The Sunday Papers

News by John Walker Co-founder

Published on Aug. 19, 2012

Sundays are for staring in confusion at being asked to write a column called "the bumday poopers" or something. I've no idea. Apparently I'm supposed to put links to all those tabs you leave open on articles you haven't finished reading yet. Is that it?

Simon Parkin on Hookshot uses the game Papa & Yo, and some interview quotes from Jade Raymond to argue that games need to off er more than a gun-barrel view. It's hard to disagree with the sentiments. It's also hard not to think, "Er, yes, so play all the games that don't then?" He concludes, "But as the men and women working in games – and those of us who buy them – grow older, start families, assume new responsibilities and different worldviews, there’s a growing hunger for games that explore new themes, ideas and messages. I cannot be the only one tired of looking at the world down the barrel of a virtual gun."

You know what you hear a lot about? How games, gamers and game developers are sexist pigs. What about a positive story instead? Tiffany Martin's cake-pie.com ran a piece this week celebrating Gaslamp Games, they behind Dungeons Of Dredmor. Having beaten the game, Tiffany took to the forums to see if this was a regular thing, or a proper achievement. And while many celebrated her rogue-like prowess, it took a turn for the sadder. It has a happy ending. "I want to say thank you to David Baumgart, to “Daynab” the forum mod, and to all the future men of the Gaslamp Games forum. I want to welcome all women who enjoy being badasses to play Dungeons of Dredmor, possibly the least sexist game in the world, made by the most inclusive developers known."
GOG.com this week released Tomb Raider: The Angel Of Darkness. I found this a little sad, not because the dreadful game shouldn't be archived in their collection, but because they didn't point out just how terrible it is in their description. In 2010, during their relaunch, they promised that their product pages would be written by fans of the games, and not quoting marketing speak. The page for AoD is the precise opposite of that. Which reminded me of an absolutely fantastic piece from EDGE on the making of the game, and how it went so very wrong. “We got wrapped up in that whole beautiful big animation experience. I don’t know if we ever would have understood what we got wrong with the animation until the game was out. We could have easily used another two or three months. We could have used another year.”
Eurogamer launched a new partner site this week called Outside Xbox. It's a site focusing on video content about our console chums, by people who are rather good at that. You can see their Gamescom coverage here, for instance. And then maybe have a word with them about auto-playing videos and the lack of tags.
Talking of Eurogamer, Tom "Tom Bramwell" Bramwell had a bit of victory this week after spotting that EA were raising money for war veterans by selling... weapons, based on Medal Of Honor. The tomahawk was particularly egregious, and he pointed this out. This led to EA doing a 180 on the deal, and dropping the tomahawk entirely. "EA is partnering with real-world weapons manufacturers not only to make sure that the guns in Medal of Honor: Warfighter are authentic but to make real-world weapons based on the game. I'm putting all this stuff in italics to emphasise how much it doesn't compute to my middle-class British liberal brain. Look! Here's a f***ing Medal of Honor tomahawk!"
Destructoid has an interesting piece on those who did not see their names in the credits for Darksiders II.
A man who does get credit is Cliffy "Cliffy B" B, who has written a piece for Gamasutra in which he explains how arguments work between developers. "I've learned that while developers are incredibly intelligent, they can sometimes be a bit insecure about how smart they are compared to their peers. I've seen developer message boards tear apart billion-dollar franchises, indie darlings, and everything in between by overanalyzing and nitpicking."
While The Verge is in desperate need of a more enthusiastic copy editor (their tiny scroll bars scare small children), this lengthy piece on body hacking makes for some extraordinary and gruesome reading. "Tim, the proprietor of Hot Rod Piercing in downtown Pittsburgh, put down the scalpel and picked up an instrument called an elevator, which he used to separate the flesh inside in Sarver’s finger, creating a small empty pocket of space. Then, with practiced hands, he slid a tiny rare earth metal inside the open wound, the width of a pencil eraser and thinner than a dime. When he tried to remove his tool, however, the metal disc stuck to the tweezers. “Let’s try this again,” Tim said. “Almost done.""
Scare the pants off yourself with this piece from Naomi Wolf on how facial recognition technology is being used for surveillance all around the world.

And I believe I'm supposed to link to some music. So why not some Jens Lekman having an argument with himself?

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