WTF Happened May 2026
Welcome to yet another edition of WTF Happened, a monthly recap of news from a variety of topics and sources with some personal reflection on recent events. The whole reason this exists is we didn't want to have to ask AI for event recaps in the future. Everything is hand-researched and hand-written... or at least typed with a mouse and keyboard.
I want to first apologize for the delay of this month's article. I wanted to focus first on getting the Syrsly.com website redesign fully implemented, but in the process, I broke the backend system severely before realizing what I had done. I ended up spending weeks putting it back together, and it's still not 100% how it used to be. The article editor has changed a lot behind the scenes, and with these changes, I inadvertently made things harder for myself. A lot of work goes into these articles not just for each individual article's content but also for the website as a whole. We don't just throw together Wordpress blogs like most news sites out there nowadays. We're almost ready to take on new team members to help take the site's content to new levels of awesome. Follow @Syrsly.com on Bsky to keep an eye out for more info, but keep in mind this will be a volunteer editor position, not a paid job.
World News
U.S. State of Affordability Report 2026
The "States of Affordability" report (Brookings) was posted May 27. It's an article listing depressing stats about making ends meet and living well rather than struggle-bussing to live at all. I don't want to make this about me, but I imagine a lot of people reading that report would feel like the report was about them. U.S. ain't lookin' pretty!
Blue Origin Spaceship Rocket Exploded During Static Fire Test
The Blue Origin New Glenn LN-01 rocket was being put through standardized static testing and it failed by blowing the fuck up!
This explosion set back NASA's plans by at least half a year. Both the rocket and the launch platform were ruined and will have to be reconstructed.
Dog Shot Woman From Inside Truck
A woman was shot with a shotgun blast from inside a neighboring vehicle at a traffic light. The neighboring truck was harboring a dog that was getting antsy and started messing with its owner's shotgun which was fully loaded. (Yahoo!) Oof. Or should I say woof? According to reports, the woman was hospitalized but is making a full recovery with no life-threatening injuries. The dog was also reportedly fine. This could have been a lot worse.
Swimmer Won The Enhanced Olympics Without Enhancements
The Enhanced Games sports event was hosted May 21 to May 24, 2026, where it welcomed athletes who take performance-enhancing drugs. (LA Wonders) The 50-meter backstroke swim was won by a swimmer named Hunter Armstrong who took no drugs at all and beat the previous world record by 0.02s. (SFGate) He's like a gamer who plays their favorite game in "New Game +" mode at the highest difficulty because otherwise the game is just too easy to be enjoyable.
DOJ Issued Anti-Weaponization Fund
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said the fund will compensate and formally apologize to those alleging government weaponization. (Fox) I know little about this fund currently, but it's nice that the Department of Justice is at least trying to make things right for those who were taken advantage of for political gain.
Iran Peace Treaty Ceasefire In Works
The U.S. appeared to be wrapping up negotiations for a temporary 60-day ceasefire with Iran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. (NPR)
South Korea Martial Law
Speaking of ceasefires, a woman in North Korea, I mean South Korea - sorry, I just am not used to saying South and Korea together with anything violent - a woman in South Korea grabbed a soldier's gun to yell at him in the middle of being blocked from the National Assembly. (BBC)
Ebola Outbreak In Africa
There was another ebola outbreak in Africa around early May 2026. There was a rather efficient outbreak control unit in Africa ran by the U.S. since the 2014 outbreak, which reached the U.S. with 9 reported external cases and 2 reported internal cases with both internal cases fully recovering (CDC), but the U.S. response system has since been cut back and is no longer actually responding to the outbreak at all. (Washington Post) This could mean we see a lot more cases of ebola and other viruses and mutations of such viruses.
Dutch hospital workers were also quarantined due to PPE failures during a perceived hantavirus exposure. (Mirror) This was also confused as the same virus outbreak seen in Africa, but it is not ebola. We live in an age of misinformation, so please read up on this stuff before you share info on social media.
Trump Got Crazy Tax Protections
Mid May, we saw Trump's IRS lawsuit take a surprising turn: The settlement plan signed by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche included a clause that the IRS could never again investigate Trump, his family, nor his businesses. (Politico) This all started with a leak that happened during Trump's first term.
The Ballroom Defenders
President Trump has always had quite a few defenders on network television and at his rallies and on social media, and it's always crazy, but this time around, it seemed as if they were reaching new lows by thanking God for Trump being able to see that a ballroom needed a remodel. (Flipkowski)
Social Media & Internet News
Bluesky Talks About Edit Button
The most asked for feature on Bsky, the edit button, was discussed more openly this month on a thread by @alexbenzer, an employee of Bsky. It didn't really amount to much action, but it was a show of care by the staff that it needs to be considered more.
