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The Xmaspiration: Survivorship Bias
"I’m also exhausted, really exhausted. It’s so stressful, I think because of the amount of time Neptune plays out over it feels like a total investment into the game. I remember I was out all day at a...
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Electron Dance 2011 Review
Apologies! This should have been posted in 2011 but there just wasn't any room in the schedule. Better late than after I'm the late HM, though. If you're wondering what Electron Dance goodness you...
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The Rings
In May 2004, Mrs. HM and I went on a whistle-stop tour of Kyushu, the big southwestern chunk of Japan, home to Nagasaki, the steamy onsen town of Beppu and the slightly surreal Dutch theme park Huis...
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Parenting Is Not an Escort Mission
In a personal essay, Jenn Frank used 90s simulation Creatures to talk about her disconnection from motherhood – both physical and mental. It's worth your time if you haven't read it already and I'm...
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A Theoretical War, Part 1
This is the first article in The Academics Are Coming series. 1. prologue Perhaps one of my saddest university memories is when I shrugged my shoulders and accepted the end of mathematics. Before my...
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Cat’s Away Chronicles IV
The fourth of a five-part video series. This time I hunt down Pippin Barr. He who hath made Epic Sax Game, Let's Play: Ancient Greek Punishment and The Artist Is Present. Warning, this video contains...
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A Weaponized Machine
November 23, 2010. Quintin Smith posts about a free browser game called The Infinite Ocean on Rock Paper Shotgun. I plan to dabble with it but stay for the duration. Jonas Kyratzes is easy to find in...
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A Slave Obeys
Arkane Studios' Dishonored skidded onto the scene last week, a game that echoes Looking Glass Studios' seminal Thief although sports skill upgrades a la Deus Ex. Inevitably there was both great praise...
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Returning Home, 1
In 2010, I felt that 2D shooters were done. With plenty of free stuff kicking around, there was no need to buy a shooter that I'd already seen 20 years earlier. I'd dabbled in some of Jeff Minter's...
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The Alien Cortex Must Die, 1
Trapped on remote planet Zaga-33 with a hostile alien population, there is only one way to escape. The alien cortex must die. Continue reading: The Alien Cortex Must Die, 1
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The Author As Content
If you wanted to piss off literary critics in 1967, you probably should have written an essay called ‘Death of the Author’ like Roland Barthes did. The author, he maintained, is irrelevant to...
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The Ethics of Selling Children
I had finished writing a mail to Ed Key, the developer of Proteus, and the pointer hovered over the Send button. I proofread the mail a couple of times and everything looked good. It was time to click...
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Into The Black
Developer Orihaus made a short game called Obsolete for last year's 7DFPS challenge. There are two ways to approach Obsolete. Option A is the obvious one, play. You can bask in the cold, abstract...
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A Letter to Nicolau Chaud (NSFW)
The following article is about Nicolau Chaud's sex game Polymorphous Perversity; it is most definitely NSFW, contains spoilers through to the game's ending and discusses sexual violence. Proceed with...
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Fish Out of Water
This is the first part of the Dishonored quadrilogy. And lo, it came to pass that shortly after its release, I played Arkane Studios' Dishonored. For someone who has— —spent the last couple of years...
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The Secret of Kairo
Richard Perrin's first-person exploration/puzzle game Kairo (available on Steam tomorrow) is a great example of environmental narrative taken to the extreme, because it tells a story eschewing words...
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The Five Stages of Starseed Pilgrim
Alexander “Droqen” Martin's Starseed Pilgrim is another one of those games. It's another Fight Club game, like At A Distance. A game you can't talk about. A game it's even dangerous to acknowledge the...
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Faith of the Pilgrim
This is everything I have to say on Alexander “Droqen” Martin's Starseed Pilgrim. If you don’t want to be spoiled, read last week’s The Five Stages of Starseed Pilgrim instead. This is it, people, this...
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The Hokra Problem
A deleted scene from my interview with Doug Wilson: At the time, I remember feeling a little facepalm. As I don't have a console, no co-located multiplayer experiences exist, QED. It was a ridiculous...
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Shooting Spirit
This is the first part of The Shooting Gallery trilogy. Cinema and literature have shown they can weather the storm of time: The African Queen can make contemporary audiences laugh, Nosferatu is still...
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