Blogroll
Links to other websites that Doctor Professor finds interesting, entertaining, or useful.
Blogs and Analysis
If you like reading what I think about games, you’ll probably like reading what these folks think about them too.
Videogames, programming, tabletop games, and nerd culture ephemera.
Shamus Young is a prolific blogger on game design, storytelling, industry practices, and more. He also used to be a columnist for The Escapist and his old Experienced Points articles and Stolen Pixels screenshot comics are worth an archive binge. His writing is insightful and approachable and I’ve picked up some very useful concepts from him. His blog also hosts a few regular guest writers including Rutskarn and Bob Case.
Start With: My favorite is his Mass Effect Retrospective that covers the entire trilogy - but if you want to start with something that isn’t fifty parts, Games and the Fear of Death is a quick writeup of good and bad ways to scare the player. Or you could browse his curated list of entry points on his home page and pick something yourself.
Raph Koster's personal website: MMOs, gaming, writing, art, music, books
Raph Koster is a game designer known mainly for his work as lead designer of Ultima Online and creative director of Star Wars Galaxies, as well as his book A Theory of Fun for Game Design. His blog ranges a bit but most frequently discusses the design of online games.
Start With: Do auction houses suck?
Deranged Rantings About Games
Jeff Vogel founded Spiderweb Software in 1994 and has been making old-school RPGs ever since. His writing reflects lessons learned from his decades of experience as an indie developer, starting long before Steam and its ilk. Archive binging encouraged - but note that after 2020, he stopped updating his Blogspot blog and moved to Substack.
Start With: Make Your Game Easy. Then Make It Easier.
The Art and Business of Making Games
Game Developer (formerly Gamasutra) is a community site for game developers. While some news gets posted, the emphasis is on shared learnings and analysis of various aspects of game development. It’s a great place for soaking in the collective wisdom of the industry - there are articles and blog posts by people with a wide variety of experiences and perspectives.
Start With: Player Relationship types in Hades' Star
We update our developers blog on a weekly basis, aiming to be a shared source of learnings, data, and information for game developers. Follow us on Twitter for the latest posts.
A blog for indie game developers hosted by games portal Kongregate. Kongregate does well when the games people host there do well, so it’s in their interest to educate interested developers on how to design, build, and market their games effectively. The results are quite interesting.
Start With: Fixing Your Game’s Perceived Slowness with Elevators
News and Reviews
How I stay informed about new and upcoming games and the latest industry happenings.
The resource for people who make and sell games.
GamesIndustry.biz is a news site focused more on industry happenings than on specific games. It’s a good way to keep a finger on the pulse of the games industry as a whole.
Start With: As a news site, most content is not evergreen, but Our Uncertain Streaming Future is a solid example of what to expect.
GameCritics is a non-profit game review site aiming to raise the level of discourse about games as art and entertainment. It’s my go-to source for reviews - the quality is high and there are enough writers that the coverage is wide.
Start With: It’s a review site, so find a review of a game you’re interested in to get calibrated. But here’s a solid example: Darkest Dungeon Review
Diehard Gamefan is also a non-profit game review site that aims to give in-depth unbiased reviews out of pure love for the industry. Coverage tends to favor Japanese games or more thoughtful genres, though you can still find reviews of games like WWE 2K17 as well. The writeups are high quality and I pay attention when they review a game I’m curious about.
Start With: It’s a review site, so find a review of a game you’re interested in to get calibrated. But here’s a solid example: Import Review: Persona 4: Dancing All Night (Sony Playstation Vita)
The largest video game database online, Giant Bomb features Game Reviews, News, Videos, and Forums for the latest in PS4, Xbox One, PS3, Xbox 360, Wii, PSP, DS, 3DS, NGP, and more!
Giant Bomb is a gaming news/reviews/wiki/community website - it’s basically got it all. The site was founded by alumni of other gaming sites, most notably Jeff Gerstmann after he’d been fired from GameSpot for giving a low score to a game the site was currently advertising. As you might expect, Giant Bomb has a much more independent voice and content quality is quite high.
Start With: Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle Review
IGN is your #1 destination for all video game news, expert reviews, and walkthroughs.
IGN is a gaming news/reviews/wiki/community site. News strays a bit outside of just video games, as is common for more mainstream sites. The most useful thing for me is the collecting of shockingly good guides to popular games - it’s often a better resource than GameFAQs.
