Reading List November 2021 (Patreon)

The November reading list is here, folks! It's a pretty youtube-heavy list this time around, but we've still got some great variety. In particular, if you're thinking about picking up that Moonglow Bay I just recently talked about, there are some solid second opinions that covered some ground I didn't that you should check out. And once you're done with those, there's a whole bunch to check out, from Noah-Caldwell Gervais' continuing phenomenal work highlighting Forza Horizon to a jolly ode to the axe in video games.

Second Opinions

I Played 15 Nonviolent Narrative Indie Games Because Ew Blood by Micah Edmonds: Edmonds has been trying to explore nonviolent games for almost a year now, which has ultimately culminated in a nearly four hour beast of a video exploring how 15 different games engage the player in ways other than the usual conflict-heavy verbs. Having watched him work through the project and offered a fair number of recommendations of game’s I’ve covered that ended up in the final list, I couldn’t be happier to see how it turned out. It’s great stuff!

Moonglow Bay is a Small Fishing Game With Big Feelings by Nicole Carpenter: Carpenter focused primarily on Moonglow Bay’s chill tone. While I’m perpetually rushing to get as much value out of a game as I can, Carpenter took the opposite approach and worked through Moonglow Bay at a relaxed pace, giving a different view of the game.

Moonglow Bay Review: A Relaxing Fishing RPG That’s All About Keeping It Reel by Jay Castello: Castello focused on a topic I also found very refreshing: the fact that the game is actually willing to give its main character a life, personality, and opinions. They also discuss boss fights, something I didn’t highlight since I only got to play one and had no strong feelings one way or another. I’ve seen their opinion on the matter echoed pretty universally, though, so give it a look if you’re on the fence about this game!

The Video Game Industry’s Finally Getting Tired of Blizzard’s Shit

It didn’t seem possible before this month, but of course, Blizzard’s numerous mounting controversies managed to get worse with a report from the WSJ focusing on CEO Bobby Kotick. And while the big headlines have been about major console companies starting to give Blizzard the side eye, the situation is slowly boiling over in the games journalism sector, as well. All of these articles drive at the same point. Games journalists are tired of Blizzard’s shit, tired of the larger cloud of misdemeanor that swirls around the entire industry, and most of all, tired of other journalistic outlets refusing to make a stand about it.

The Games Industry Is Truly Repellent by Stacey Henley

Bomb the Video Game Industry! by Kaile Hultner

Bobby Kotick Must Resign by Chris Plante

Video Game Love Letters

Everybody's got a favorite game, and three creators talked about some of their's this month, making for some fascinating deep dives into why these games compel their fans so deeply. 

Metal Gear Solid 2: A Love Letter to My Favorite Game by Writing on Games: Extensive MGS breakdown-er Writing on Games decided to tackle his favorite of the series and investigate why it’s the one that’s stuck with him.

Majora’s Mask in 2021 is an Existential Nightmare by HeavyEyed: We’ve all been dealing with covid in our own ways, and it’s made for some rich video essay material. It’s HeavyEyed’s turn to tackle the topic, discussing the lessons he’s learned playing Majora’s Mask under the current covid conditions.

Should Games Be Frustrating? by Razbuten: Razbuten’s latest looked at a number of his personal experiences muscling through game mechanics purposely designed to resist and frustrate a player, discussing the pros and cons of their various approaches along the way.

Everything Else

A Guide to the First 15 Seconds of Every Game by Patrick Gill: Ever wonder what all those logos that pop up every time you launch a game are? So did Gill! So he went and did some research into some of the most popularly used proprietary software and what it all actually does.

The Brilliance of FFXIV’s Comedy Questline by Games as Literature: Games as Lit tackled one of FFXIV’s most infamously hilarious side questlines following intrepid (and absolutely useless) Investigator Hildebrand, highlighting the ways the questline utterly smashes many of the game’s established conventions to great effect.

Automotive Fantasyland: What Makes Forza Horizon 5 So Compelling? By Noah-Caldwell Gervais: NCG’s latest connects Forza Horizon 5 to a lot of different, larger themes of car ownership and childhood nostalgia, painting the game as a paradise where boyhood dreams and fascinations about one of yesteryear's biggest status symbols are to be indulged in as vicariously as possible.

The 10K Recommendation Special! By hotcyder: Everybody loves big recommendation videos of smaller, unknown creators! To celebrate hitting a big milestone, hotcyder talked about some of their favorite creators.

How to Write a NieR Song by 8-bit Music Theory: Like it says on the tin, 8-bit broke down the structural framework of NieR’s soundtrack to reverse engineer a song in its style.

Dishonored’s Chaos System Was Never Punishing You by Ruth Cassidy: Cassidy looked at the way the original Dishonored’s chaos system clashed with players’ expectations, providing a thematically resonant core that nonetheless came at the cost of player satisfaction.

The Failing of Failstates by Soft & Hollow: We’ve all been there when playing a horror game: that slog where you’ve died two dozen times, and the horror’s lost its teeth. After all, in a lot of games, the horror is primarily rooted in the threat of death, and it’s already made good on the promise a dozen times over. Horror games have been dealing with this challenge for a long time in trying to find ways to still threaten the player while not drawing them out of the experience when they fail, and Soft & Hollow documented some of the most and least successful ways they’ve found to do this.

Why Assassin’s Creed Unity Can’t Rebuild Notre Dame Cathedral by Simone de Rochefort: Ever since the fire that ripped through Notre Dame, the idea’s been floating around that digital preservations like Assassin’s Creed Unity’s version might help restore the monument. But as Rochefort found, there are numerous inaccuracies built into the digital assassin playground. And some of the reasons why are fascinating.

We Need to Let Go of Silent Hill 2 by Jessica Hill: Silent Hill 2 is a game about being incapable of moving on. Hill explores the irony of the game’s fanbase spending a decade doing the same, waiting for the slightest hint of the next big release and emulating the game in a hundred same-y indie titles.

From Soulcalibur to Fire Emblem — Axes in Games by KBash: KBash looked at the tropes axewielders in games tend to inhabit, regardless of genre, as well as examples of how playing with those tropes can make the humble axe something more.

Deathloop: How Arkane Used Frank Lloyd Wright, Tarantino, and Twiggy to Build a World by Keith Stuart: Stuart interviewed the developers at Arkane about the real world inspirations behind Blackreef’s look and design. The answer: a lot of stuff from the ‘60s!

What’s Going On With Dungeon Encounters? By Sam Howitt: Howitt recently covered Dungeon Encounters, a minimalist dungeon crawler by some of the biggest names in Square Enix, and highlighted all the way the game directly juxtaposes against Squeenix’s more usual fare.