Frequently known for his ineptness at video games, including Minecraft, since he began playing in 2010. Lewis' introduction of Simon's wit to the Internet in useless How-to guides for World of Warcraft bosses is generally cited as the reason for the Yogscast's existence.
Due to his Minecraft skin being a stereotypical dwarf, Simon roleplays as a dwarf of Khaz Modan (a nod to his long-standing fandom of World of Warcraft) sometimes known as Honeydew in various Minecraft series.
His YouTube channel (shared with Lewis) can be found here
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Series featuring Simon:
- The YoGPoD
- Yogscast Minecraft Series
- Yogscast Garry's Mod series
Simon Lane provides examples of:
- All Girls Like Ponies: He tries to get Hannah Rutherford to watch My Little Pony with him, thinking she would love it because she is a girl. Unfortunately, the way he words it makes Lewis Brindley think for a second that something was going on between them and it made him a bit jealous.
- Artistic License – Geography: Played for Laughs when he asks Daltos why he's on an EU server for TTT despite being American. He jokingly shouts that he thought America was part of the EU.
- Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: He's easily distracted, which often makes for a funny moment when something is sneaking up on him.
- Bad Boss: In the Jaffa Factory series. This actually causes Lewis to leave Honeydew Inc in episode 13. In Episode 14, Sjin immediately gets fired from Sips Co and joins them, but quits pretty much immediately when Simon keeps beating him with a stick.
- Berserk Button: Played for Laughs. Bringing up the Bees in Minecraft attached to the forestry mod gets him screaming mad in just a few seconds. He blames them for the Jaffa Factory series getting the hatchet (even though there were more legitimate reasons).
- The Berserker: In Murder, he starts playing this way but gets shot instantly.
- Big Eater: Self-confessed.
- Big "NO!": Gives off quite a few of these.
- Catchphrase:
- Noooo!! Why would you do that?
- Coooooome 'eeere!!
- That's a very nice x/everything you've got there...
- Balls to it!
- See you later, shitlord!
- Follow me! [I'll lead the way!]
- Aaaaaaaawww! It's lovely!
- Diggy diggy hole!
- "That's a very good question! [I'm glad you asked!]" More often than not, he doesn't know the answer.
- "This fucking game", usually said in a very high-pitched voice. Used as a reaction towards poorly-made games, particularly glitches within them.
- Clone Angst:
- His Master Clone gets killed in Yog Labs, forcing him to essentially have to die to keep on living. He doesn't remember any of his past life as a result.
- Played for Laughs in Shadow of Israphel.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Shows a slightly odd view of the world, although it's partly an act.
- Combat Pragmatist: When playing as the murderer in Garry's Mod, he can be surprisingly skilled and pragmatic, often stabbing people in the back and waiting for them to turn on someone else before making his move. This is an acquired trope since his initial strategy was to go in screaming.
- Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: At gaming in general.
- Cutting the Knot: What's his preferred solution in TTT when there are only three people left, including himself, and he isn't sure which one is innocent and which is a traitor?Simon: I killed both of you, fuck it!
- Death by Cameo: He briefly appears in Area 11's "GIGACRAFT" machinima. Just as Sparkles* thinks this means he'll be the new protagonist in a Shadow of Israphel-style machinima, a creeper blows him up, causing Sparkles* to flee since his boss has died and he fears he'll be held responsible.
- Death Is Cheap: Deconstructed. When his Master Clone is destroyed in Yog Labs, he has to replace it himself, but now has none of his previous memories.
- Determinator: Simon is completely determined to make sure that BRIAN BLESSED can't take his jam.
- Distressed Dude: In MoonQuest, he gets stranded on the moon for several episodes. Eventually, he gets teleported off the moon.
- Epic Fail:
- His efforts to build a Santa on top of the Jaffa Factory were quite simply dreadful. Initially, he wraps the belt below its bottom (causing the usually deadpan Sips to burst out laughing for several minutes), then makes its face look like (posthumously-exposed child molester) Jimmy Savile. When Duncan points out the latter, Simon reacts with horror.
- Crashed into the moon in MoonQuest.
- In JaffaQuest 105, he undid several episodes of hard work. How did he do this? He tried launching the rocket inside the factory "museum tour", causing a huge explosion and destroying the entire factory. The explosion was so big that it caused at least two of their games to crash. While he at least has the excuse of not knowing that it was fuelled, he didn't even bother checking.