Start With: Super Mario 64 Wiki Guide is an example of their excellent game guides.
The latest gaming news, game reviews and trailers.
Destructoid is a gaming news/reviews/community site. Noise and clickbait are relatively low for this kind of site, though for my money it’s never quite recovered from losing Jim Sterling. These days I just use it for news and reviews. There may be deeper useful insights hidden in the community blogs; I have not gone digging.
Start With: 100% Objective Review: Final Fantasy XIII
The Gamer's Guide
Kotaku is a gaming news/reviews/community site. Note that this is part of Gawker Media Gizmodo Media Group, so noise/clickbait/manufactured-controversy levels are high. My advice is to ignore every opinion that’s not part of a review, pay no attention to rumors and speculation, and remember that “fans are in an uproar” usually means “we found three angry comments on Reddit.” If you don’t think you can reliably filter that stuff out, don’t read this site. If you can, there’s some value in it - I occasionally find out about games and such here that other sites don’t report on.
Start With: Here Is A Very Specific Video Game Thing That Sucks is a decent example of the mixed bag that this site can be. It’s about getting annoyed at a certain class of game mechanic, but the mechanic is legitimately problematic and I have yet to find a better writeup about it. But if any article on the site gets you any angrier than this article does, take a breath and remember that anger is part of their business strategy.
DualShockers is a gaming news site. We provide the latest gaming news, gaming reviews, and trailers for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC, and more.
DualShockers is a gaming news site - and despite the name, it’s not just for PlayStation. Noise and clickbait are low. They also post more promotional trailers and screenshot galleries than other news sites, particularly of Japanese games.
Start With: Kotaro Uchikoshi Interview: Director Talks Zero Escape Series Development and Future Projects
PlayStation LifeStyle is your best source for all things PlayStation, including PS4, PS5, PS3, PSN, PSVR, and Vita News, Reviews, Trophies, Guides, and more!
A PlayStation-specific news/reviews/community site. Noise and clickbait are low. There’s analysis and commentary as well as useful resources like a complete guide to PlayStation Store updates (which Sony themselves don’t even bother with anymore).
Start With: Zanki Zero: Last Beginning Review - Live, Die, Slap Goats, Repeat
Nintendo Life has you covered for all the latest Nintendo Switch, 3DS and Wii U news along with in-depth reviews, features, videos and interviews. We also cover Nintendo eShop, Virtual Console and Retro Nintendo consoles.
A Nintendo-specific news/reviews/community site. Reports on Nintendo items that are too obscure for generalist sites and goes more in-depth on them. There’s also a weekly article about what’s new on the eShop which I find quite useful.
Start With: Review: RiME (Switch)
Push Square - PS4 News, PS4 Pro and PlayStation VR News, PS Vita News Reviews, Screenshots, Trailers
A PlayStation-specific news/reviews/community site. Covers PlayStation-related items in more detail than other sites, including publishing guides for the more popular games.
Start With: Guide: The Best PS4 Co-Op Games
RPS is about PC gaming. Lovely, delicious, strange and compelling PC gaming. It’s written by a gathering of Britain’s top games critics, and aims to cover everything from the latest breaking stories about the biggest releases to esoterica from the format’s most obscure peninsulas. Our philosophy is that AAA and indie are just as likely to produce fascinating games worthy of our time and coverage, and give all extremes equal prominence.
A PC-specific news/reviews/community site. Covers PC gaming items that don’t make it onto other sites, including more discussion of hardware. My favorite column is Unknown Pleasures, which picks out a handful of games from that week’s Steam releases to recommend. There’s also a lot of coverage of free games.
Start With: The 50 Best Free Games On PC
Comics
Because games are funny, but these people make them funnier.
Videogaming-related online strip by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins. Includes news and commentary.
Started in 1998 and still going strong, Penny Arcade is the video game webcomic. Creators Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik have also since gone on to create many more related properties, including a children’s charity and a series of gaming conventions. With their attention split thusly, the comic itself has arguably passed its best days, but it’s still enjoyable and if you’re familiar with gaming culture of the past couple of decades the archives are still there for your enjoyment.
Start With: It’s hard to pick just one, but how about Mancraft? It’s a solid strip, but if you read the associated news posts it turns out to be so much more.
