“The Right Time to Die”: Subverting the Intent of Darkest Dungeon Josh Rivers February 9, 2017 Opinion 1 I want to start by saying that I don’t believe there’s a wrong way to enjoy a game; they’re entertainment products, so if you’re enjoying yourself you’re automatically doing it right. There are however cases wh...
Writing with Paranoia: What If it’s All Just a Sink full of Raw Meat? Josh Rivers December 19, 2016 Opinion 2 I suffer from paranoia. I’m not talking about a tendency to just worry a lot, as the term is typically misused – I’m talking about full-blown paranoid delusions. I’ve suffered from these for most of my life. Th...
The Awkward Plot Dump, and Why We’ll Inevitably See it Again Josh Rivers November 9, 2016 Opinion There’s a movie called The Last Stand starring Arnold Schwarzenegger that I saw in cinemas many moons ago. Being just another schlocky action movie, I remember nothing about it except for one scene: a scene whe...
For the last time: GAMES ARE NOT MOVIES Josh Rivers October 7, 2016 Opinion For the last couple of console generations we’ve seen the big budget publishers abuse the word “cinematic” to justify things like stunted framerates and a futile obsession with photo-realism. AAA companies not ...
A Never-ending Cycle of Games about Never-ending Cycles. Josh Rivers September 6, 2016 Opinion 1 Games appear to have cottoned on to a neat little trick: they can extend their replayability by crafting a compelling narrative reason for why the game repeats itself. The mere fact of having a reason for the r...
Inside demonstrates the difference between unity and conformity Josh Rivers August 12, 2016 Opinion Inside is one of those games that doesn’t have a story so much as it has a sequence of events connected by themes. The question of “what the fuck” is very much left to the player to answer, and my word have a l...
