Who's writing about video games?
July 21, 2014 10:51 AM   Subscribe

I'd like to learn more about video and digital games. I don't know where to start. I'm thinking--there must be bloggers, games writers, etc. who are writing about both classic video games and new releases? Who are they?

That's pretty much it. Any other resources you can suggest--a Big Book of video games, with perhaps brief summaries of the basic mechanics, narratives? Does that exist?--would be most welcome too.
posted by Ollie to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (10 answers total) 23 users marked this as a favorite
 
Video Games: The Movie (trailer) is a documentary currently in theatres that goes through the history until present day and the genres of games that emerged and social changes etc. It's a feel-good movie, quite back-patty, but it's a quick way to be exposed to a lot of aspects of video games with some context and background.
posted by anonymisc at 10:57 AM on July 21, 2014 [1 favorite]


I guess it depends on where you want to start and how much knowledge you already have. Rock, Paper, Shotgun is probably the best online source right now covering new games and industry news, but they definitely write for an audience that is already pretty video game savvy.

In terms of getting a broad grounding in video game fundamentals and history, I would recommend by starting with a few articles (two Wikipedia, one scholarly):

Mechanics
Genres
History
posted by 256 at 11:00 AM on July 21, 2014 [2 favorites]


Ashly and Anthony Burch are a sibling team who have what I find to be really interesting discussions of both current and classic videogames. Their video series "Hey Ash, Whatcha Playin?" and their podcast are both really fun and hilarious (although filled with LOTS of brother/sister inside jokes) and within that hilarity, they also address Serious Issues like sexism in games and the state of video game narrative.

Anthony also used to be a regular contributor to Destructoid - you might find his columns or Destructoid's other archived posts to be right up your alley. It's become more current-news-focused than is really my thing over the past couple years, but when I was reading it regularly around 2010-2011, its contributors posted a lot of really interesting stuff about all different aspects of modern and current gaming.
posted by augustimagination at 11:10 AM on July 21, 2014


Feminist Frequency talks a lot about video games in the blog and YT channel.
posted by saucysault at 11:24 AM on July 21, 2014 [1 favorite]


Kill Screen sounds like what you're looking for (with the caveat I'm the developer on it and friendly with some of the staff). It was founded by a friend, Chris Dahlen who writes at a lot of different places. Ian Bogost might be a good follow as well (I really enjoyed Racing the Beam). And Gus Mastrapa.
posted by yerfatma at 11:31 AM on July 21, 2014


Full glass, empty clip via our wonderful wonderchicken.
posted by vrakatar at 11:34 AM on July 21, 2014


A lot of good suggestions here -- I get most of my gaming news and editorial-type writing from RockPaperShotgun. I also like the criticism podcasts Idle Thumbs, Crate and Crowbar and Not a Game, and the YT channels Errant Signal, SuperBunnyhop and Matthewmatosis, and MattChat.
posted by Drexen at 11:52 AM on July 21, 2014 [1 favorite]


Extra Credits is a weekly video series about video games, specifically from the game creation and analysis perspective. It is extremely accessible and entertaining, and is well worth a look.
posted by Aleyn at 5:05 PM on July 21, 2014


Game critic Harold Goldberg, author of All Your Base Are Belong to Us has a blog.
posted by monospace at 7:04 PM on July 21, 2014


Response by poster: Thanks everyone! I'll work my way through all of these over the next few weeks.
posted by Ollie at 4:00 AM on July 22, 2014


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