Awkward Zombie is a comic by Katie Tiedrich that pokes affectionate fun at the ridiculous things that happen in games. Jokes are very well framed, though it helps to have at least a passing familiarity with the games being lampooned.
Start With: Culture Schlock. All the Ace Attorney comics are personal favorites of mine, but I have lost count of the number of times I have linked this specific one to people.
A light-hearted comic by Matthew Taranto starring the cast of Super Smash Bros. Brawl and the worlds of their respective games. It’s finished now, but if you’re a Nintendo fan the archives are absolutely worth a binge.
Start With: Security
A comic by Zac Gorman that celebrates the way games can capture our imagination. Dramatic moments are recreated in emotionally evocative panels or strips, expressing not how the scenes were but how they made us feel. There hasn’t been a new one in years, but there’s plenty to enjoy in the archives.
Start With: http://magicalgametime.com/post/48470399171
Videos
I don’t even watch TV anymore. I just watch these people talk about games.
In-depth video game reviews and critiques, with a sharp focus on gameplay and narrative where applicable.
Joseph Anderson makes longform videos analyzing and reviewing games. They’re quite meaty, ranging in length from around 25 minutes on the low end to multiple hours on the high end. His analysis is insightful and he’s quite good at pacing and organizing his videos to keep them clear and engaging. I’m a big fan of his work and always happy to see when he’s put out a new video - the longer, the better.
Start With: The Witness - A Great Game That You Shouldn’t Play
Balanced, thoughtful and mature gaming coverage of core games. Episodes produced by Sam P.
Skill Up’s videos are insightful, entertaining, and well-researched. While they are mostly reviews of recent titles (or previews of ones currently in beta), they also include the definitive look at the history of loot boxes: The Untold History of EA’s Long (and Rich) Pay-2-Win Love Affair
Start With: A VERY Serious Review of Blood and Truth (2019)
Join Masahiro Sakurai, director of several Kirby games and the Super Smash Bros. series, as he reflects on his work in the games industry and offers insightful and easy-to-understand advice about game development. The goal? To try and help make games around the world a little more fun!
Legendary game director/designer Masahiro Sakurai (best known for Kirby and Smash Bros.) shares approachable and digestible nuggets of wisdom gleaned from his time in the games industry. His insights are useful for anyone looking to make action games and are backed up by years of success.
Start With: Stop for Big Moments!!
Hi, I'm Alanah Pearce, I'm a 27 year old Australian living in California. I am a video game writer at Sony's Santa Monica Studio, and wrote about video games for various media outlets for nine years before that. Basically, this is my personal channel, which is a hobby that I update in my spare time. Even though it is intended to be a personal channel, I apparently end up talking about video games majority of the time anyway.
Alanah Pearce is a former games journalist and a current games writer. Her personal YouTube channel is mostly games-focused and ranges widely, featuring news reactions and commentary, analysis of industry events and trends, gameplay streams, video podcasts, and more. I’m mostly here for her commentary and analysis - she applies her insider experience and perspective and the results are consistently insightful, even-handed, and engaging.
Start With: Why are games announced early, then delayed?
Here at Errant Signal we felt the world was lacking in internet reviews of videogames, so we set out to fill that void. Upon realizing it was standing room only, we decided to try that new Italian place instead.
Chris Franklin makes video essays that function as reviews but are more about critical analysis. Often focused on a specific game, occasionally focused instead around an idea or trend, the videos examine games on their own merits but also consider how they fit into the broader context. Videos are generally ten to fifteen minutes long, though sometimes range down to five or up to twenty.
Start With: Errant Signal - Sonic and Speed
I make video essays about games, web culture, and social politics.
Ian Danskin doesn’t just talk about video games, though they (often adventure games in particular) are the subject of most of his videos. Regardless of the topic, he anchors the discussion in a broader context and applies critical theory for a deeper understanding.
Start With: The Artist is Absent: Davey Wreden and The Beginner’s Guide, an examination of The Beginner’s Guide that digs into the nature of storytelling and communication itself.
In-depth games reviews and analysis, nothing more; nothing less.
Matthewmatosis analyzes, critiques, and occasionally recommends games and series, with a focus on mechanics and the effect of design decisions on the player. There are even a couple of full-game playthroughs with commentary: Dark Souls and Devil May Cry. His insights are valuable and I’ve learned a lot from his videos.
Start With: Tetris - A Perfect Game? is a bite-sized intro to his style.