- His introduction to Murder involves him charging around, screaming at the top of his lungs with a knife out. Given how Murder requires the main antagonist to be cautious and more subtle, he was gunned down more or less instantly. He did improve afterward, mind, but he still set the tone for the rest of the video.
- In Hole Diggers, tried to launch a rocket into space before it was finished fueling, leading to it running out of fuel half-way and crashing back into the ocean. Simon and rockets just don't seem to mix.
- Fat and Skinny: The fat to Lewis Brindley's skinny.
- Fat Bastard: He admits this knowingly, though as shown by the real-life videos it's more part of a persona he puts on.
- The Gadfly: Especially when TotalBiscuit's nearby. For every time he's being incompetent in Magicka, there's another time it's intentional. TB tries to one-up him, though...he also shows elements of this towards TB in Trine 2.
- Genre Blind: When Simon starts playing Garry's Mod Murder with the others, his initial strategy is to run in screaming at the top of his lungs, randomly trying to stab anyone in his way. It doesn't work, and he later wises up somewhat.
- Have I Mentioned I Am a Dwarf Today?: In almost every circumstance he refers to himself as a dwarf, plays as a dwarf... he even has a knitted dwarf hat he sleeps in.
- The Hyena: The guy loves to laugh, and it's often glorious and very contagious.
- Implausible Deniability: During the TTT livestream in December 2014, he murders William Strife and is basically caught in the act. He runs away, screaming "Someone killed Will! Oh god, it was awful", then proclaiming to be innocent before Daltos guns him down.
- Incoming Ham: Most prevalently in Murder, when he charges at everyone screaming at the top of his lungs.
- It Amused Me: The reason he often hits Lewis, makes up zany stories for The YoGPoD, does his crazy expressions, and about 20% of everything he does. He even admits to committing RDM in Trouble in Terrorist Town simply because he had the opportunity and couldn't resist.
- Jerkass: Acts like this to Lewis sometimes, but it's all in good fun and just part of his persona.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Has his moments in the Shadow of Israphel series, such as sticking close to Grizwald to protect him during the Legend of Verigan livestream and reassuring Knight Peculier of his ability to save the world. Then there's his reaction to Peculier's death...
- Kindhearted Cat Lover: Despite having a love for corgis, he also has a pair of cats that he absolutely adores.
- Kleptomaniac Hero: He cannot stop stealing things.
- Large Ham: He enjoys bellowing things out, which makes him so funny. It makes the evil voices he does even creepier, on the other hand.
- Leeroy Jenkins: Simon's solution is often to charge into a fight with little regard for the consequences. He later tries this in Murder, but fails miserably since the game isn't easily won that way.
- The Load:
- Does this a bit in the Magicka and Trine 2 Lets Plays with Lewis Brindley and TotalBiscuit, though it's likely that he's intentionally trolling him.
- While hardly useless in the Jaffa Factory series, he does less work than Lewis or Duncan Jones and spends a lot of his time easily distracted, forcing them to get him back on track.
- Mad Bomber: Generally, if something explodes, then 80% of the time Simon is responsible. He's rather fond of using TNT to solve a problem, which creates more, and also develops a love for jihad bombs and C4 in TTT.
- Man of a Thousand Voices: It's joked that this is his job at Yogtowers. The voices often blend together and never stay consistent, however.
- Metaphorically True: He's fond of half-truths when playing as a traitor in TTT, although it rarely works.
- Minor Injury Overreaction: He tends to scream loudly even if he receives a minor wound in-game. Suffering from mild burns in TTT is enough to get him to scream, as is a punch in Minecraft if he isn't expecting it.
- Mistaken Identity: He misidentified longtime friend Daltos during the TTT livestream, mistaking him for someone else that used to play WoW with them. Strippin was bemused by this, pointing out that Simon had known Daltos for three years.
- Naïve Newcomer: In Murder, he, along with Sjin and Hannah, have no experience playing the game at first. With Simon, however, it's particularly noticeable owing to his attempt to be The Berserker when the game generally requires much more subtle strategies.
- No Indoor Voice: His loudest screams are audible in other videos recorded several rooms away, that don't even feature Simon. Not to mention the one time he apparently set off a car alarm in the street outside.
- Oh, Crap!:
- Tends to have these a lot in TTT when he's the last innocent left.
- During the TTT livestream, he finds C4 in a house and asks why there's a countdown. He then screams for everyone to get out the house, to no avail since he blocks someone else in and there are only seconds to go. Everyone degenerates into helpless laughter.
