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I want a game where you control one hero in 3D and one in 2D. The 3D hero’s motto is “Onward and upward!” while the 2D hero’s motto is “Up and to the right!”
0 CommentsCapsule Review: Solo
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0 CommentsCapsule Review: TY the Tasmanian Tiger
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The worst part of finally getting around to writing articles that I’ve wanted to write for several years are all the reference links I saved that have since broken - especially the ones that aren’t on the Wayback Machine. I am haunted by ghosts of knowledge.
0 CommentsCapsule Review: Just Cause 3
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0 CommentsCapsule Review: Endless Sky
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0 CommentsNintendo Labo and Theories of Edutainment
Further readings: Architect Edwin Heathcote connects dots between the toys architects play with as children and the buildings they design as adults: https://...
A lot of non-parent, non-child gamers seem nonplussed by Nintendo Labo. Super Bunnyhop takes an in-depth look at why Labo is really exciting for the children lucky enough to grow up with it.
How Undertale Helped Me Grieve
Fair warning, this post is going to be pretty heavy. Additionally, it contains spoilers for Undertale.
There’s something you can do in Undertale that never appealed to me, but this highly-personal essay finally makes sense of it as a powerful example of how games can help us process difficult emotions. (Spoilers for Undertale. Content warning for loss of a loved one.)
Who's the Boss: Player Choice, NPC Consent, and the Designer's Unseen Hand
Last week, we discussed the spectrum of allowance - a way to describe how allowed a given action is within a game, ranging from impossible to required. A key point is that the game’s designer places each action on the spectrum. Aside from bugs (which violate the designer’s intent) and hacks (which partially override the original design with another), in a game you can only do what the designer lets you. This is true even when you have freedom of choice - that freedom was granted by the designer.
Some games understand this well and play with it effectively - see for example The Stanley Parable, especially the confusion ending (warning: spoilers). But not all games that examine player choice understand the designer’s role.
The Journey Of Me is a free browser game. It’s a 2D platformer and it takes about fifteen minutes to play. I am now going to spoil the hell out of it, but honestly I don’t think you should be too worried about spoilers in this case.
