5 ms·

this is a list almost entirely about how video games make money. There's very little here of substance about video games as a medium, and very little that seeks

by zemo 6y ago

this is a list almost entirely about how video games make money. There's very little here of substance about video games as a medium, and very little that seeks to investigate how video games function as cultural artifacts. This isn't a list for people who want to make video games or who want to advance the state of video games as an art form, this is a list that only serves the capital class, and looks almost exclusively at video games through the lens of business opportunity. The first article starts out largely about Animal Crossing, and another Animal Crossing article appears on the list, but neither even attempt to interpret the game in any way, or to consider what the game might mean and how it relates to life as we know it. Compare with this recent Atlantic article: https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2020/04/animal-crossing-isnt-escapist-its-political/610012/ https://www.theatlantic.com/family/archive/2020/04/animal-cr... and you'll see what I mean. I find this incredibly ironic, because Animal Crossing is rich in content about labor, economics, and consumerism, but these themes are taken at face value and never critiqued in any meaningful way. While the author has cobbled together a list of articles about how games make money, the list is bereft of any interpretation of games in general, even the game about making money. Nothing in this list will improve the reader's literacy when it comes to interpreting and playing games. A handful of the articles are just marketing about upcoming games. What makes this article on of the best articles about games? It is little more than an advertisement. https://www.polygon.com/2020/3/2/21155158/valorant-project-a-riot-games-shooter https://www.polygon.com/2020/3/2/21155158/valorant-project-a... To simply call these articles the "best gaming articles" is incredibly self-centered, as the viewpoints expressed in this list have an extremely narrow focus, and the focus is almost universally on money-making.

cambalache 6y ago
I have not read you but I believe you. I crave for good game journalism, insightful enough but not academic (because regretfully academics try to optimize different metrics).The closest example I have is some pieces during the early years of RockPaperShotgun, but that site jumped the shark eons ago. Do you have any examples or recommendations?
- Peckingjay 6y ago
  I like sifting through Simon Carless' blog on Gamasutra [0]. He has a weekly curated list of interesting articles he's read about video games. I rarely read all of them, but there's usually at least a few interesting ones in the lot. [0] https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/author/SimonCarless/185740/ https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/author/SimonCarless/185740/
  - VHRanger 6y ago
    There's a lot of good stuff on gamasutra in general
- zemo 6y ago
  if you're on HN you should probably just read all of Ian Bogost's articles in The Atlantic. I don't mean that to sound reductive; I'm an engineer by training working on a game design MFA now, his writing was some of the first material about games analysis that I found accessible. The Animal Crossing article of his I just linked is actually pretty boring for his work, but I imagine that The Atlantic specifically asked him for a piece about ACNH because it's such a cultural phenomenon right now. The stuff he says in that piece is the stuff academics have been saying about Animal Crossing games for a decade now. His pieces in The Atlantic are very accessible, and he comes from a technical background, so a lot of his work is written through the lens of procedurality (or procedural rhetoric). I'm oversimplifying here, but procedurality is the study of how the rules of games create meaning. Since he's writing in The Atlantic, the stuff that's being published there is designed to be accessible to a non-academic audience. I really loved [Don't Play the Goose Game](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/10/dont-play-the-goose-game/600472/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/10/dont-...), which is about Untitled Goose Game. The title is, of course, sarcastic clickbait that the author doesn't actually fully believe, but the content of the piece (which is about the relationship between labor and play) is very thoughtful. It also links to other pieces that you can read for some follow-on material. If you hate that piece, you might like Miguel Sicart's [Against Procedurality](http://gamestudies.org/1103/articles/sicart_ap http://gamestudies.org/1103/articles/sicart_ap), which is something of an academic diss-track against procedurality as a critical tool. > regretfully academics try to optimize different metrics um I'm not sure what you're getting at here, that's not really my experience with games academia at all. > insightful enough but not academic based on what you asked for, Payne and Huntemann's [How to Play Video Games](https://nyupress.org/9781479802142/how-to-play-video-games/ https://nyupress.org/9781479802142/how-to-play-video-games/) might be up your alley. It's written specifically to bring the ideas of games academia to a non-academic audience. edit: oh and to be clear, since you said "I have not read you": ummm if my first post made it seem like I'm Ian Bogost I should probably just clarify that I am not, in fact, Ian Bogost.
Tarsul 6y ago
I agree. Also, there is a disproportionate amount of articles about esports. The only article I found worthwile (very much so), was the one about Nintendo's history in Sweden/Europe. It's also about money/distribution but at least it's an interesting historic account of how Nintendo came to Europe in the early eighties through the lense of the distributor in Sweden with funny anecdotes. https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/12/09/the-lie-that-helped-build-nintendo https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/12/09/the-lie-that-helped-...

