"Where is all the good writing about games?"
Hello Friends! As it’s May 4th, I’ll go ahead and do the obligatory “May the fourth be with you” salute. Of course, if you prefer the dark side, you can wait till tomorrow when it’s Revenge of the Fifth. Ok, now that’s out of the way, we can get on to the April edition of This Month in Let’s Plays!
Let’s Do the Time Warp Again
Taking us back in time to games of yore, Jessica Brown provides a trip down memory lane for those of us who had the Sega Game Gear as kid (or adults)
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Hello again friends far and wide, to another edition of Blogs of the Round Table. Lindsey Joyce, your scheduled guide through this May’s BoRT has been swamped by the demands of school, work and family, while I, on the other hand, have nothing planned except sitting in this library and wondering what that smell is. A good plan changes, though. But enough about me. What about you? We want to know about your plans, and what they mean to you. Do you love it when a good plan comes together? or do the best laid plans of mice and
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Friends, it has been too long. I’ve been looking forward to kicking back, pouring a hot beverage and sharing a leisurely Sunday afternoon with you over another This Week in Videogame Blogging!
Sensual Design
Let’s start with a few pieces on how game design creates meaning through the senses. In part 3 of his ongoing series on lighting, Robert Yang discusses the particularities of lighting 3D games. The three-point lighting system often found in film and 2D games is a great standard most of the time, but, according to Yang, it can’t be the standard in 3D
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Whoa, talk about a lot of good writing to get through in This Week in Videogame Blogging! Let’s get right into it.
In trying to figure out what to say this week, and by say, I mean figure out how to structure what these other writers were saying in such a way as to best complement their work, I found this piece by Maddy Myers to really say it all:
Creating art and music is not just about the glamorous act of being inspired and pouring out your soul. It, too, is rife with the thoroughly
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I haven’t done this in a while, so excuse me while I shake some of the rust off. Welcome to another round of This Week In Video Game Blogging!
The Look Back
Starting off today we take a look into the past.
Richard Moss wrote a feature at Polygon on the very first First Person Shooter, Maze Wars, talking with the people who were there. Meanwhile, Jeffery Matulef at Eurogamer, explores the legend behind the maybe government experiment, maybe not real arcade cabinet Polybius and those making a documentary about it.
Bryant Francis at Gamasutra
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This month we have a double, yet related, feature.
First, in side A, I talk with Alan Williamson and Lindsey Joyce, the editor-in-chief and managing editor respectively of Five out of Ten. We chat about the creation and ongoing process of creating the magazine, what it’s like working with a hand of experience and what it’s like learning the ropes.
Then, in side B, Alan Williamson returns, this time, with his co-author Kaitlin Tremblay to talk about their book, Escape to Na Pali: Journey to the Unreal, that came out of an upgraded Five out of Ten
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Welcome to another minisode of the Critical Distance Confab.
These minisodes are something different than our main podcast series. At the end of every month, myself and a guest, will list off a few games each that haven’t gotten the attention of critical discourse we feel they deserve. These games can be anything from ich.io art games to prestige indie games to left by the wayside AAA games.
This month I’m joined by the editor-in-chief of the micro zine ZEAL, Aevee Bee.
http://www.critical-distance.com/podcast/Critical-Distance-Confab-minisode-03.mp3
Direct Download
Aevee’s Picks
Drakengard 3 by Square Enix
Danganronpa:
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You are in a maze of links, all alike. Obvious exits are Forward, Back and [x].
>n
You can’t go that way.
>i
You are carrying: a lantern, a blue keycard, a can of chainsaw fuel, a sense of existential dread and an indistinct scroll.
>read scroll
You need to unroll it first.
>unroll scroll, read scroll
It is signed by one Joe Köller. “The date is May 31st 2015,” it begins. “and this is This Week In Videogame Blogging!”
[press any button to continue]
An Ouroboros of Trouser Snakes
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Hello my friends, another month has flown by, can you believe it? We’ve had an almost full month of rain here in Texas, which means there’s been every opportunity to hide away inside watching Let’s Plays. Thank you LPers for getting me through the month! In summation, here’s what May had to offer This Month in Let’s Plays:
Welcome to the Club
First, Critical Distance is pleased to report that two of its own have joined the rank of Critical Let’s Play creators this month:
In her new series Ways of Playing, Lana Polansky plays LSD
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I just settled into a deep cup of chamomile tea for the last night at home before a long bus ride takes me away for a week when I realized I forgot to write this roundup. I’ve always been more of a coffee drinker anyway.
Besides, isn’t it true that the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry? How often? Let’s dig into this month’s Blogs of the Round Table covering every facet of ‘plans’ to find out.
How much planning do you expect from a game? Do you pine for minutia or
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