Category: External Sources

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Comes to an End with ‘Torment: Tides of Numenera’

For the final episode of the Moving Pixels Podcast, we discuss Torment: Tides of Numenera. The original, Planescape: Torment, had been on our longlist of maybe games to do for the podcast for a while. Then its spiritual successor was announced and made. We had the idea at one point to do them back-to-back. Give the two episodes a neat connective tissue. That plan obviously never came about. The fact that we had to give ourselves a lot of lead time to play through merely one of them is evidence enough of why. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Goes to ‘Detention’

This year's horror month is dedicated to the Taiwanese indie game, Detention. A school is haunted. A student is haunted. A game is haunted. The past haunts us. That's the main takeaway from Detention. When it comes to the Halloween episode of the podcast, we kind of let Nick suggest the game. He's the horror aficionado and he always picks something interesting. You can find the podcast on PopMatters, SoundCloud, iTunes and through the podcast’s RSS feed. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Gets Caught Up in ‘A Case of Distrust’

This month we talk about A Case of Distrust. Four adventure games in a row. This one was Nick's suggestion as I had never heard of it before. It was a stylish looking text-based 1920's noir adventure game. The most interesting aspect of the game is the taxicabs you take from one location to another. Every time you can have a conversation with the driver. It's all optional, but it adds so much texture to the world and as we note in the podcast, so relevant to current day America. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Becomes Sentient, Discusses ‘The Fall Part 2: Unbound’

This month we look at the follow up to one of my top games of 2014, The Fall Part 2: Unbound. While there was a lot of discuss about The Fall 2, so we got a good meaty discussion, I wasn't as into it as I was the first one. It had all that delicious philosophical material regarding identity and consciousness that captured my attention in the first game. It's the sort of thing specifically made for me. Yet, I only thought it was fine. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Goes on ‘The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit’

This month we take a look at the prequel? to Life is Strange 2, The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit. It's a short, free game about the power of imagination of a young child in a less-than-optimal home life. It's more of an indie family drama than the super powered sci-fi tale that the main entries are. It's a neat exploration of tip toeing around the triggers of an alcoholic father, or at least it was in my head. Really, it's about a kid whiling away the time when left to his own devices. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Discusses the ‘Circular’ Series

This month we look at a pair of games by Mike Bithell, Subsurface Circular and Quarantine Circular. Another long one. A little ironic for the focus of this podcast episode being on two fairly small games, but also not ironic given how textually dense they both are. And that's not just a pun on the gameplay being text based. Both games are like the best of those mid-century sci-fi stories, they're about ideas and about communication. Subsurface Circular, while nominally a detective story, plays out more like a slice of life experience on the subway. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Mythologizes ‘Horizon: Zero Dawn’

This week we get into the huge open world, post-post-apocalypse by Guerrilla Games, Horizon: Zero Dawn. I’m going to come out any say it, this game has a really bad opening few hours. I say on the podcast that were it not for the podcast, I would have checked out after two. They are so abysmally slow and make the hunting combat, side quests and world traversal and all you can find in it so tedious and dull. It doesn’t help that most of the voice acting the opening area is stilted and just bad. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Goes to Hell…blade

This month we discuss my GOTY of last year, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice. Let me just say off the bat I apologize for the awful audio at the very start. I tried to create a sonic experience relating to the game and upon hearing it, I should have just gone with the standard “hello.” Trust me, the game’s audio is light years beyond anything I could produce. I am still in awe of this game even months after playing it. While certain details escaped me, the vast majority of the game’s visuals and sequences are vivid in my memory. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Spends a ‘Night in the Woods’

This month we go back to the Infinite Fall well and discuss Night in the Woods. Depression, mental illness, economic regression, human sacrifice to cosmic horrors, meeting god and realizing he’s a dick, what a lovely video game to spend your hours playing. There’s no way to make that sentence not sound facetious even when you’re being completely sincere. Even three months after playing it, I was surprised during our discussion how vivid so many of the details and scenes were in my mind. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Kills Nazis Again, in ‘Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus’

This month, we decided to follow up on our catch up of the new Wolfenstein series with last year’s follow up, Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus. WordPress didn’t save what I wrote here when I clicked published. It’s gone. I don’t remember what I said and I’m too angry to even attempt to recreate it. You can find the podcast on PopMatters, SoundCloud, iTunes or through the podcast’s RSS feed. “You take freedom away from the American people, you’re playing with fire. | more