Rythian: Rest in peace, ears. Rest in peace, headphone users. - Power Trio: He mainly teams up with Duncan and Lewis, but from 2013 onwards has also regularly teamed up with Hannah and Kim.
- Pyromaniac: Don't give him flint and steel in Minecraft, and don't let him use it near TNT either.
- Rage Quit:
- Did this in Fable III after a Game-Breaking Bug resulted in him being trapped in a tree.
- After a third attempt to complete I Get This Call Every Day, Simon angrily stormed out, shouting "FUCK THIS GAME, I QUIT", leaving Lewis to awkwardly finish the video.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: Simon is the Red Oni to Lewis Brindley's Blue Oni, being the least focused of the two and more easily angered than Lewis. Although Lewis has shown quite frequently (from 2013 onwards) that he's Not So Above It All.
- Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated:
- Due to Shadow of Israphel going on hiatus, a rumour started circulating that Simon had died and that was the reason for it. Fans naturally started believing it, in no small part due to the Google Plus transition allowing imitators and spam accounts to circulate the rumour. This was considered the final straw, and comments on his and Lewis' channels were banned for two months.
- In 2015, loose tongues on Reddit began circulating rumors of his death again when Simon was in the hospital and out of Yogscast videos from March through September.
- Sad Clown: The reason for his six-month hiatus from the main channel was supposedly due to him suffering from mental health issues.
- Sarcasm Mode: He is fond of using this sometimes.
- Screams Like a Little Girl: On occasion, his screams are less masculine, notably in Murder. In Monster Hunters, Kim Richards of all people tells him to stop screaming.
- Self-Deprecation: He's mocked himself a number of times for shouting too much, most noticeably after his six-month hiatus.
- So Bad, It's Good: The philosophy behind some of his character impressions.
- Tempting Fate: In the Space Engineers videos, Lewis walks Simon through the piloting controls. Simon quickly notices that his ship loses speed when he's not accelerating, so Lewis tells him to turn off the inertia dampeners followed by a warning: "The amount of energy you put into speeding up is the same amount of energy you need to put into slowing down. So be careful." Immediately after Lewis finishes this sentence, Simon comes careening in from the edge of Lewis' POV and crashes into their Space Labs sign at ~80 km/h. The rest of the episode is basically Simon trashing their base with similarly clumsy piloting.
- Token Evil Teammate: Compare him to Lewis and Duncan, who are productive and fairly competent. Simon, on the other hand, murders the others for petty reasons, sets things alight, uses TNT to "solve problems" and is rude to the others (albeit not entirely seriously). His performance in Trouble in Terrorist Town is also fairly bad, with a lot of Unfriendly Fire. Ironically inverted for YogLabs, in which Lewis is manipulating the unwitting Simon.
- Token Good Teammate: For YogLabs, he's the only one with a moral compass; while some of the science team have varying standards, they still experiment on others willingly. Simon is mostly an Unwitting Pawn, and eventually rebels after Lewis orders him to destroy a village with some TNT-firing weaponry, later trying to release a group of commandos (though he ends up killing most of them). Since clone #0028 ends up dying in the process, clone #0029 continues as normal.
- Took a Level in Badass: Despite starting out as an incompetent gamer, Simon has managed to catch up with the others in some respects.
- His Minecraft skills are considerably better than they used to be. Compare his building in Tekkit to Galacticraft, when he builds a fantastic airship and later designs a good way to harvest pigs for building a base out of ham.
- Initially, his performance in Murder is subpar, since he simply charges at opponents screaming at the top of his lungs, which gets him shot early on. Later, he calms down and manages to get quite a few wins as the murderer, all while being focused and unusually efficient.
- While his performance as an innocent terrorist is subpar, as a traitor Simon has learned some decent strategic moves.
- Trademark Favorite Food: Jaffa Cakes.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Due to Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!, this happens a few times:
- Played with in Yoglabs when he sees Israphel in Lewis' clothes during "Yogdonalds". While he understandably gets a bit panicked and confused, he forgets about this later.
- When playing "Nightmare Church" in Garry's Mod, his reaction to a cat in the microwave is one of disinterest.
- Unwitting Pawn: In Yoglabs, as Lewis Brindley has him as a guinea pig.
- Vitriolic Best Buds: With Lewis and Kim Richards primarily.
- Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: Spiders really freak him out.