Ask Jeeves Shut Down
Ask Jeeves and its parent community site, Ask, have shut down. The Ask Jeeves site was shut down officially on May 1. (Reddit)
StreamElements Not Doing So Hot
StreamElements was rumored to be shutting down following a rather convincing employee leak. Later in the month, StreamElements confirmed they were considering shutting down the service but were also pursuing acquirers to keep their funding and had already secured further funding. (GamesBeat) It is my opinion that all streamers should move to self-hosted bots and alerts solutions. It makes no sense to pay tons of money for such a service, but at the same time, the services cannot fund their platforms if customers don't pay for the service. The solution that makes the most sense to me is to use something you can run on your own computer or host on your own server. I highly recommend PhantomBot to those who want to self-host a chatbot and alert system for their stream. I use a customized PhantomBot setup for my own stream. I previously used StreamElements and later StreamLabs but wanted something I could run 24/7 on my own server with little maintenance and little performance hit to my gaming PC.
New Burger King Logo Generator
Pixel Design comes out with new logo font generator toys very frequently, but this monthy, they added the Burger King logo. Immediately following the release of this generator, Old Hobbit posted a McDonald's "I'm lovin' it." injection. I was going to gather a bunch of the good posts here, but I gave up on that idea when almost everything I saw simply wasn't nearly as funny as the initial McDonald's injection.
Discord Partnered With Game Pass
I don't know if they ever did such a partnership before, but I saw advertising around mid-May for Discord subscriptions including free months of Game Pass.
UCF Pro-AI Teacher Got Rightfully Boo'd
A clip from a speech in a large commencement event for Spring 2026, posted on YouTube May 8, made its rounds around social media because it featured a woman being pro-AI and getting immediately boo'd. To be fair, the speaker was trying to tie businessmen to her career with a phrase, "embracing innovation." She struck a cord with her audience, but her speech painted a picture of a woman who was out-of-touch with reality and was living too comfortably to know she was in a safety net.
She compared generative AI of 2026 to hardware getting more convenient and the internet getting faster. Yes, I can see how all of these things were transformative. Not all of them were damaging to the world, though. The internet didn't cause entire fields of work to vanish over the course of a few years. Phones getting smaller didn't destroy the economy or cause the world's CO2 emissions to skyrocket or make the phone technology somehow less consumer-facing. Generative AI services have caused data centers to hog the world's resources more than they already did in the middle of a worldwide effort to reduce pollution that has now reversed due to the greed of the companies which are now in a figurative and almost literal arms race to see who can reach singularity first.
Celebrity News
Tom Kane Died 64
That headline reads like a game for Nintendo 64. Tom Kane, the voice of Yoda in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, died at the age of 64. (IGN) Sugar, spice and Chemical X could not save him. IYKYK. 
New TV Shows
In May 2026, several new TV shows premiered, including Born With Luck on May 4, Dutton Ranch on May 15, The Boroughs on May 21, and Star City on May 29. We also saw new seasons for Zillow Gone Wild (Season 3) on May 1 and Deli Boys (Season 2) on May 28. Additionally, the limited series adaptation of Lord of the Flies debuted on May 4 and we got a spin-off prequel episode of The Bear titled "Gary" on May 5. There was also a movie-like finale for Good Omens on May 13 on Amazon Prime Video where it was listed as a third season but was really just one very long final episode.
The Boys got its finale on May 19 and aired on Amazon as well as in theaters, mimicking the finale of Stranger Things. Unfortunately, the finale of The Boys felt less like an ultimate showdown of world-ending powers and more like a rushed brawl in the White House.
New & Upcoming Movies
Masters Of The Chinese Universe
"Masters Of The Universe",
the 2026 live action adaptation of the classic He-Man origin tale, was
first shown in a Chinese theater on May 18 with the movie slated to
release in American theaters on June 5. Everyone else was treated to
some great promo material on social media.
I saw the film at its June 5 release and really enjoyed it at the time, but it doesn't outdo the Kevin Smith adaptation of the cartoon. The film was a box office failure with a budget of $200M and only half that in box office sales worldwide. It was set up for a sequel, and the sequel is said to still be in development, but I won't be surprised if the sequel gets canned. Thankfully, the story mostly wraps up nicely and can be watched as its own self-contained story.
The Whitest Kids You Know
The Whitest Kids You Know, an extremely popular sketch comedy group known for their Monty Python-esque dark humor, released a barely marketed cartoon movie titled "Mars" on May 1. Looks interesting as someone who loves their previous work.
Plenty of Others
Some other May movie releases included Ready Or Not 2: Here I Come and A Great Awakening both on May 5, Hamlet and Project Hail Mary on May 12, The Mario Galaxy Movie and Normal on May 19, and Iron Lung on May 29.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day Hyped
The upcoming Spider-Man movie got a mid-May poster design (DiscussingFilm) and was announced in theaters with a brand new trailer showing more hints about a telepath being the ultimate villain of the film. Many people hinted that Jean Grey, the female telepath from the X-Men cast, would be featured in this film. If that's the case, we may see some kind of tie-in scene in the end credits to tie this universe to the upcoming X-Men films and the new Avengers phase, but because this is a Sony film, it may not tie into anything and may drop the ball entirely.
