Nick Sutrich’s Top 10 of 2023

This 12 months felt just like the 12 months everybody was firing on all cylinders. Every market phase was on fireplace this 12 months, from gaming to tech, films and TV, books, music, and a lot extra. All that point spent locked down over the previous few years has lastly grown productive fruit, however it’s additionally been a little bit of a bizarre 12 months for me.This 12 months, I discovered that some sorts of telephones (and different shows) make me really feel bodily ailing. As a consequence, I’ve needed to get glasses for the primary time since center college, and I’ve had my justifiable share of bizarre accidents and different points like that all year long. The massive 40 is simply across the nook for me, and I’m already feeling it.But, paradoxically, it is also the 12 months I received into the perfect bodily form of my life; I received to journey for work once more, and I received to see VR lastly come into its personal as a correct gaming medium.So what else occurred? Here’s my year-end recap of the highest 10 issues I beloved in 2023.Samsung’s foldables now have actual competitors(Image credit score: Harish Jonnalagadda / Android Central)Motorola is perhaps the primary firm to launch a cellphone with folding glass, however Samsung will get the credit score for blazing the path to make them common. The downside is that the corporate has turn out to be somewhat complacent in its place of management over the previous few years, and, fortunately, the competitors received loads more durable for the South Korean tech large this 12 months.Phones just like the OnePlus Open are simply plain higher than Samsung’s finest, providing sleeker designs, higher cameras, sooner charging, and higher battery life. That doesn’t suggest Samsung’s telephones aren’t value shopping for — the S Pen performance remains to be unequalled, and Samsung’s software program is a little more mature than different gamers at instances — however it’s now truly simple to suggest many alternate options to Samsung’s folding telephones.Because of this, Samsung’s portion of the foldable market share has dropped all year long, and I absolutely count on to see a renewed fervor in Samsung’s foldable merchandise in 2024. I like foldable telephones and wish to see this house proceed to thrive. I additionally want extra firms keen to make shows that do not make me wish to curl up in a ball and die.Getting to journey for work once more(Image credit score: Nicholas Sutrich / Android Central)One of my favourite perks of this job is the flexibility to journey to see new locations and issues. I’ve been doing this for years, however COVID put a damper on that for some time.This 12 months, firms lastly pulled again the curtain and did all of the occasions. I received to go to New York a number of instances this 12 months, and I nearly made it to San Francisco for the primary time in over six years. Unfortunately, for that final journey, an American Airlines laptop glitch brought on all of my flights to get delayed and finally canceled.Oh effectively, perhaps subsequent 12 months. Either method, I’m so grateful for the chance to journey and meet different members of this incredible business!Kindling my love for matcha(Image credit score: Adobe Stock)I’ve lived with Tourette Syndrome my complete life, however you would not essentially understand it except you recognize me personally. Still, though my signs are normally gentle, worse bouts are available waves, and there have been intervals all through my life the place the tics are practically insufferable.Over the previous 12 months, espresso has began triggering my signs in probably the most horrible of the way, and I can now not drink the fragrant drink I as soon as beloved. Thankfully, matcha has been there to exchange it, giving me a caffeine kick once I want it with out being as harsh as espresso.L. Theanine has loads to do with this, from what I’ve discovered, and I’m grateful for drink that does not make me really feel terrible!Living in a Silo(Image credit score: Apple TV+)I’m a sucker for post-apocalyptic books, television exhibits, and flicks. I’m undecided what it’s in regards to the theme that draws me, however I can not seem to get sufficient of it. Apple TV Plus’s new sequence, Silo, caught my eye instantly and was the very first thing I watched once I lastly tried out the subscription service this 12 months.My spouse and I have been instantly hooked, however there was an issue: the present ended on such a loopy cliffhanger, and this 12 months’s author’s strike ensured that season 2 would not be airing any time quickly.Thankfully, this present is predicated on a e book sequence. Better but, season one would not even cowl half of the content material within the first e book! We picked up the e book after discovering this out and are already practically on the finish of the second within the sequence.In brief, it is a twisted story of people residing in giant underground silos due to some cataclysmic occasion. You’ll have to look at the present or learn the books to search out out extra, however I promise it’s extremely value your whereas.Phones I can truly use(Image credit score: Derrek Lee / Android Central)”Wait, aren’t you the editor in charge of phones,” I hear you ask. Yes, and whereas I cut up that honor with the nice Harish Jonnalagadda, the issue is that the majority telephones on this facet of the Atlantic Ocean make my head wish to cut up in two. Meanwhile, Harish will get to play with telephones