A Game Where You Are a Cloud

I was out for a run the other day, and I found myself in desperate need of distraction as my mind kept wandering to some rather unpleasant topics (topics that I can't actually discuss here on this public blog). I had read a few post about Mountain, although I hadn't purchased it yet, and as my eyes drifted skyward I thought to myself, "I wonder what it would be like to design a game where you are a cloud?"

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Games and narrative: The ludologist's lament

Some of you may have read Ted Castranova's post a few months ago over on Terra Nova titled Movies Stink. As I tried to convey in my comment there, I'm sympathetic to Ted's plight. Having novel and film shaped artifacts foisted upon you at the expense of game shaped ones really sounds like it sucks. Of course, I'm also more or less unable to have much empathy with him in this matter.

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Video games are not a monolithic medium

Video games are not a monolithic medium. I've said this before and I'll probably have to keep on saying it for at least a few years. In the meantime I've been wanting to get a blog post up to point people to when any of the myriad issues that come back to this simple fact pop up. This is that post.

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AC: Revelations and la vita assassino (spoilers)

Jumping from roof top to roof top, hiding in shadows or hanging patiently from ledges, uncovering the secrets of an ancient brotherhood, leading a cabal of highly skilled killers, and of course exeucting targets using a range of tools and techniques...This is the assassin lifestyle, and it is this experience that I believe Assassin's Creed: Revelations (as well as the other games in the series) aspires to grant the player...

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Ideation and Game Designers

There's a common refrain from many successful game designers when it comes to the topic of ideas. You've probably heard it before. It takes several forms including "Ideas are cheap." "Ideas are worthless, it's all about execution." "No one's interested in your game idea." "Game design isn't about ideas." The list goes on. Game designers as pundits are often pretty down on ideas. As a researcher, I've been trying to puzzle out exactly why this is...

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