Sunday, April 26, 2009
Sunday Supplement: “Level design is communication”
3:00PM David Wildgoose |
Welcome to the Sunday Supplement, your Sunday-ly wrap of some of the best games writing of the last week or so.
GameSetWatch: ‘Diamond in the Rough’: Forget ‘Combat Mode Engaged’
Combat maybe our primary mode of game interaction, but Tom Cross looks at how other systems can just as successfully engage the player.
Offworld: Ragdoll Metaphysics: Cloud Gaming Is The Nebulous Shape Of Ubiquitous Gaming
Jim Rossignol examines the potential ramifications of OnLive and its fellow could computing gaming solutions.
Fullbright: Reorienteering: spatial organization in BioShock
2K Marin’s Steve Gaynor reveals a few secrets of BioShock’s level design.
Resolution: A Thousand Deaths Is A Statistic
Lewis Denby examines the real meaning of death (and murder) in games.
Groping The Elephant: Contextual Specification – Example 1
Oh, and yes, here’s your obligatory Far Cry 2 related essay…
Tetris Lessons Available, 2 Hours For $40
9:00AM Owen Good | Shawn Elliott (2K Boston) tweeted this this past week. Some wit up in Vancouver is offering Tetris lessons “at affordable rates,” one of those things the un- or underemployed will now rush out to imitate. More »
Get Drunk On Boomer Bile
8:00AM Owen Good | Sidling up to the bar at a trendy club and explaining how one makes “Boomer Bile” would identify you first as “disgusting” and then, after further explanation, “disgusting and a huge nerd.” More »Hotfix Patches Up GTA IV Stuttering Problem
7:00AM Owen Good | A mini-foofaraw sprouted this week over the PC version of Grand Theft Auto IV, when a Windows Live update either introduced or worsened a stuttering issue in some players’ computers. More » 
Feast Your Eyes On Muramasa: The Demon Blade
6:00AM Owen Good | GameTrailers assembled a comprehensive look at Muramasa: The Demon Blade, the latest iteration in the cult-hit series that’s due out for Wii in late July. More »
ESA’s Lobbyist-Womans Is Gone
5:00AM Owen Good | A little over two months after being named the “senior v.p. for government affairs” (read: top lobbyist) for the Entertainment Software Alliance, Jennifer A. Manner is now gone. More »
King Denies Little Boy’s Wish To Be Named ‘Sonic X’
4:30AM Owen Good | This reads like a fairy tale, but it’s all true. A 6-year-old Norwegian boy wanted to change his name to “Sonic X,” and in his land, such things must be approved by the king. More »
Create-a-School Returns To NCAA Football
4:00AM Owen Good | NCAA Football enthusiasts are already rejoicing- promotional materials tout a “teambuilder” feature in NCAA 10 that signals the return of “Create-a-School,” which has yet to appear on any next-gen versions. More »Apple Approves, Quickly Removes “Baby Shaker” App
3:30AM Owen Good | This is probably not how Apple planned to celebrate the week it hit a billion downloads from the iTunes App store. It’s apologised for admitting the unabashedly tasteless “Baby Shaker” for distribution, and removed it. More » 
