Power has a funny effect on the human mind. History is positively filthy with powerful leaders who turned into total jerks or went paranoid after the power went to their heads. Apparently, superpowers are a different story entirely. Discovery recently posted about research done at Stanford’s Virtual
Robin Arnott’s soundscapes push the edges of what nothing sounds like. We dig deeper into his design philosophy and how making music is as crucial to feel of Antichamber as the game itself.
It seems that somebody at New Jersey’s Patterson Public Library system didn’t get the memo in 2011 that the Supreme Court ruled in favor of games as a form of protected expression. The library system reportedly banned people from playing computer games in the library, catching the attention of the N
Moonbot Studios, the team behind 2011’s Academy Award-winning animated short and game/storytelling app/novel The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, are looking to bring a new vision to life with Golem. With a gorgeous, hand-drawn Renaissance aesthetic and an intriguing take on the origin
Bout, a self-described “photo-taking game” is a rare mobile game that works almost as well as a spectator sport as it does an exercise in in-group hilarity. You play by starting a photo challenge – you can write your own, or select from currently available gems along the lines of “animal you most lo
Games are famously good at teaching – they encourage and reward skill acquisition, they use every trick in the operant conditioning book, and they are basically great at teaching the player both details about their fictional worlds (no matter how inane) and how to play them. Folks in the educational
Change the color palette of your little DJ protagonist. Switch the controls around to your liking. Set the entire game to the song of your choice (any MP3 or Ogg file will do). Rush Brothers is a hyperactive, charming exercise in accommodating player tastes. – – – The game plays like a much more for
UCLA’s Game Lab is currently showing student work, allowing interested members of the public to come over to the Broad Art Center’s New Wight Gallery and play the creations sprung fresh from the DMA program’s young minds. Among the most interesting and provocative projects is Objectif, a tabletop/ca
You don’t need to be a soccer fan to appreciate the artistry and humor of 8bit football, a series of 8-bit illustrations of iconic players and historic moments from Matheus Toscano. His work is showcased today as part of the Guardian’s series on “beautiful games”, a collection of artwork that celebr
It’s becoming something of a familiar narrative – a bunch of game industry veterans get together and start working on a dream project. They realize that they have something exciting going for them – so they quit their jobs to focus their efforts on said dream project – and they launch a Kickstarter
Women in games can’t seem to keep themselves from getting captured. What gives? – – – Now, a new Tumblr is collecting depictions of the many weird, wacky, and downright disturbing instances where female characters have been kidnapped in games. It goes much further than the corny good vs. evil “save
There’s nothing more interesting in all of entertainment than the creative process of brilliant, talented individuals. The origins of the creative spark, the proverbial “lightbulb moment” was the focus of a recent Unwinnable feature on the inspiration that guided Stan Lee, Guillermo del Toro, and ot
Guys – speaking particularly about straight guys – your dance moves say a lot about you. A new study detailed in Science Daily shows that dudes can immediately pick up on the physical strength of other guys – just by watching them dance. “A study, led by psychologist Dr Nick Neave and researcher Kri
Joe McKay is an artist who is interested in exploring and breaking the artificial barriers between “art games”, and “art that comments on games” – and he wants to bring fun and meaning to both of those worlds. His latest playable installation, Light Wave, is currently on display in Long Island Unive
New York Magazine recently published a fascinating, depressing piece about the traumatizing effects of high school, based on some very new (and disturbing) research. The gist is pretty simple – since adolescent brains are still forming in a lot of important ways, the experiences we have during that
We’re all in trouble. According to a new piece in The Week, there’s been a marked rise in legitimate cases of Digital Attention Disorder – that is, an addiction to the internet and its infinite distractions. Some people have it so badly (no NeoGaf jokes, please), that they require professional treat
After a banner year, the game industry is going through something of a Kickstarter hangover right now. It was the bright and exciting new thing last February and March, but now, we’re as likely to hear about big name hail mary prayers like Gas Powered Games’ latest bid to get Wildman going, or scary
2D puzzle-platformers were practically an indie go-to joke for a while. We were at the point, maybe a year or two ago, where you couldn’t sneeze at a game developer meet-up without stumbling onto someone’s conversation about their puzzle-based hop-and-bopper about water/acid/gravity/the laws of ther
Big-budget games aren’t necessarily known for their thematic subtlety. I dislike that notion as much as the next narratology-jargon loving person, but the big guns, bigger explosions, and exaggerated action hero stereotypes that populate the majority of AAA games tend to confirm, rather than dispel
It’s breaking news today – Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta has announced an end to the policy that officially bans women from combat, on the heels of a lawsuit brought by the ACLU. It’s a pretty major victory for gender equality in America – especially considering the reality that women are active
It goes without saying, but making a video game is, well, hard. The more I learn about development, the more it amazes me that any game gets completed, let alone stands as a functional, polished, even fun experience. That goes doubly so when making a game with a “message”. To be clear, all authored
The Cave, out today for PSN and Wii U (and arriving tomorrow for XBLA and Steam), is the first title to spring from legendary adventure game designer Ron Gilbert’s (The Secret of Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle) new gig at Double Fine Productions, the title is a classic adventure presented via 2D
Considering a recent article in Edge that claims that the number of women working in the game industry is actually on the decline, it’s easier to swallow SOE’s terrible G.I.R.L. acronym for the actual good the initiative does. The G.I.R.L. (it stands for Gamers In Real Life, sigh) scholarship progra
The first truly major marketing gaffe of 2013 arrived yesterday, in the form of a bloodied, dismembered, bikini-clad statue offered to UK and Australian purchasers of Dead Island: Riptide special edition. It was a display of spectacular density, since publisher Deep Silver seems to have forgotten al
