On Murder Simulators
"Murder simulator" has been one of the most popular rhetorical sledgehammers in the national FUD campaign against violent video games. Popularized by Dave Grossman in his 1996 book On Killing, the phrase was [...]
The Evolution of Mass Effect
[SPOILER WARNING: As with all entries in the Critical Mass Effect series, this contains various degrees of spoilers, in this case for Mass Effect 2] The unimaginatively titled Mass Effect 2 may [...]
What Mass Effect Got Right
In the last entry, I highlighted the most egregious problems of Mass Effect. But the fact remains that I've played it to completion twice, when I don't manage to complete most of the [...]
What Mass Effect Gets Wrong
Welcome to the first real entry in Critical Mass Effect, a compendium of articles that will poke and prod at all the design decisions that make up the Mass Effect trilogy.This will not [...]
Mass Effect’s Astoundingly Inept Sidequests
Author’s Note: This is the first entry in Critical Mass Effect, a compendium of articles on Bioware’s ambitious, troubled space opera trilogy. The next two entries will focus on everything wrong and [...]
What do we get out of video games?
Every self-reflective games writer (and I like to think that's most of us) is dogged by one question above all others: "How do you measure the value of a game?" When we [...]
This Is Not a Story About Gaming with Autism
Earlier this month, Joel Goodwin published "The Ethics of Selling Children," an article questioning the increasing prominence of confessional writing in games blogging. He expresses the ambiguity I feel better than I [...]
Games Played in 2012 Described in One Sentence
Taking a page from Brendon Chung, I present one sentence on each of the games I played in 2012 (or at least all the ones I can remember - inevitably a [...]
Notes on a Nameless Island
I am going to tell you a story about an island. This island will soon cease to exist, and this will be no great loss, because no life resides on it. [...]
A Few Questions with Dan Pinchbeck
Dan Pinchbeck, the British game designer/academic behind The Chinese Room and Dear Esther, was gracious enough to answer a few questions that popped into my head when playing the recently-released remake [...]