In-depth video game critique, analysis and retrospectives plus video essays on game design.
Thinreaper likes shining a light on games that didn’t receive much critical analysis. His videos range from looking at a specific aspect of a game’s design to an in-depth review of an entire game, with a focus on overlooked games or examining popular ones from new angles.
Start With: Red Dead Redemption - In-depth Review. And if you make it through that hour and a half, check out the 17-minute followup, Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare - In-depth Review.
I do a mixture of in-depth video game critiques, standard reviews, and random opinion pieces. I'm still new at making videos, but working hard to improve. You can follow me on Twitter at @cdavis_games or email me at chris@cdavisgames.com.
Chris Davis does look at some triple-A games, but spends more time with indie titles - which I appreciate. He takes in-depth looks at games that don’t otherwise get much attention, and I find the results useful and entertaining. Going even further niche, he has an ongoing series specifically looking back at A History of Isometric CRPGs.
Start With: CrossCode Review | A Hidden Gem
Recipes and artisanal cakes.
Medium- to long-form analysis of games and franchises. His look at Metroid II clocks in at a mere half hour, while his Pokémon Omega Ruby video is more of an abbreviated Let’s Play with analytical digressions that is over seven hours long and totally worth it. Shay has a knack for identifying and explaining the core of a game experience and how aspects of the overall design enhance or diminish it.
Start With: Sonic Spitball, a look back over the entire Sonic the Hedgehog series (as of 2016) and how it might better embody its core strengths in 3D.
Welcome to Super Bunnyhop, where we make pseudo-journalistic content about video games! Your host: George Weidman
George Weidman reviews and analyzes games, but he also does some honest-to-god investigative journalism, researching topics like what gaming was like behind the Berlin Wall or the state of the art for preventing motion sickeness in VR and wrapping up his learnings for your entertainment and enlightenment.
Start With: Garry’s Mod Nazis
This Earth is not well.
At some point, Shammy pivoted his channel to focus on in-depth reviews, and I’m glad he did because the results have been great. His writing is clever and makes for very entertaining delivery of his insights. He makes a lot of off-color jokes, but they aren’t a crutch - one of his best videos is A Mom-Friendly Review of Outlast 2 made with the constraint that the video has to keep the language clean and avoid jargon.
Start With: An Actual Review of Titanfall 2
How does Half Life teach without tutorials? Why didn't Capcom tell you that it was manipulating Resident Evil 4's difficulty? How are Nintendo's level designers inspired by Chinese poetry? Find out, in Game Maker's Toolkit, hosted by Mark Brown.
Mark Brown provides what is essentially an intro course on game design. Sometimes videos are focused on specific games, but more often they are focused on a class of problem or solution - aiming to give game makers another tool for their kit. Mark has an unfortunate tendency to label certain approaches as better than others rather than noting their tradeoffs, but he’s still a good source for an intro-level view of some important and valuable concepts.
Start With: Super Mario 3D World’s 4 Step Level Design
My name's Bobby the Tongue. I'm a part-time tenor saxophone player and part-time investor, primarily in long-odds NFL parlays. When I was a young man touring with the Count Basie ghost band, the bandleader asked me if I liked gaming. I thought he meant something else, so I said yeah. Turns out he meant video games, and I had to play them every day on the bus from then on (it was a weird situation where there were three tenors and only one alto so I thought it wouldn't hurt to be polite). Long story short, now I like them, but if they fall even slightly short of my expectations you'll never hear the end of it.
Bob Case’s posting schedule is a bit erratic, but he puts out quality review and editorial videos. There’s an emphasis on RPGs and his channel got started by ranting about Mass Effect 3, though he also talks about broader topics and non-game nerdy things.
Start With: Tasteful, Understated Nerdrage: A Tale of Two Companies - an eerily prescient look at what will inevitably happen to BioWare after its then-recent acquisition by EA.
The study and discussion of game design
Daltrey Waters’s channel has changed a bit, but I found his design analysis videos interesting and enjoyable. His older stuff is worth an archive binge, though you can skip anything posted after 2016.
Start With: 4 Reasons Why PlayStation and Nintendo Games were Different
watch my stupid ass videos
In the world of gaming humor videos, there are two types of creators: Dunkey, and people who wish they were Dunkey. He’s also gotten pretty good at reviewing games seriously when he wants to.
Start With: Dunkuza 3