New & Upcoming Games
GTA6 Slated to Release In May
Grand Theft Auto IV was slated for a May 26, 2026 release date (Rockstar) but was delayed again to a November release.
Mixtape Pushed In Our Faces
Mixtape released May 7 with high ratings and suspicious popularity. The game had good visuals, but it seemed to come out of nowhere with no real selling point. It still did well and got pushed by major gaming publications around its release and soon after. One reviewer said "I cannot get it how it got so much 10/10 reviews." The answer is they likely gave the game to the publications and reviewers and probably paid to get high ratings in some publications. It's also likely the people at said publications aren't gamers. There's a massive disconnect between glowing critic reviews (including many perfect scores from major outlets) which didn't often criticize the game at all and highly polarized player feedback that criticized the game's short runtime and lack of challenge and mostly passive and linear narrative design. I heard the game had some sexually suggestive content in some scenes which featured underage teenagers. I really don't want the game enough to try to confirm that or see how uncomfortable those scenes are, but I will say it seems like the type of game you could watch rather than play. Don't feed money into such games. Support the good game studios instead.
AOE4 New DLC: Yue Fei's Legacy
The new DLC expansion for Age Of Empires IV, Yue Fei's Legacy, released May 7 as well. May 7 really was a big game release day. This DLC was met with mostly negative reviews which turned to mixed reception later in the month. To me, the DLC is too expensive for what it adds to the game. For ~$15 USD, you get 2 new default maps and a new civilization, the Jin Dynasty, as well as a short single player campaign and a couple new music tracks. If AOE4 is your bread and butter, you likely already got this DLC, but if you're a casual player, the money is better spent on a whole new game.
Moss Going Non-VR
Moss franchise was a loved part of the VR ecosystem for a while, and the first and second Moss games were announced to be coming to all major platforms as a non-VR remake containing both titles. (Gematsu) While it sucks that the non-VR version will be a remake and not just an update to the VR version, I will likely pick up the Switch 2 version of the game eventually just for the portability of it.
New Sim: Breadboard 3D
We saw Breadboard 3D released on May 9. This is more of an app than a game, but it qualifies as a game because it includes some gamification of the breadboard mechanics to teach users how to use breadboards. You can buy the game for $4 USD on Steam.
FLAW!
A new indie shooter released May 12 on Steam under the title FLAW.
This shooter looks really fun and takes me back to the 2002-2005 glory
days of low poly narrative shooters featuring badass main characters.
Subnautica 2 Early Access
On May 14, Subnautica 2 released into Steam's Early Access program. The original Subnautica was great, but its sequel has that much sought after coop feature! Unfortunately, the game's content is very short (takes ~6 hours to complete by yourself) in its early release, so we suggest waiting for the full 1.0 release.
Subnautica 2 also got a VR mod soon after release (VR Games Showcase) that may make it worth a look for some who are starved of good PCVR content.
New & Upcoming VR Games
Myst & Riven PSVR2
Myst and Riven remakes' ports for PS5 and Xbox were announced May 5. (Cyan) On PS5, VR is an optional feature instead of a separately sold title. Myst was already ported to Xbox Series X/S, but Riven is getting its port on May 19.
Blind Touch VR Demo
The demo for Blind Touch VR released May 8. I'm indifferent toward this game, because it looks kind of cool but isn't as educational about blindness as it claims to be. Blind people are not like The Daredevil. They don't see sound waves and don't see the whole environment from a single soundwave, either. That said, the demo is free, so it might be a good time-killer. This is a VR port in progress of a non-VR game by the same basic title, Blind Touch, which was released back in February, but I believe it was designed with classic VR staples in mind, so playing it as a flat game seems pretty pointless.
H3VR2
H3VR, short for Hotdogs, Horseshoes & Handgrenades VR, was a well received experimental VR shooting range game with the theme of hotdogs. The creator of the game and I have argued a lot on Twitter in the past, but I still loved the framework and enjoyed it enough that I openly requested a proper sequel several times. The constant updates were great, but I just wanted the game to be called done so I could move on.
Well, I'm finally getting what I asked for, and the sequel, H3VR2, was announced May 6 on Bsky.
Fan Projects
Someone posted this cool Miss Twisted cosplay. There was also a concept circulated for a modular retro handheld design, the RG Modular, and I reposted a screencap of it here.