from producers that truly appear to care about our eye well being as customers.I’m speaking about PWM sensitivity, a situation that I’ve developed over the previous 12 months and a half. The humorous factor is that I had by no means heard of cellphone shows that sparkle, but nearly each main flagship system launched lately has a display screen that glints to various levels.My mind hates this gentle flicker, and with out my astigmatism-correcting glasses, considered one of these telephones for even just a few seconds can provide me a headache, make me really feel dizzy, and even make me nauseous.Thankfully, extra firms are being attentive to this rising downside, and upcoming telephones just like the OnePlus 12 have shows that assist mitigate the unfavourable results many fashionable shows create.The web is not all the time a mistake(Image credit score: Jay Bonggolto / Android Central)Part and parcel to determining that flickering shows negatively have an effect on me is the superb group of individuals on the PWM-Sensitive subreddit and the LED Eye Strain Telegram group.This group of useful individuals is consistently searching for each other, testing the newest telephones and reporting on their success charges for show sensitivity. It’s arduous sufficient to have an issue that solely impacts a small share of the inhabitants, however these fantastic individuals have given me a group to share my ache with, and that is actually one thing particular.It seems the web wasn’t an entire mistake in spite of everything!VR video games that really feel like actual video games(Image credit score: Sanzaru Games)This 12 months is the 12 months VR went AAA, little question about it. With Asgard’s Wrath 2’s launch this month and Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR’s launch in November, there’s little doubt the Meta Quest 3 affords up the AAA-quality video games we have been dying for.But these two video games aren’t the one massive releases this 12 months. On the Quest, we additionally received video games like Breachers, a Rainbow Six Siege-like multiplayer title, the Escape from Tarkov-like Ghosts of Tabor, a reboot of cult-classic The seventh Guest, the extremely well-written and produced Arizona Sunshine 2, and a slew of different high-quality titles, as effectively.On the PlayStation VR2 facet, we received not one, however two Resident Evil VR video games, Horizon Call of the Mountain, Gran Turismo 7, Arizona Sunshine 2, and the promise of extra gaming greatness from Sony within the coming 12 months. It’s been a superb time to be a VR gamer, and it is solely going to get higher from right here!The present of pets(Image credit score: Nicholas Sutrich / Android Central)Some individuals love cats or canine, however I’m extra of a fan of pets that do not get my home soiled or smash my furnishings. I’m particularly speaking about my pet chickens who stay in a hen fort I constructed for them in my yard.Scoff all you need, however these lovable feathered pals introduced me a lot pleasure in 2023, together with a serving to of sorrow. I misplaced two of them to ailments this 12 months, however the ups all the time include downs in life, and it is a pleasure to look again on the recollections these little goofball hens made all year long.Plus, the group of hen people I’ve discovered on Instagram is really considered one of a form and has been very type and useful. Yes, I truly run an Instagram account full of their antics. I’m mildly obsessed.My health club(Image credit score: Google Maps)I’ve by no means been a sports activities particular person or somebody who appreciated to work out. My extracurricular actions in highschool and school primarily concerned hanging out with pals and enjoying video video games, however I discovered one thing across the time I turned 35: use it or lose it.I’ve been going to a don’t-call-it-CrossFit health club known as Hard Exercise Works for the previous three years, however 2023 is the 12 months I lastly went all in and began going practically day by day of the week. The progress I’ve made this 12 months is nothing wanting astonishing to me, particularly as an individual who has by no means had a lot in the way in which of coordination or overt bodily power.I might need my justifiable share of bizarre issues (listed above), however I’m in the perfect bodily form of my life, and man, it feels good. If you are in any respect contemplating doing the same old “I’m going to get more fit” New Year’s decision, I’d heartily suggest trying round for a health club that does CrossFit-style exercises.As has been the case with a few of the earlier factors on this article, the group actually makes a distinction and retains me going even when I’m feeling drained, and it makes all of the distinction on this planet.Our new AI overlords(Image credit score: Paramount Pictures)Yeah, okay, so this final one is a little bit little bit of a joke, however it’s additionally semi-serious in a bizarre method. This 12 months marked a large milestone for AI, one which’s each superb and scary on the similar time.Movies and TV have conditioned us to consider that AI will finally destroy all of humanity, and we in all probability ought to by no means construct it within the first place. Yet, people are going to be human and forge ahead it doesn’t matter what. Google Gemini is the newest AI instrument in a sea of them and guarantees to blow our minds in 2024 with its human-like thought capabilities.Let’s simply hope Terminator or The Matrix weren’t prophesy.