Category: External Sources

Eric Swain External Sources

Searching For ‘Her Story’

This time we talked about this year’s water cooler game, Her Story. This is up a bit late as we had a number of technical difficulties. First a broken computer meant it wasn’t posted on its normal Monday date. Then an issue with SoundCloud meant the podcast couldn’t be downloaded until last night. It’s all fixed now. This is a game I knew we’d have a good discussion about, even if I didn’t have my own opinion on it straight. In fact, I’m still not sure what I think of it overall, because it is a complex work. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

Attempting to Characterize Artificial Intelligence in ‘The Fall’

I’m finally back to writing and finally getting around to jotting some thoughts down on my number 2 game from last year, The Fall. These are more the beginning of thoughts regarding The Fall‘s display of consciousness and intelligence than fully formed conclusions. One of the big issues a lot of science fiction has is that when it presents alien intelligence it generally just shows off a facet of human intelligence. Star Trek is the big example. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

Critical Distance Confab – Minisodes 05 – Text Games, Far Away Places

Another minisode, this time I managed to rope my boss, senior curator Kris Ligman, into joining me last month. I’m getting a feel to how I want these minisodes to work. I think Aevee Bee was on the right path with giving an idea of what we would like to read about these games. I wish I had grasped onto this harder during this episode. It might have been a better idea instead of trying to explain Unrest on my own terms in a short amount of time. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

‘The Fall’ Explores Artificial Intelligence and Indentity

This time on PopMatters’ Moving Pixels Podcast we talk about my second favorite game from last year, The Fall. We continue this week with another philosophically loaded sci-fi game touching on the concept of identity. Originally, we thought about discussing both The Fall and The Swapper in the same podcast, but after recording both episodes, I’m glad we decided to separate them. They’re both such thematically dense games and we didn’t get to touch on everything I think we could have in them, that cutting the time we spent on each wouldn’t be fair to either game. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

Exploring the Nature of the Self in ‘The Swapper’

This week we discussed The Swapper, a game I put off playing for far too long. Upon relistening to our discussion, I was glad we did connect much of it back to the game as possible. I remember our discussion of the philosophy of the self and epistemology taking up the majority of the discussion. Which is fine, because if a game can engender such a discussion that’s a mark in its favor. It’s also games like The Swapper that show having a wider reference point is not just a plus, but a necessity. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

One More Episode: A Second Look at ‘The Detail’

I said I’d take a look at the second episode of the The Detail on the last Moving Pixels Podcast and that’s just what I did. I had hoped it would get through some growing pains and get better especially since it clearly wants to be more than a mere pulp escapade. The set up is similar to The Wire, in getting a special detail unit together to handle big cases, but certain details are calling to it. Plus, the ending stats where it shows the percentages of players who made certain choices it adds in a fact about the real social issue that choice connects with. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

Gaming in the Analog World

And I’m finally back to writing my column at PopMatters. I’ve been out of the game as it were these last few weeks. I was wiled away by the prospect of getting back into playing Magic. I’ve been lamenting leaving the game for a while now and wishing I could get back into it. With money being a major factor as to why I left the game, it was also difficult to jump back in. Over time one loses contact with the game and makes it even harder to muster up the drive to come back. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

The Moving Pixels Podcast Focuses on ‘The Detail’

We look at another episodic adventure game, The Detail. Though, instead of going episode by episode, we just dip out toes into the first one. I like what The Detail was doing in its functional form aspects to some degree, but too much of it feel route. It’s not helped that it keeps bringing to mind better examples of it is trying to do with gang and drug violence against a crack team dealing with it. The Wire on the realistic end and Batman on the more bombastic side. | more

Eric Swain External Sources

Critical Distance Confab – Minisode 04 – Wandering Around and Feeling

A new minisode for the CDC podcast is up on Critical Distance. I would like to thank Imran Khan for answering the call and appearing on the podcast on short notice. He was a great guest to have on and a wonderful voice to edit.1 Another 6 games, and another month of hoping that this little project is doing something. This is the fourth episode and I feel like I’m getting into a sort of rut with them. I don’t want them to become routine, but I don’t know what else to do with these minisodes. | more