Who writes well about videogames?

[koganbot]

The guy in the next apartment wants to know: Who writes well about videogames? Or even not so well?

Define "about" however you wish. Reviews. Anthropology. Etc.

I know nothing about this subject, but by complete coincidence I just found — thanks to a Trevor reblog — a1reviews.tumblr.com, which at first glance may fit the bill.

Comments

[askbask.livejournal.com]

I recommend this slow-moving podcast series http://alifewellwasted.com/

It may supposedly get a new episode soon.

[atommickbrane.livejournal.com]

Ah, I only play them I'm afraid (and even then I stick firmly within my Nintendo world).

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

Youtube channel Errant Signal gets a lot of love, though I haven't really sat down with it.

[askbask.livejournal.com]

When I wrote about this stuff at university my man was Henry Jenkins - this piece in particular inspired my favorite hand-in (about Metroid Prime) http://web.mit.edu/cms/People/henry3/games&narrative.html

Here's a funny one http://henryjenkins.org/2009/08/on_games_and_gags_between_sile.html

Blog posts tagged with games culture http://henryjenkins.org/category/games-culture

[mordy (from livejournal.com)]

Tom Chick (quartertothree), MTV Multiplayer for news, ILG and specifically forks' Coint + Plick which is currently unveiling top 10. I find best video game chat is conversational not critical (which often overdoes the pretentiousness and hasn't really developed a new vernacular for discussing video games, so often we get video game crit in cinema or music crit idiom). imho video games heavily resist being theorized and may come to the closest to demanding Sontag'ian Against Interpretation'ism among all contemporary cultural/art forms.

[meserach.livejournal.com]

Rock, Paper, Shotgun is my general go-to videogames writing site. In addition to featuring many of the best games writers in the business pretty regularly on their own pages, their weekly "Sunday Papers" roundup features links to some of the best general videogames writing found around the web.

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

A note: the Sunday Papers are generally wonderful, even if you find the tone of the post-Gillen site increasingly terrible.

Another note: PC only.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

My friend M on Tumblr, from a knowledgeable inside-industry designer perspective (can't link right now; Tumblr's stopped being accessible at work, which does wonders for my productivity). My other friend corneredangel regularly posts off the cuff about video game writing on his LJ -- more critiques of the ongoing conversation in video game criticism than writing about the games proper. I'm not knowledgeable enough to pass the same kind of judgment, but if I wanted to read more writing about video games I'd start with the writers and venues he mentions.

Repost

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

Left some of these on Tumblr, but:

For video game from a theoretical perspective, I like Ian Bogost. (The go-to in this genre/discipline is Jim Gee, particularly "What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning," but I like Bogost's from the hip style more.) My gaming friends would have even wonkier folks in mind.

Reviewers, I like Chris Dahlen over at Pitchfork, who also edits a review/blogging site called Kill Screen: http://killscreendaily.com/

I think I follow A1 Reviews, but I also follow a pretty good aggregator called Humane Games: http://humanegames.tumblr.com

Re: Repost

[askbask.livejournal.com]

Pitchfork presented one of the worst videogame essays I've read via the KillScreen label (not written by Dahlen) http://pitchfork.com/features/articles/7962-kill-screen/

Re: Repost

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

Haha, my old pal Nick Sylvester, doing what he does best -- trolling the target audience of [insert whatever subject he happens to be writing about] for inscrutable reasons.

[yumiyoshi.livejournal.com]

Gamasutra has loads of things!

http://www.gamasutra.com/topic/console-pc contains the video games as defined by console

I don't know what aspect(s) of games the guy in question is after, but for my part, I really like the design discussions, myself: http://www.gamasutra.com/features/design/

Everything old is new again

[davidfrazer.livejournal.com]

Shamelessly off-topic, but a 1990s K-Pop group called Space A have reformed and released a remix of their song "Sexy Guy", originally from 1999.

Interesting comment from sub_divided:

This is what happens when the "retro" sound-of-the-moment creeps up to include stuff from just ten years ago, the actual original groups figure they might as well get in on the action XD.

Re: Everything old is new again

[koganbot]

Well, if they'd only been spacier they'd have been more Space Invadery, hence not off-topic at all. E.g.,

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(I like the '90s "Sexy Guy" more than the new one. Old one makes me think of techno-funk somehow mating with Jam & Lewis.)

[arbitrary-greay.livejournal.com]

http://kotaku.com/5558166/in-praise-of-sticky-friction

http://www.chewingpixels.com/the-importance-of-video-game-violence/

An interesting take on what Pokemon would be in real life, with all of its unfortunate implications:
http://pokemonunchained.tumblr.com/tagged/PU/chrono

http://feitclub.tumblr.com/post/42553049732/brinaelegiraffe-shelzie-hatewizard

[arbitrary-greay.livejournal.com]

Your mileage may also vary with the Blistered Thumbs website, which is largely geared towards people with pre-existing knowledge about gaming. But their content is largely visual-based, many video-based so you often get to see right there what they're talking about, decreasing learning curves.