Worth Reading: 10/06/2014

There's probably not a game I've been looking forward to this year the same way I've been looking forward to Alien: Isolation. There are lots of games that I'm interested in, plenty of games I've enjoyed, but Alien: Isolation is the rare time where I'm reminded I'm not totally cynical yet. I can still act like I'm 14.

Even though I was tasked with reviewing Alien, I tried to simulate how I would have normally played it. That means spreading it out over several nights, likely more than a week. I don't tend to marathon games, albeit largely because I don't have chunks of time available to marathon anything. Even still, when you get your hands on a game like that, are you able to hold back, or do you just dive in and not stop?

The last time I marathoned through a game was Dark Souls earlier this year, and that's because my wife was out of town. There were no rules, my playing habits were lawless, and I ate pizza on a livestream. But I also find experiences like that tiring. There aren't many games that can hold my attention that long, even if the time is available. Often, I'll find myself resenting the game, as mechanics wear thin when held to the scrutiny of repetition.

It depends on the game, obviously. I have fond memories of summer vacations spent stay up until the crack of dawn with Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy VIII. The presence of sun was actually my reminder that I should probably go to bed. Back then, I had spent weeks training myself to sleep until well past noon. I can't even do that with a serious hangover these days.

You Should Read These

• "Confessions of a Former Internet Troll" by Emmett Rensin

One of the reasons I've dropped the term troll is because the term dehumanizes people. (It's the same reason I stopped saying "gamer" years ago, too, since it puts people into a boring, defined box.) Behind every mean Internet comment is a human being, and so is every person reading one. What makes Emmett Rensin's piece so compelling is that he used to be someone who spent his time trying to get a rise out of people, and makes the argument "trolling" has now changed--it's more sinister. I don't know if I buy that, but his confessions are interesting.

"I am going to find it difficult to tell you precisely why I was so taken by this scene and why I threw myself so enthusiastically into its underworld. The simplest and likely sufficient answer is that I was 14 years old. It all felt vaguely dangerous, vaguely revolutionary, but with ill-defined goals. Its romance was the same one that makes Randians of so many high-school sophomores. It gave the sickly sense of power one gets from finding the next button to push, laughing in a rapidly reddening face. It's no different from the power trip a bully takes at school, except now I was the powerful one and not the victim. It was something between having power for the first time and the guilt of knowing it was ill-gotten. Power, because there is nothing quite so seductive to a teenage malcontent as a world that offers belonging coupled with authority; that is secret in the way that everybody knows you're into something slightly criminal. Guilt, because it was all schoolyard. Even when it was less dangerous, it was offensive, vaguely sexist and vaguely racist and vaguely homophobic in the daring-to-transgress kind of way. Even if I wasn't better than it then, I already had the sense that I might like to be."

• "Destiny's Unintended Critique of Consumerism" by Simon Parkin

I just bought a new iPhone. It's pretty good, but it's not that different. The screen is bigger, and it's certainly faster. While I'd like to say the reason I picked one up was "hey, my contract's up," it's definitely more than that. There's an allure to having the newer, shinier thing that's all about the newer, shinier thing. Parkin extends this idea to the game of the moment, Destiny, explaining the allure of the elusive loot cave underscores the whole reason for playing a game like Destiny: the never-ending pursuit of the newer, shinier gear.

"So you return to work in order to save up. The better your equipment, the greater your social status with other players. The greater your social status, the more they will want you on their team and the more they will envy your achievements, which are clearly displayed in the clothes that you wear (in the game’s later stages, the only way to advance your character is by equipping him or her with better items). In this way, from a certain angle at least, Destiny exposes the alluring futility of the consumerist systems on the other side of the screen. The game is designed to keep you dissatisfied with your lot so that you will continue playing and investing. Like World of Warcraft, when you peel back the metaphor, the game offers a bleak (if unintended) critique of consumerism: once you reach the endgame, you become a character that has everything in world. Everything, that is, except for a purpose."

If You Click It, It Will Play

These Crowdfunding Projects Look Pretty Cool

• No Pineapple Left Behind is about running a school where kids have turned into pineapples. Yup.
• Elegy for a Dead World challenges players to write fiction, based on a series of sci-fi prompts.
• Human Resources comes from Uber Entertainment, and pits giant monsters against giant robots.

Writing From Giant Bomb's Community, Courtesy of ZombiePie

• Raven 10 talks about the beautiful world from The Vanishing of Ethan Carter.
• Sparklykiss has started a podcast with members of the moderation team.
• MooseyMcMan tackles the prickly issue with Destiny's reliance on grinding.
• Mento has started an incredibly ambitious project to fill out every SNES game page.

Tweets That Make You Go "Hmmmmmm"

Oh, And This Other Stuff

• Kevin Wong breaks down what makes the introduction of Resident Evil 4 so good.
• Brenna Hilier tries to explain what it's like to attend the Tokyo Game Show.
• Rick Lane explains how Left 4 Dead managed to change his life.
• Rebecca Watson outlines some of the truly problematic elements of video games journalism.
• Alexa Ray Corriea answers the age old question about why pumpkins aren't in Middle-earth.
• Tom Battey helps dismantle the argument that criticism is the equivalent of censorship.
• Jason Coskrey speaks with Hideo Kojima about making a horror game when he's scared of them.
• Frozenbyte hangs out with its QA team to profile what it's like to be a member of a QA team.
• GB Burford does a deep dive on how the Dead Space series got off-track by the third game.
• Jordan Erica Webber shows how games fail to take disabled players into account.
• Zach Gage ponders whether Shadow of Mordor made the right call with its "kiss your wife" joke.
• Tiny Cartridge argues the fan service-y Senran Kagura Burst deserves more consideration.
• Bo Moore investigates why PC games on Steam cost more in different regions.
• Jon Bois gets in the Halloween spirit, and finds a ghost to haunt quarterback Cam Newton.