2014 Games Writing

December 30, 2014 10:23 AM

This Year in Videogame Blogging: 2014. Critical Distance provides a roundup of some of the best articles about games this year.

A couple of late personal favorites missing from the roundup: Jenn Frank and Cara Ellison both had great guest Top 10s for Giant Bomb, the latter featuring the immortal line: "This game is the Citizen Kane of ripped, naked big-dicked dudes in love. It’s the fucking Citizen Kane of fucking."

posted by kmz (17 comments total)

I did read it earlier in the year but I'm re-reading The Cult of the Peacock which is kind of an argument against designing games to teach you how to play them. Or at least a good articulation of why requiring that as a design goal can feel very frustrating sometimes.
posted by RobotHero at 11:55 AM on December 30, 2014 [1 favorite]

I was kinda disappointed that the first half of the list was mostly bullshit that had more to do with the people who play games than it did about games, but the last half is full of a lot of really meaty games criticism.
posted by empath at 12:48 PM on December 30, 2014 [1 favorite]

Of course, at least one of the writers (I haven't checked them all) has his own list of best writing from 2014 which I think is a pretty good list.
posted by RobotHero at 2:17 PM on December 30, 2014

bullshit that had more to do with the people who play games than it did about games

And yet, I feel like that's exactly what gaming in 2014 was all about. Not the games, but the bullshit that a loud and shitty minority of players keep shoveling.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 2:32 PM on December 30, 2014 [3 favorites]

Yeah, I think in this year of all years, you really can't talk about games without also talking about the culture of games.
posted by kmz at 2:42 PM on December 30, 2014 [2 favorites]

My nominee, if you include board game writing: Charles Simon's review of Tragedy Looper.
posted by persona at 3:43 PM on December 30, 2014 [1 favorite]

I'm glad Zolani Stewart got a shoutout, he is the foremost authority on Sonic the Hedgehog .
posted by hellojed at 4:02 PM on December 30, 2014

"Yeah, I think in this year of all years, you really can't talk about games without also talking about the culture of games."

I never could figure out what people mean by "culture of games".
posted by I-baLL at 4:18 PM on December 30, 2014

My nominee, if you include board game writing: Charles Simon's review of Tragedy Looper.

Reminds me of this Infinity Blade review.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 4:31 PM on December 30, 2014 [1 favorite]

If you had told me that Jenn Frank would return from her video game exile temporarily to tell everyone that Elite: Dangerous was her number one game of the year, I'd have asked you to pass me whatever you were smoking because it sounds EXCELLENT. Of course, if you had told me that I'd be spending my end-of-year holidays in 2014 by ferrying cargo around in not one (Elite: Dangerous) but two (Euro Truck Simulator 2) games, I'd have said the same thing.

In summary, Jenn Frank is awesome, Elite: Dangerous is awesome, and you should become a space trucker like me.
posted by chrominance at 4:53 PM on December 30, 2014

P.S. THANK YOU Steely-eyed Missile Man, I've been looking for that Infinity Blade review for a while. Now if only I could remember what I needed it for...
posted by chrominance at 4:55 PM on December 30, 2014

Is Elite: Dangerous really that good? The RPS impressions I read didn't really sell me, much less the comments on the article. Space games of the "space submarine" variety have been kind of ruined for me since KSP taught me about orbits, however I used to LOVE games like Privateer and Freespace, so maybe I am ready for another one in that vein.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 5:02 PM on December 30, 2014

That doesn't bother me, but then I have a flight stick. It's (figuratively) inconceivable to me that anyone would try to play a game like Elite without one.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 8:23 PM on December 30, 2014

When I get the oculus rift, you best believe I'm getting a flight stick, and probably a rumble chair, and a driving cockpit for racing games.
posted by empath at 8:26 PM on December 30, 2014

Sticks are cheap!

Or, you know, expensive. Either way.
posted by Steely-eyed Missile Man at 9:25 PM on December 30, 2014

Elite's not really my thing, but it seems to me that the entire point of the game is the fidelity of the experience. Controls are a big part of that.

Cara Ellison's comment about intimacy in Shadow of Mordor reminds me of this excellent piece on the same topic, which draws interesting parallels between toying with the orcs in Mordor and holding up guards in Metal Gear Solid 2.
posted by neckro23 at 10:01 PM on December 30, 2014

So after reading through a bunch of these essays, I'm fairly convinced that "Papers, Please" was the best (or at least the most important) game of the year. A unique game concept, perfectly polished, with a merger of game mechanics, narrative, and theme that was more or less flawless.
posted by empath at 6:50 AM on December 31, 2014 [1 favorite]