Tiny Gods
One appealing aspect of religion is that it lets us presume our world is crafted with the same care and intent that we put into our art. The difference here isn’t a matter of intelligent design vs unintelligent design – to…
Tag Art
The Unknowable
Games tend to offer us questions just so they can supply the answers. In life, a vast amount of information is lost forever. Most of it is unimportant: For most people, it’s impossible to know, say, what they had for…
War Stories
America has a relationship with violence that is, let’s say, a little too friendly. That’s not to say that the American mindset is violent necessarily, that we are predisposed to do violence, but that so much of our outlook is…
Self-Made
Eh, I’m tired. It’s hard to focus, hard to create. It’s hard to be the person that makes things. I don’t know if it’s like this for everyone, but for me part of the process of creativity is the process…
Hexagon
The biggest difference between Super Hexagon and other similar games, fast paced reaction endurance challenges like Flappy Bird and Canabalt and Race the Sun, is that the presentation is inverted. You aren’t running away from or towards anything, but rolling…
Built From Ideas
There’s an argument that’s been floating around in game design circles for a while that if, say, you have an idea for a game, if you could possibly express that idea using any other medium then you probably shouldn’t be…
Merciful Criticism
I understand feeling threatened by criticism. I mean, at the point where you’ve invested enough of yourself into something to really care about it – and that’s what art asks of us, that we care – that you spend time…
City On Fire
There are certain common threads that run through stories about violence. Violence has consequences – this is almost the very definition of violence. When you forcibly enact your will upon the world, things change, and often not in the ways you…
Fog and Sound
I’ve been having a hard time thinking this week. This isn’t the real essay. This is a placeholder. The real essay is incomplete, pending a time when I can think, and pay attention, and construct a spine and ribcage to…
JazzPunk!
Yeah. the title just didn’t feel quite right without an exclamation mark. I’m not sure why ‘JazzPunk!’ isn’t the official title, because if any game deserves exclamation marks it’s this one. The entire experience of JazzPunk revolves around Surprise! With…