Spoiler Warning This week, Tracy and I finished up our playthrough of Borderlands: the Pre-Sequel! We called in the cavalry, fought our way onto and through an alien installation, and killed a many-faced alien god, possibly prompting some kind of interstellar war. But did it matter? Let’s find out! Jo is: Aurelia, literal ice queen…
Twiny Jam: Make a Game in 300 Words
This March, legendary interactive fiction and game creator Porpentine hosted a game jam challenging new and experienced authors to create a Twine story in 300 words or fewer. Twine is a game-authoring platform that helps creators make games without having to learn (too much) code. While it’s mostly used for deceptively simple text-based games, the…
Revolutionary Girl Showdown: Utena vs. Kill La Kill
Let’s start this piece off right: by issuing a battery of content warnings. Kill La Kill, one of the most talked-about shows of 2013, features cartoon violence, incest, non-consensual sexual situations, and what can only be described as “rape by an article of clothing.” Revolutionary Girl Utena, directed by the legendary Kunihiko Ikuhara, began airing…
Game Diary: Borderlands: the Pre-Sequel! (Part 3)
SPOILER WARNING: Part three of Borderlands: the Pre-Sequel sees me and Tracy doing a bunch of chores, phoning friends for help, and facing down the person we assumed would be the boss: Colonel Zarpedon. Jo is: Aurelia, literal ice queen and downloadable extra. She creates an ice shard that tracks enemies and does ongoing cryo damage….
Rebecca Mock On Artist’s Rights and Diplo Offering “Credit”
Back in February, Diplo used an original GIF by illustrator Rebecca Mock as background art in promoting his music. Staff writer Jo Fu wrote about the incident and his misogynistic response to the fallout. Here, she speaks with Mock about how artists can protect themselves and their work.
Cool Games of April: Staff Picks
State of Decay: Year One Survival Edition Developer: Undead Labs Publisher: Microsoft Studios Xbox One April 28, 2015 I love zombies. I know the market has been a bit flooded recently with zombie…stuff, but State of Decay did it right. You play a whole team of people, all of whom live together in a safe…
Awesome Webcomics of April: Staff Picks
Hotblood Toril Tuesdays & Thursdays at 12:00 AM Eastern Standard Time. NSFW The Wild West with centaurs. Need I say more? Ok, I will. James Rook, a Civil War veteran with limited options, and Asa Langley, a steel icon, get into wild shenanigans in the year of 1871. There’s violence, sex, profanity, revised American history,…
March Roundtable: Kids and Games
Welcome to the next installment of the Game Section’s monthly roundtable! Growing up is weird. Gaming can be strange. The games children play? Often truly bizarre. This month we talked about games we played as children. Apparently we all know our way around a solo board game or two. What did you all play, readers?…
He Wrote Our Soul Music: Remembering Terry Pratchett
Terry Pratchett was an important author–to a lot of you, to a lot of your faves (Kieron Gillen, for example), to a lot of us. Here’s how. Rachel Stevens: I remember working at a library part time in high school, and tracking down every Pratchett book I could find. I think the first work I…
PAX East 2015 in Indie Games: Games are for Everyone
“Games are for everyone,” we say to ourselves, or on Twitter, or when our moms ask us about #GamerGate: “That’s why this is happening. Because some people think games are for everyone, and some people don’t.” PAX East 2015 is a convention that’s out to prove it: games are for everyone. And you know what?…
Hotline, Freddys and the Blind Forest: Cool Games of March! [GIFs]
Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number Dennaton Games Devolver Digital PS4, PSVita, Windows, Mac, Linux: March 10, 2015 Hotline Miami the original was an indie darling, a top-down murder simulator with tight controls and a difficulty curve that fit precisely into the deranged zeitgeist of video gaming circa 2012. Its amazing retro-80s soundtrack and simple premise…
Life Geek: Bookshelfies Edition
Do you know exactly where all your books are located? When you go over to someone’s house for the first time, do you zero in on their book collection in order to determine if you are kindred spirits? Is loaning a book to someone a silent act of genuine trust for you? If you answered…
