The recent Guardian article by Tom Watson on why MPs need to play videogames to understand them got me thinking. If you haven't already read the article, go read it then come back. Done? Good. This sparked a conversation on a messageboard I visit, specifically regarding the comment that kids aren't taught programming any more, they're taught Office. This is sadly very true, and something that led me to another realisation – at one point, kids *were* taught programming, but not by their school. I can only speak from a British perspective on this, so if you're an American...

Mods are something I've seldom played with, historically speaking, but more and more lately I'm stumbling on interesting-looking conversions for games I own that are too compelling to pass up. A case in point, and the mod that prompted me to raise the subject, is the superb tech demo for Ashura: Dark Reign, a Sonic the Hedgehog-themed total conversion for Unreal Tournament 2004. Having played this for only a few minutes, I was amazed by the technical achievement and attention to detail – had I not known it was a mod, I could almost have believed I was playing the latest Sonic Adventure...