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May 26th

…RELATIONAL OBJECTS

Cha Holland has a striking essay up on Tale of Tales’ Bientot l’ete. Content warning: discussion of suicide.

On Eurogamer, here’s this touching article from Simon Parkin on a conversation between the author and Ryan Green, co-developer of That Dragon, Cancer.

Reacting to a piece last week from Daniel Joseph, Jeremy Antley serves up a bit of a history lesson on how games became a private activity:

[G]ames, with the birth of the modern period, achieve direct, actionable linkages to the production of truth, which also coincides with the rise of liberalistic practices of…

June 2nd

…erratic horror.

And Sebastian Standke and Christian Huberts have put out a bilingual (German/English) call for interviews on the subject of atmospheric games.

MISCELLANY

David Surman has put together a collection of work from one of Christian McCrea’s classes, showing off conceptual hard case covers for thatgamecompany’s Journey.

I don’t often list my own work here, but this is one subject I can get pretty passionate about: on Let’s Plays, their history, and why they’re worth preserving.

I’ve saved the best for last, of course, and this roundup’s sign-off goes to David Sirlin, who has…

June 23rd

…a poor choice for a videogame protagonist. Meanwhile on Electron Dance, Joel Goodwin posits that 2D shooters are about “cleaning.”

On the Radiator Blog, the well-informed Robert Yang takes us through a history of PC gaming’s “use key.”

Game historian Richard Moss takes a look at the videogame adaptation of The Thirty-Nine Steps and deems it a sign of “a bright future for interactive stories.”

Michael Clarkson describes why Dontnod’s Remember Me falls flat and Not Your Mama’s Gamer’s Alisha Karabinus takes a peek inside how State of Decay achieves a sense of harsh realism through emergent…

August 18th

…refused to let you read it as opposed to so many other barriers games have thrown up.

Retrospectives

Some writers decided to take the time in the summer lull to look backwards.

Samien McFerran at Eurogamer unveiled the history of the Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone’s Fighting Fantasy game book series now getting a rebirth on mobile platforms.

Edge Online published The Making Of: Thomas Was Alone.

Some guy at PopMatters could think of little else and explains the storytelling stylings of Loom.

Alex Rubens explores how Missile Command came to be and how…

…Man Ian Bogost has finally finished an oral rendition of his review on Gone Home, much to the enjoyment, or possibly chagrin, of his neighborly angels. I must admit listeners, I was concerned it was an evil incantation for an actual display of viscera whenever anyone said ‘visceral.’ Despite the tight watch on his modest home by the car lot, Daniel Joseph was able to spread subversive thoughts gained from Bogost’s words before the government could censor it:

There is nothing literary about Gone Home, if we are to weigh it against the history and progression of the

…

November 24th

…business model lurching forward into another cycle. Well, I care! How can I possibly experience the gritty reboot of Madame Bovary imagined by Matthew Wasteland if I don’t have the newest console. Of course, for indies, there’s always the other new console that just came out. You probably haven’t heard of it.

We don’t often feature Kickstarters on Critical Distance, but this (TW: gore) visual history of horror games is right up our alley! Speaking of horror, Aaron Gotzon is talking out how Binding of Isaac uses horror over at Ontological Geek. What kind of game is Binding of…

This Year In Videogame Blogging: 2013

…anti-shooter long before Spec Ops: The Line.

Ceasar Bautista takes Susan Feagin’s The Pleasures of Tragedy and applies it to Far Cry 2.

Alex Duncan of The Animist blog look at what The Unfinished Swan as to say about creation and self-creation.

Matt Sakey at Tap Repeatedly puts his Roman History degree to use and explores why Total War: Rome II fails to allow the player to be Roman.

Liz Ryerson counters the indie game scene’s trusisms regarding Michael Brough’s Corrypt.

And finally, like last year, we end this section on Sparky Clarkson’s epic round…

February 2nd

…Deliverance: “TL;DR: yeah they’re wrong.”

Lana Polansky talks about photography in videogames.

And finally, Christian Nutt compares Tomb Raider to Tearaway as two linear games with very different personalities.

It Is the End

Fear not, friends, for This Week In Videogame Blogging is sure to return next week. Please send in any suggestions you might have on Twitter, or via our email form. Until then, consider submitting to Zoya Street’s Memory Insufficient issue for Black History Month. We are planning some things of our own for the occasion, too. Thank you for joining us!

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February 9th

…Anjin Anhut shone a light on artist Tamara De Lempicka for her influences on Rapture’s Art Deco aesthetic. While we’re here, Anhut also wrote a piece clarifying what concept art actually entails so as to disassemble the high expectations brought on by mislabelled promotional art.

Amanda Cosmos wrote a nice introductory account on the history and spread of the Otome genre. Elsewhere, Julian Murdoch spoke with Hato Mao, creator of Hatoful Boyfriend, and glimpsed into the incredible wealth offered by the pigeon-centric Otome.

Over on Pop Matters, Scott Juster thinks Wario could save the WiiU. Mary Hamilton objected…

March 9th

…week, to the many (nearly 150) patrons who have already contributed to our new Patreon. Your support allows us not only to remain open and ad-free for the foreseeable but will also us to finally go forward with our many community-building projects, which will include a wiki, archive, job board for writers, and much more besides. Do you want to see more podcasts like our recent one on Black History Month? So do we. And with your help, we can make that happen.

A last point: while I will be scarce on the site for the next two weekends…