by zemo 6y ago

cambalache 6y ago

I have not read you but I believe you. I crave for good game journalism, insightful enough but not academic (because regretfully academics try to optimize different metrics).The closest example I have is some pieces during the early years of RockPaperShotgun, but that site jumped the shark eons ago. Do you have any examples or recommendations?

Peckingjay 6y ago
I like sifting through Simon Carless' blog on Gamasutra [0]. He has a weekly curated list of interesting articles he's read about video games. I rarely read all of them, but there's usually at least a few interesting ones in the lot. [0] https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/author/SimonCarless/185740/ https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/author/SimonCarless/185740/
- VHRanger 6y ago
  There's a lot of good stuff on gamasutra in general
zemo 6y ago
if you're on HN you should probably just read all of Ian Bogost's articles in The Atlantic. I don't mean that to sound reductive; I'm an engineer by training working on a game design MFA now, his writing was some of the first material about games analysis that I found accessible. The Animal Crossing article of his I just linked is actually pretty boring for his work, but I imagine that The Atlantic specifically asked him for a piece about ACNH because it's such a cultural phenomenon right now. The stuff he says in that piece is the stuff academics have been saying about Animal Crossing games for a decade now. His pieces in The Atlantic are very accessible, and he comes from a technical background, so a lot of his work is written through the lens of procedurality (or procedural rhetoric). I'm oversimplifying here, but procedurality is the study of how the rules of games create meaning. Since he's writing in The Atlantic, the stuff that's being published there is designed to be accessible to a non-academic audience. I really loved [Don't Play the Goose Game](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/10/dont-play-the-goose-game/600472/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/10/dont-...), which is about Untitled Goose Game. The title is, of course, sarcastic clickbait that the author doesn't actually fully believe, but the content of the piece (which is about the relationship between labor and play) is very thoughtful. It also links to other pieces that you can read for some follow-on material. If you hate that piece, you might like Miguel Sicart's [Against Procedurality](http://gamestudies.org/1103/articles/sicart_ap http://gamestudies.org/1103/articles/sicart_ap), which is something of an academic diss-track against procedurality as a critical tool. > regretfully academics try to optimize different metrics um I'm not sure what you're getting at here, that's not really my experience with games academia at all. > insightful enough but not academic based on what you asked for, Payne and Huntemann's [How to Play Video Games](https://nyupress.org/9781479802142/how-to-play-video-games/ https://nyupress.org/9781479802142/how-to-play-video-games/) might be up your alley. It's written specifically to bring the ideas of games academia to a non-academic audience. edit: oh and to be clear, since you said "I have not read you": ummm if my first post made it seem like I'm Ian Bogost I should probably just clarify that I am not, in fact, Ian Bogost.

Tarsul 6y ago

I agree. Also, there is a disproportionate amount of articles about esports. The only article I found worthwile (very much so), was the one about Nintendo's history in Sweden/Europe. It's also about money/distribution but at least it's an interesting historic account of how Nintendo came to Europe in the early eighties through the lense of the distributor in Sweden with funny anecdotes. https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/12/09/the-lie-that-helped-build-nintendo https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/12/09/the-lie-that-helped-...