by Emily Durham | Jul 29, 2021 | Opinion, Roundtables, Video Games
It’s summer here in the Northern Hemisphere! Time for lake swimming, marshmallow toasting, and the ever-important summer barbecue. Oh, and games. Don’t forget the games.
When we brainstormed this month’s topic, we came up with a few different ideas: astronomy, astrology, the dog days of summer, dogs… hot dogs… and barbecuing. Which leads to two important questions that will form the backbone—but not the entirety—of this month’s spicy, grilled discussion.
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Emily Durham is a freelance writer by day and a Sidequest copyeditor by… also day. When they’re not editing or playing with cats, you can find them playing Celeste or Hollow Knight, sewing korok cosplays, or… playing with cats. You can find their tweets at @sedimentalvalue.
by Tia Kalla | Jul 19, 2018 | Essays, Video Games
Plot is Solyent Green, Chuck Wendig tells me. It’s made of people. As someone who reads and writes fanfiction fiction on a semi-regular basis, I can point out lists of books that lived (or died) based on their characters. Always, I find myself preferring a tired concept with great characters over a newer concept with dull characters.
But when I switch from the Kindle to the 3DS, I’m switching into a different format. The protagonist of a video game is often a blank slate with little direct dialogue, a vehicle designed to minimize the barrier between player and narrative. It’s hard to make a great character when it’s the player, not the game, determining what that character is. Can an RPG still make a great story when the protagonist is at the whims of the audience? One series in particular, Dragon Quest, wanted to do both: provide a great story and leave the characterization of the protagonist up to the player. It just took them nine games to get there. (more…)
Longtime writer, temporary office minion, and nerd of all trades, tiakall is a fan of lengthy subordinate clauses and the Oxford comma. She enjoys plants, cats, puns of varying quality, and making cannibal jokes before it was cool.
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