‘The Flame in the Flood’: Gaming As Naturalism, Gaming As Romanticism
The Flame in the Flood provokes musings on the often troubling determinism of American naturalism.
Neuromance
Extinction of Identity in the Persona Series
Sometimes growing up can feel a little like killing yourself. The Persona video games capture that extinction of identity.
‘Firewatch’ and the Case of the Much Too Obvious MacGuffin
In creating a plot device to motivate its characters, a MacGuffin, Firewatch competes against itself, with a story that it is a gimmick and a story that it really wants us to care about.
Undressing Kratos
If you want a man to represent brutality, in the end you're going to end up taking his clothes off.
The Didact and the Analyst: Learning How to Not Get Screwed Playing ‘Tharsis’
The first time that I played Tharsis I lost in two turns. The first time that my friend played Tharsis, he won quite handily.
‘Sid Meier’s Pirates!’, Ever Sailing As a Crew of One
1987's Pirates! remains cutthroat in the seventeenth century sense and in the Gordon Gecko “Greed is good!” sense.
A Question of Immanence: Louis Vuitton, Lightning, and Our Virtual Selves
Clothes make the heroine, just as they do in real life or as they do in our virtual lives
‘Republique’: Some Types of Information Are Freer Than Others
Republique reminds us that some free expression is more immoral and more dangerous than other forms of free expression.
Learning from Weak AI
Unlike players, AIs don't have to internalize rules. They are the rules.
Lara Croft Abides
Rebooting classic characters allows for re-evaluations of a character, possible growth, possible evolution, and as a result, usually end up telling a unique and engaging story -- at least at first.
‘Cradle’ Questions the Dichotomy Between Religion and Science
To my little Westernized brain, science concerns itself with the material world, religion concerns itself with the supernatural, and never the twain shall or should meet.