"Where is all the good writing about games?"
What can be said at the close of 2022 that hasn’t already prefaced a thousand best-of lists? It wouldn’t be fair to say there were no bright spots this year, because there certainly were. In addition to a slate of excellent new releases…
An entire epoch of games criticism has come and gone in the time since this site first came into existence nearly 13 years ago. It’s difficult, now, to even access the emotional state we had back then, the optimism of unfettered possibilities…
Welcome back gaymers! Pride Month is a year-round affair here at Critical Distance–the same goes for Wrath Month–but all the same it feels timely in June to highlight some of the best damn queer-themed writing featured in our weekly roundups through the…
This February, the annual games writing jam took the theme of Lists! I chose it for two reasons, first of all that it’s obviously been a hell of a year since the last writing jam, and I wanted to choose a theme…
What a year it’s been! Ordinarily Eric Swain would be leading our annual mega-roundup of the best of the best games criticism, analysis and commentary, but this year you have none other than Kris Ligman, former senior curator and current financial director,…
Another year has passed and now is the time to look back and take stock of the year that was. For Critical Distance that means crafting our mega roundup, with links curated from all the year’s weekly roundups and bolstered by recommendations…
Who has been forging new paths in criticism, highlighting untold stories, and sharing the most interesting lenses on games? It’s time to announce this year’s Critical Distance Awards. This is the second year that we have run our Awards separately to our…
It’s time for our year-end mega-roundup of games criticism! The purpose of this feature is to create a representative snapshot of the year, curated from the links we shared. I have been doing this for several years, and every time I have…
The first Visual Essay Jam was held on itch.io over the weekend of February 10th-12th. In this short time, and only two weeks after I had come up with the idea in the first place, 25 visual essays were submitted, covering a…
Going through the archives of the past year, if I had to boil all this writing down into a single word, it would be “resist.” As far back as day one of this year I found lots of emotive and thought-provoking work in…