’d forgotten to use grenades at all. In a desperate situation, I’m much more likely to reach for the stick that shoots death - the one that’s onscreen at all times. Grenades are relegated to bumper buttons and distinguished by icons I haven’t bothered to learn. Let them sit in their inventory and listen to muffled gunfire.

But it wasn’t always thus. Halo: Combat Evolved was born in a time before aim-down-sights. Which means, when I play it on the Steam Deck, the whole length of the left trigger is given over to grenades. Even when I plonk the machine down on the couch to go grab a drink, there’s a reasonable chance I’ll accidentally throw a hot potato. That’s just how easily accessible grenades are on the ringworld.

They’re also a highly visible part of Halo’s combat sandbox. When I get the jump on an Elite, and the lanky alien goes down with a growl of anguish, a

05 May 2026 By Jeremy Peel Bits

Marathon’s med drone is for emotional support and, to a lesser extent, healing

A perma-smiling comfort on the cold surface of Tau Ceti IV

Marathon is frightening. Especially in solo mode, where the silence of rival players is so acute you can hear the blood pumping in your ears, Bungie’s extraction shooter slips into a form of unscripted survival horror. One that makes you entirely responsible for your own safety, on a world that would be awful enough without all the murderers. Have you seen the wildlife? The bugs splatter you with ichor and the birds tell on you, giving up your position to any rivals who might listen. "Caw! He’s here, lads! Grease your elbows for a knifing!"

It’s a terror that turns even the sensible visitor superstitious. Leaves you hankering, on some level beneath active thought, for a good-luck charm or totem. That’s what I realised the first time a teammate hurled a med drone in my direction. The little blocky bot made a gleeful parabola across the crags of Perimeter and settled comfortingly over my left shoulder. Some enterprising robotics engineer had tuned its digital display to show a reassuring smile - much like the face of Minecraft’s iconic creeper, but with the frown turned upside down.

The magic of the med drone is that it