We here at Kill Screen are constantly amazed by the number of ways that videogames, a medium that started off as the frivolous pastime of reticent computer engineers, hasrubbed off on so many different aspects of modern life. Case in point: digital maps. We were navigating overworlds of Hyrule from
Can footman Thomas Barrow save the abbey? We don’t know, because this graphic-adventure adaptation of everyone’s favorite T.V. show about snooty British butlers isn’t real. Chiptune composer Bill Kiley had the brilliant idea to lay down an 8-bit version of Downton Abbey’s theme, and he took the libe
Last night I got a chance to kick my feet up with Wave Trip, a new snazzy music game by the sangfroid dudes at Lucky Frame. After doing so, I took it as my duty to tell you about it right away! Like all the great iOS games, Wave Trip is quite simple, almost disposable really. You pilot a lilting tri
We’ve all been there. The hiring process at a new job is typically a gauche, banal affair. There is lengthy paperwork fill out. Contracts to go over. An icy rep from H.R. casting a watchful eye. The shameful revelation that you’ve forgotten your pen and have to ask to borrow one. Then, there’s the i
In a splendid interview over at VentureBeat, Cliff Bleszinski, the brains behind the Gears of War series and bosom-bud of Ice-T, broached the all-American topic of football. When asked what games he was currently playing, Cliffy responded, “I’m actually watching football,” going on to say that both
Games that exist online, that is, your Eves and Planetsides, present an unique challenge to game preservationists. They will disappear without a trace when their popularity dies. Glitch, a quirky MMO that shuttered in December, is very much worth remembering. (Ironically, the idiosyncrasies that ma
Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Activision’s mega-popular atrocity of a military shooter, has joined the ranks of pork rinds, Facebook, and Osama bin Laden. It has been banned in the nation of Pakistan. According to a snippily-worded circular distributed by the APCDACTM (that’s the All Pakistan CD, DVD,
Yesterday it was announced with misgiving that THQ, the publisher responsible for completely respectable titles such as Saints Row and Darksiders 2, was folding. This was not unexpected, as the facts of the company’s fiscal woes were widely publicized. I’m not here to muckrake through the aftermath
It’s no secret that social games like CityVille have a seedy underbelly, relying on casino schemes to keep players pumping in e-bucks and spamming friends. But now that there is a social game that purports to correct the social ill of poverty in the third world, you can feel better about idly wastin
With our spinning jennies and textile mills and industry, the ancient Iranian craft of carpet weaving, which dates back some 2,500 years, is one that is lost to much of the modern world. Yet these luxurious woolen rugs with symmetrical patterns and paisley motifs are the subject of the devious Farsh
That handsome incorrigible rouge of the British royal lineage, Prince Harry is at it again, this time ruffling up the Taliban by comparing war games to videogames. Last night, The Guardian posted an interview with the young prince, who, on his way home from a four month tour of duty in Afghanistan,
The internet is a source of limitless amazement, as evidenced in this new trailer for Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta, an Arabic developed knock-off of the Uncharted series, which has surfaced on Steam Greenlight. If you think the game’s treasure-hunting protagonist Faris Jawad looks familiar, you’r
No longer pigeonholed as the needless playthings of Gen Y’ers, videogames are forever proving their usefulness to science. Scientific American ran an illuminating article on memory and how it is obfuscated by the simple act of, get this, walking through a door. It’s harder than you think. – – – Acco
We’re all in agreement here that videogames are a form of art, right there with hip-hop and architecture and the animated GIF, but what about code, that intangible string of 1’s and 0’s running in the background, managing the possibilities for interaction with the structure of a game. Could that too
The career of a practicing poet is an obscure one, often confined to the pages of chatbooks with small runs. Just imagine the difficulties of a guy who makes, um, something there isn’t a word for, videogame poems. Gap is a new poem, and a navigable one, by the programmer/poet extraordinaire Sonny R
Last week, a demo for Fire Emblem Awakening, the latest entry in a series of tactical-role playing games that dates way back to 1990, was made available for free on the Nintendo 3DS store, and there went my night! You can think of Fire Emblem like chess or go or Djambi, but with less balance and mor
You might have heard that Temple Run 2, the sequel to one of the most popular games on iOS, was released today. You might have even downloaded and had the same reaction as we did: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH! Canabalt was nice, but it’s time to move on. We have no beef in particular with the Temple Run franchi
It was a crisp, clear day in March, and I was walking briskly to the Westin Hotel, trying to keep warm in the shadows of high buildings on 3rd, between Mission and Market. I had an arrangement to meet “a guy with a big beard and wearing a cowboy hat.” I knew little else. This bearded stranger was Sh
The word on the street is that Time Surfer is great. I know this because when I tell people I’m playing it, they usually respond with, “I hear that’s great!” And Time Surfer, an iPhone game about, funnily enough, surfing through time, IS great. It is that game, the mobile distraction that, if you gi
From the rising popularity of hot yoga to controversy over kids doing the sun salutation in middle school, the two thousand year-old ritual from India is having a moment. So we thought it would be a perfect time to visit one of the most twisted exercise games around, the 2012 Indiecade finalist Zomb
