Rather than launching a sleek, worthwhile encrypted messaging app, Musk dropped a junky, insular extension of his social media platform.
Star Wars games love giving us the ultimate power fantasies of the galaxy far, far away: wielding lightsabers and the Force as Jedi, being ace pilots or wry smugglers, and stepping into the combat boots of front-line soldiers in galactic conflict. Its latest collaboration instead asks you to consider another, persistent element of the galaxy ticking away far, far beneath that: the life of a subservient droid.
This morning FuturLab announced a surprise new collaboration DLC for its beloved Powerwash Simulator sequel, letting you step into the galaxy far, far away to… well, powerwash things. The DLC casts you as a P0-W2 labor droid, tasked with cleaning up across the galaxy, from the Lars Homestead on Tatooine to Echo Base on Hoth and even inside the hangar bay of a Star Destroyer. You’ll be able to team up with friends, as with other Powerwash Simulator DLCs, because no droid should have to clean all the carbon scoring in the galaxy off of ships and surfaces alone.
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FuturLab describes the Star Wars pack as seeing your poor droid taking menial assignments until that “quickly spirals into being commandeered to carry out the Empire’s dirty work, before clearing the way for the Rebel Alliance,” although it remains to be seen if there’ll actually be a narrative arc across its cleaning scenarios or if that’s just some flavorful setup.
But still, there is some potential for intriguing Star Wars commentary here, in that FuturLab makes your perspective that of a droid instead of just some lowly human on the bottom rung of these different factions’ pecking orders. Star Wars has always had an up and down history with how it treats droids as an underserved group. Droids’ quest for personhood and rights is regularly framed through the idea of what kind of labor is considered base enough to be below organic beings and instead consigned to an indentured droid class, who often almost solely exist, in some regards, to do this kind of work, rather than being allowed to exist as sentient beings in their own rights.
Even putting aside that this is perhaps the kind of video game fantasy we’ve never really seen play out in Star Wars before, perhaps it simply being a fantasy that we assign to a droid is commentary enough. You’ll be able to think about the plight of droid rights and also clean gunk off of an X-Wing when the Star Wars pack for Powerwash Simulator 2 launches this summer for $10.
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Experts are sounding the alarm about the chance of a “super” El Niño this year, as the latest projections show that the Pacific Ocean is on track for an intense warmup. This could trigger a persistent—or potentially irreversible—climate shift.
According to the World Meteorological Organization, almost every major climate model points to El Niño arriving by May, with average sea surface temperatures on track to rise 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit (1.5 degrees Celsius) by early summer. This would constitute a “strong” El Niño, which would have serious implications for global temperatures and weather patterns. But it could be even worse.
More extreme scenarios could lead to a climate regime shift—a large, sudden, and persistent change in the structure and function of Earth’s natural systems. A study published in Nature in December 2025 found that the likelihood of regime shifts significantly increases during a super El Niño, as these events trigger major climate disruptions.
“These shifts matter because they can turn a short-lived climate shock into a longer-lasting risk,” study co-author Jong-Seong Kug of Seoul National University told Inside Climate News.
Some models within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Forecast System project temperatures climbing 6.12 degrees F (3.4 degrees C) higher than normal once El Niño fully sets in, according to Tampa-based meteorologist and climate specialist Jeff Berardelli.
Even when the models adjust for the fact that the planet is warmer now than it used to be, this El Niño could send Pacific temperatures soaring 4.86 degrees F (2.7 degrees C) above normal. If that departure holds for three months, this event could surpass the strongest El Niño on record—when Pacific temperatures remained 4.5 degrees F (2.5 degrees C) above average from 1982 to 1983.
James Hansen, a climatologist at Columbia University, told Inside Climate News that even a moderately strong El Niño within the next 12 to 18 months could push the average global temperature about 3 degrees F (1.7 degrees C) above the preindustrial level. That would exceed the 2.7 degrees F (1.5 degrees C) warming threshold that the international community considers a turning point for catastrophic climate impacts.
Hansen said he doubts the global average temperature would meaningfully cool back down below that threshold—even after El Niño dissipates. A super El Niño could trigger an even more severe, possibly irreversible shift.
According to Kug’s study, a super El Niño “may potentially drive the system into a new state through positive feedback loops or the persistence of climatic memory,” the study states.
Each of the three “super” El Niños on record (including the 1982-1983 event) exerted “profound worldwide climate effects” that substantially impacted ecological and socioeconomic systems. That’s because intense exchanges of heat between the ocean and the atmosphere disrupt oceanic circulation, thereby altering global temperature and precipitation distributions.
These regime shifts led to unprecedented marine heat waves and major changes in drought and extreme heat distribution, particularly in and around the central North Pacific, the southeastern Indian Ocean, the southwestern Pacific, and the Gulf of Mexico.
The evidence shows that despite the cyclical nature of the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), “super El Niño events can trigger persistent climate shifts that reorganize regional baselines,” according to the study.
While it’s unclear whether these events are becoming more common due to human-driven climate change, scientists expect their impacts to intensify as the planet warms. Studying the fallout from this year’s El Niño could offer insight into how global warming amplifies—and prolongs—the effects of these climate shocks.
We were all having such a good time in Westeros at the start of the year thanks to A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (well, unless you were Baelor Targaryen), and House of the Dragon is back to remind you that that’s the exception to the rule in Westeros, for the most part—and this time it’s not just Targaryens who are in for a rough one, but everyone under their rule.
HBO has released a new trailer for the return of House of the Dragon, as the civil war between the Greens and the Blacks gets even messier and bloodier. There are, of course, lots of dragons and big teases of the battles to come—but a lot of this trailer is also just undercut with the dread and doom of practically everyone involved realizing that there’s no way out of this darkness but through, and they’re going to have to ask a lot of themselves to make it through in one piece.
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Yes, gone are those fleeting hopes that Alicent and Rhaenyra might figure out some way to remember who they once were to each other from last season (although anyone who’s a fan of George R.R. Martin’s worldbuilding knows that was doomed to fail anyway), but really, no one is having a good time in Westeros this time. Even with Rhaenyra seemingly ascendant in her power—once again firmly backed by her husband, Daemon—is going through it. Alicent is starting to realize that perhaps none of her kids should’ve come within touching distance of the Iron Throne, as the battered and broken Aegon plans to bring his cruel brother Aemond down once and for all. And then there’s Criston Cole looking miserable and despaired, but that one isn’t too much of a bother considering how easy he is to hate.
House of the Dragon has just one more season beyond this to bring us to the Dance’s brutal end, so expect things to get much worse before they get better when the season 3 kicks off June 21
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