Tech News
Unity Asset Store "$2+ Sale"
The Unity game engine has always had one of the best commercial asset libraries on the market, which means it should surprise you when I say it has always had the worst possible asset store experience. The site is clunky and constantly finding ways to get in the way of business rather than facilitate business. In light of this, Unity has some really epic sales every few months if not more often. The only problem is their sales sometimes make no sense. That's what we dealt with when the "$2 sale" was launched. It was a "$2+ sale" where most items were $3.50 or higher. It lasted from May 22 to the end of the month and continued into June. The deals of this event are historically low prices for some really good assets. However, it's all tied to a game engine that no longer holds a place in many former users' hearts. I'm still using Unity as a kind of toy, but I've been slowly porting my personal assets to Godot for future projects. Godot is faster and smaller and just provides a more straightforward development environment that doesn't give nearly the same amount of headaches as Unity.
A Big Graphite Editor Update
On May 26, Graphite Editor got its May update. Graphite Editor is a vector art tool. The May update didn't get a proper blog post, but instead we got a lengthy YouTube video explaining the added features and improvements. There were a lot of additions to cover, but to summarize, the video demonstrates new non-destructive features including layer blending, morphing capabilities, and improved gradient controls. This release also introduces dynamic data attributes, extensive text and JSON processing nodes, and a customizable workspace interface. You can use Graphite in your browser, so trying it is quick and easy.
Rust Week 2026
From May 18 to May 23, a Rust programming event titled RustWeek was held in Utrecht, Netherlands. I always thought Rust was a pretty cool programming language, and I'm only slightly surprised it got a week long event.
Anthropic Greatly Handicapped Opus AI Model
Anthropic, the creators of the Claude AI service, released a new version of their Claude Code AI model titled "Opus 4.7" that was meant to make the Opus requests more efficient but ended up being practically unusable. Reddit saw many great memes about it, including this one... and this one. I had some other posts saved, but the mods of the subreddit like to delete a lot of these posts.
Flipper One, the Flipper Zero Sequel
Why can't people name things appropriately? The first product is supposed to be 1 or just nothing at all after the base name. The second is 3.1. The third is 95. The fourth is 98, and the fifth is 2000! It's basic counting!
On May 21, The Flipper One was unveiled to be the sequel to the popular hacker doodad, Flipper Zero. (TechCrunch) I want one! I mean, I want Zero, too, but One is pretty cool. It may be a difficult price to justify if you're not really into cybersecurity, but the final cost of the base model is yet to be determined.
Nintendo Price Hike
Nintendo Switch 2 price increased from $449 to $499 in the U.S. (IGN) Other regions were also affected, so if you live elsewhere, you can get more info at the source.
Board Gaming Just Got Easier With MythOS
MythOS, a system-agnostic digital game master's toolkit, released May 7 on Steam. This app seems really promising for those who are into D&D and similar board games where a game master is required.
Science News
New Sea Creature Named Snuffleupagus
In a study published May 2026 in "Journal of Fish Biology" (Wiley), scientists announced the discovery of Solenostomus snuffleupagus,
a new species of ghost pipefish named for its uncanny resemblance to
Mr. Snuffleupagus, the woolly-mammoth-inspired character from Sesame
Street. (Newcastle Herald)
This fish species had already been spotted several times in recent
years based on previous spottings found on iNaturalist, but spottings
unfortunately don't count as a species discovery until the species is
scientifically confirmed to be unique. (NatGeo)
Closing Story: You Should Waste More Time!
I read a few articles this month about things like women coming back to games in their later years after being cut out of the gaming scene by a sense of their time spent on games being unjustified (Cosy Gaming Over 40). The overwhelming narrative was that people thought gaming was a waste of time, but as time went on, they realized what I realized when I was a child: there's nothing inherently wrong with wasting time... as long as you're enjoying what you're doing. It's only really a waste of time to me if you don't either enjoy the things you're doing or enjoy the end result.
I work to live rather than live to work. Not many people can say they enjoy their job, and I'm included in that. If I work on something fun, it typically doesn't pay the bills, so almost all my fun work is unpaid, but that brings up my main point: Why do I work outside work hours? Why do I push myself to deliver a news article every month? Why do I build websites when I could be playing games? The simple answer is I enjoy making stuff and enjoy the end result of adding content to my sites and having something cool to show others. I don't have complete control over a bought smartwatch, but if I make my own smartwatch, I can do whatever I want with it, and it becomes a link in a chain of events that leads me to another project and then another and then another until I'm either dead or just bored of everything. At which point, I'll likely play more video games... which will reinvigorate my interest in a hobby I never actually lost interest in, because I never stopped playing video games. I never stopped wasting my time. You shouldn't either. Enjoy your time on this Earth; Don't waste time doing things you don't enjoy.
I think I'll write a bigger article on the topic of wasting time later. I got some catching up to do on the monthly recaps first. Come back every month around the 5-15th of the month (or in this case, over a month later) for another month's recap. In the meantime...
