Robert Yang’s Masculinity Simulator Uncovers the Sadist Streak in Internet Voyeurism

Robert Yang’s Hard Lads (2020) is a short computer game about hitting someone on the back with a folding chair, a comedy of incompetence inspired by the viral YouTube video titled “British Lads Hit Each Other With Chair.” The video shows a group of young, shirtless Englishmen in the confused ecstasy of what appears to be an overlong day-drinking session, trying to execute a perfect chair hit, like the ones they’ve seen in pro wrestling matches, in a cramped back alley bet