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Eric Swain Game Issues, Recent Posts

Transparency for Critical Distance

Last week I was asked to take over the TWIVGB feature at Critical Distance by Ben Abraham. It was my sixth time. During the week I collected the links and pasted them into a word document for later aggregation as I always do and I began thinking about the way things are done with TWIVGB. I realized I had quite a lot of power over the content of each issue, even the ones I don't write. That thought scared me slightly. If there is one thing I've learned, is having someone looking over your shoulder and calling you out is the best option. | more

Eric Swain Critical Responses, Recent Posts

Resonance or Dissonance in Gears of War

My last post generated the most comments of anything I've written (so far). At the end of the comments Dagda had this to say on the Gears of War franchise: "It's why the "rah-rah kill them" mentality of the Cogs is somewhat undermined by the fact they cower behind chest high walls at every opportunity despite wearing refrigerators." That strikes me as ludonarrative resonance; undermining the tough-guy images the characters present is Gears of War's central narrative theme. | more

Eric Swain External Sources, Recent Posts

The Counter-Arguments to Why Video Game Are Bad

This is not an essay by me. I'm sorry if you got that impression and clicked your way here. There are a few posts I've read recently that articulate the debate very well. As with most posts like this it's really for me to have them at my fingertips should I ever need the link. However, with the Supreme Court case coming up soon deciding whether or not video games are protected speech under the first amendment they are good articles to pass around. If you haven't read them before, I thoroughly endorse them, if that means anything. | more

Eric Swain Critical Responses, Recent Posts

In Defense of Ludonarrative Dissonance

First off, no this is not a retraction of my opinion (which I was apparently the sole defender of) that Ludonarrative Dissonance is a bad thing for a game to have. Instead, this is a response to the growing antagonism towards the term itself. There is plenty of it about, most recently from a post of Corvus Elrod's over at Semionaut’s Notebook. I wanted to write this right away after reading it, but other commitments kept me from doing so at the time. | more

Eric Swain Recent Posts, Thoughts

I’m Done and Now I’m Back

I've been only lightly using the internet and got pretty much away from the site due to my summer class. The last class I needed to graduate. Well, I passed it this week and minus all the bureaucratic nonsense it will take to transfer the credits to Boston University I am a college graduate. Hurray for me. Anyway that means I'm getting back to reading my backlog, playing my backlog and back to writing. If I have my way I'll be start posting again next week. | more

Eric Swain External Sources, Recent Posts

So How Did I Do on TWIVGB

Well Ben Abraham was away from the internet last week, something to do with spelunking I think, and asked me to step in as writer of the This Week In Video Game Blogging feature again. I don't know what it is, but every time I take up the task the internet decides that this is the week to get super prolific. So, we I ended up writing what I believe to be the second longest TWIVGB...so far. It didn't help that my list of links doubled about an hour before I should have written the damn thing. | more

Eric Swain Critical Responses, Recent Posts

Extra Lives: Why Video Games Matter – A Book Review

I haven't done video game reviews on this site. I also don't intend to. I have only done video game critiques or criticism. The name in the top banner should be enough of a clue. So it is interesting that the first review I do for a blog about video games is really about a book. faster full movie high quality part I finished Tom Bissell's Extra Lives over a week ago, before E3 started. I wanted to finish those posts on inFamous before I got around to writing on the book. | more

Eric Swain Recent Posts, Thoughts

What I got from E3

I know it's kind of pointless to write anything on E3, especially after this pretty much summarizes the whole thing, but it's my blog and I want to. inception on youtube full movie Going into E3 I wanted to see only a few things: Beyond Good and Evil 2, The Last Guardian, Dragon Age 2, Mirror's Edge 2 and anything that hadn't already been announced. That last one is a little innocuous, because with the exception of The Last Guardian, none of the others on my list have been announced. | more

Eric Swain Game Essays, Recent Posts

The Morality of inFamous

Probably the most talked about part of inFamous is the moral choice mechanic. The idea is to split the choice between good and evil options, which can be interesting, but the criticism has been leveled at how it is handled. Reasoning in later choices makes less and less sense as you continue on. The options in the early choices are both justified, while later ones seem to prove that you have a problem with rational thought (if you choose the evil route that is). | more

Eric Swain Game Essays, Recent Posts

The Propaganda of inFamous

(*minor spoilers*) While the story of inFamous is told through the standard methods of cutscenes, found messages and calls from allies and mission handlers, it adds aftermath commentary. In the form of propaganda, the game provides story related and world building feedback on your actions. The messages only relate to the main story missions, so the words don't change, but the effect they have on you as the player as you relate to your in-game character is different. | more