What I’ve Been Reading: March 1, 2015

Hello, brave Internet warriors! It’s time to follow some links to other websites.

What I’ve Been Reading: February 22, 2015

A real life video game high school? You betcha. Let’s find out about it in this week’s What I’ve Been Reading.

Three Kinds of Video Game Criticism I’d Like to See More of

It’s often said that video game criticism needs to develop its own language, separate from film or literary critique. This is certainly a noble goal, as interactivity adds complications that forms of media that are passively absorbed simply don’t have. But wholly separating the field of video game criticism from that of film or literature wouldn’t be a good idea; much of our understanding of visual communication comes from movies, and there’s no denying that how we analyze stories in video games has a lot to do with how we analyze stories in books.

But developing a more robust language that integrates lessons learned from other fields of critique isn’t a panacea to “fix” imbalances in video game criticism. Commercial reality dictates that game criticism follow primarily what’s new and hot on the market. This has led to some worrying trends in video game criticism which I think need to be rectified. With that in mind, I’m going to discuss three kinds of video game criticism I’d like to see more of.

What I’ve Been Reading: February 15, 2015

Wikipedia corrections, virtual Hong Kong, and Kanye West. All that and more in this edition of What I’ve Been Reading!

On the Properties of Choice in Video Games

Because video games are obviously designed with player input in mind, the people who write about video games often write about player choice. Unfortunately, because ludology is a young field of study, we don’t yet have a common language for discussing that aspect of video games. Here’s a first attempt at establishing a very general, flexible framework for talking about player choice.

What I’ve Reading: February 8, 2015

This week, we’re talking emo. We’re also talking Monopoly. All that and a bunch more in this edition of What I’ve Been Reading.

What I’ve Been Reading: February 1, 2015

I’ve got a pretty heavy What I’ve Been Reading for you this week. It can’t all be fun and games…