Category: Games

Working through the pile of shame.

2023 consumption: a look at some stuff I liked

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Once more, dear friends, it’s time for me to remark that time has really flown this year, and that it seems as if I had only written last year’s one of these a couple of days ago.

Call me Bill. (And call me, Bill.)

Yep, 2023 went fast. It’s been a good year in a lot of ways, and absolutely atrocious in many others. The world continues to go to shit, and so I continue in my mission of providing distraction to those who enjoy it (thankfully, a treasured few do) through writing up what I consumed this year, culturally speaking. If this isn’t you, then punch out now. I’m not sure if this one’s going to be as long as previous editions, but let’s give it a whirl, shall we?

Previous versions are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here if you need an introduction.

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2022 consumption: a look at some stuff I liked

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Here we are again at the end of a year that feels like it only began the other week. It’s been a big one for lots of reasons, and I’ve gotten through it OK – I think? – but I have to take issue with my hopeful belief in the last one of these things that I’d somehow get more motivation in 2022.

Hahahahahahaha.

I didn’t.

In keeping with my lack of motivation, this recap may be a little shorter than previous years, but I’m hoping there’s still something in here that might pique your interest. It’s a collection of stuff that I enjoyed (or didn’t) through this year, and is one in a continuing line. Faintly ridiculous effort, but this will make it ten years of this kinda stuff, so let’s go.

Previous versions are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here if you need an introduction.

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2021 consumption: a look at some stuff I liked

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SO we grind to the end of another year, and I appear, like some kind of obnoxious groundhog, ready to dispense my wisdom. If, by “wisdom” you mean “half-assed picks of Stuff Which Was Pretty OK In This Terrible Year”.

Difference is that he’s more stylish than I am.

I’ll insert a caveat here: like, well, everyone, this year has been a struggle for me. We’re rolling toward the third instalment of 2020 and increasingly I find that concentration takes a kick in the nuts for every COVID variant found. A lot of the plans I had made at the beginning of the year haven’t come to pass because I’ve either lacked the bandwidth to execute them, or because I’ve been so goddamned tired. I haven’t read as much as I would have liked, and I haven’t listened to as much music as I’d hoped. There’s been a bit of persistent fog around through the year and it’s made it difficult to do anything than just exist, sometimes.

But that’s ok. There’s always next year.

Previous versions are here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here if you need an introduction.

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Observation (2019/2020)

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The chances of me nabbing a PS5 any time soon are fairly nonexistent, so despite the fact I have a chunk of previous-gen games floating around in my to-finish pile, I’ve been working through some of the titles included in Microsoft’s Game Pass subscription. (It came with my console, and fuck it, why not? It meant I didn’t have to buy that Blair Witch game.)

Thankfully, my most recent dip into the pool-o-games features enough creepy narrative to keep me entertained for its relatively short runtime. Yeah, compared to a Yakuza game, everything is relatively short, but still: for about 10–12 hours, Observation kept me pretty intrigued.

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2020 consumption: a look at some stuff I liked

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It’s that time again? Shit.

I mean…

I suppose this year hasn’t exactly been kind to my interpretation of, y’know, time, so it’s not a surprise that this has crept up on me. Anyway, for the benefit of me and the dick-pill spambots that flood my comments section, I guess it’s time to chunk out some words about things I liked this year.

As ever, I’m a bit uncertain as to why I do this. It feels like a bit of an indulgence, but I suppose it does allow me a bit of breathing space to look back at the year through the prism of entertainment and formulate some thoughts about it. Whether they’re any good is still up for debate, but before we get too deep in the ontological weeds, let’s get on with it.

Previous versions are here, here, here, here, here, here and here if you need an introduction.

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Book review: Masters of Doom

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Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture by David Kushner.
My rating: 4 of 5 stars.

During high school, I had a PC. I was a bit bummed by it (largely because it wasn’t an Amiga) but that didn’t last after, in my final years, Wolfenstein 3D came out. From id Software, the game saw you eventually kill mecha-Hitler in a Nazi castle. It was, arguably, the beginning of the wave of first-person shooter games that would come to dominate computers.

You know what I love about this game? The subtlety.

It was (in ’92) the product, largely, of two guys: John Carmack and John Romero. They already had made a bunch of money through the shareware distribution of earlier games, but the duo were on the cusp of history. Just around the corner was one of the most influential and hated-by-politicians games ever: Doom.

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Book review: Blood, Sweat and Pixels

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Blood, Sweat and Pixels by Jason Schreier.
My rating: 4 of 5 stars.

Making games sounds fun, right? Like, you get to hang out in cool offices and make things that are fun to play that people love? Sounds great.

It’s not, and that’s not just because the gaming audience is equally likely to lob death threats into your inbox as praise: it’s because the way games are made is fundamentally fuuuuucked.

At least this guy can go home at night.
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Ten months, thirty games?

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I’ve realised that there’s been a lot of time since my last post about what I’ve been playing, games-wise.

Blame it on 2020, or blame it on my laziness. Either works.

Still, I should have a bit of a hack at what’s been getting in my eyeballs since I last wrote. Which was, er, for my what-I-liked-in-2019 post.

Oh good.

Yikes.

Let’s catch up on ten months of gaming, shall we?

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Book review: Game Changers

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Game Changers.Game Changers by Dan Golding and Leena van Deventer.
My rating: 4 of 5 stars.

This is a neat read from two writer-academics who’ve built careers in the gaming sphere. They’re passionate about what the form can be, and have both had buckets of shit tipped on them for daring to disagree with Gamergaters or – in van Deventer’s case – for daring to be a woman online.

It’s a tag-team affair, with both authors taking a shot at a selection of topics revolving around representation in gaming, and the entrenched mindset of producers and consumers alike. It’s written from a position of deep love for games, and a respect for gamers as something other than the basement-dwelling – and fallacious – stereotype. And it’s most importantly a work that realises that games are something that can bring us closer together while allowing voices other than those of cisgender white men to have a say.
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