Q&Answers, Month 2 (Patreon)

Hi y'all!

Month 2 of this patreon thing and I couldn't be happier with it. Your support means so so much to me.

Announcement Number 1: Weekly streams! You might have already seen these, but I'm streaming Saturday mornings around 11:30 EST. I don't quite have the stream-endurance yet for those massive 6-hour ordeals, but what I've done so far is a ton of fun. You can see the archived ones here. It took me a while to figure out how to get superchats to work, they're good now! Any money I make during these will be donated to the Orange County Rape Crisis Center.

Announcement Deux: The Haunted House video has got maybe my favorite reception of anything I’ve made. Remedy saw it and confirmed that Control was inspired by House of Leaves. Kitty Horrorshow saw it and confirmed that Anatomy was inspired by Haunting of Hill House. Mfin Austin Walker mentioned it on Waypoint Radio. I think a lot of that video’s success is because of y’all helping boost it into visibility. I can’t thank you enough.

Announcement the third: New video will be out soon-ish! Less than two weeks, I think. It’s a heavy one.

On to the questions! 

Bryce

When do you feel you’re finished with the research aspect of an essay you’re amidst designing/writing? 

I’ll do a lot of reading and searching around before I even start writing, but typically from the origin of an idea, I have an idea of where I want the “story” of the video to go. So it’s kind of a linked process; I’ll read until I’m comfortable enough to start writing, and then I’ll write until I feel un-knowledgeable enough to do more research. 

Something that helps is that usually my videos are only based on one or two main sources, with several more little ones backing it up. For example, while I did a bunch of fact-checking and whatnot for the Headshots vid, the vast majority of the material came from two big papers. Those gave me an idea of the arc of the video I wanted to make, and then I just looked little things up as I went along to make sure that it fit within that arc. It’s still a pretty messy process though! Often it’s not until I read a script out loud that I realize it doesn’t quite hold together and needs more work.   

Additionally, are there any addendums or corrections about prior videos put out?

This is a great question that I’m not sure I have a great answer to. There are certainly videos I’ve wanted to say more with. I think I could have said more about non-white Jewish populations in the current day, and the struggles and oppression they face. I could have talked about the modern-day pricing of modern art- a lot of people have assumed that I’m supportive of art pieces being sold to the bourgeoisie for like, 50 million dollars. I’m not supportive of anything being sold for 50 million dollars. 

Thankfully, I don’t think there’s anything I’ve said that I truly think is incorrect. Although, I’d kill to be able to go back and readjust audio on my earlier videos, because wooooof. 

Madi Katz

When's your birthday? 

February 8! Same as John Williams, Jules Verne, and Cecily Strong. Aquarius, babyyy

If you're watching any TV as of late, what's been a recent favorite ?

Oh man. Well the new show Undone by Raphael Bob-Walksberg is absolutely fantastic. It’s rotoscoped and is totally unique looking, and has that just gut-punchy emotional truth that he seems so good at writing. Succession is great. Also I can’t say enough good things about Fleabag, I think season 2 might be one of my favorite seasons of TV ever. 

Also, I think you should leave. Always and forever. 

Sweeney in the Trees

Favourite poet or author?

He’s a recent one, but I think Ted Chiang might be my favorite author. I love short stories more than about anything (big fan of Bradbury for the same reason), and Chiang just creates these situations that absolutely captivate me. I can’t get over him. If anyone hasn’t read the story Tower of Babylon, it’s free online and just mind-shatteringly good. His collection Stories of Your Life and Others is a must-have. 

I don’t read nearly as much poetry as I’d like. I like Mary Oliver a lot, E. E. Cummings is a fave. Honestly I’m open to recommendations on this, send me some poets! 

Fletcher Porter

How do you create ideas for your videos?  Is it typically come up with a topic to discuss and then a game that highlights that (Judiasm & Whiteness ==> Wolfenstein) or a game and a topic it highlights (Mario Galaxy ==> homesickness)?

It varies! Wolfenstein is actually easy to answer, because most of the research in that video was from a MUCH longer essay I wrote for a grad class in school (Ethnoraciality and Order in the West, what a fucking good course). I was the only undergrad in there and everyone else was working on their thesis so the prof was like “just write something, I dunno.” So I wrote about the Jewish history of racialization. I actually had the idea to make a video linking that to Wolfenstein long before I did, I just wanted to make sure I had the editing chops to do it well.  

I think there’s a division in my essays, where some are talking about a game and some are using the games to talk about something. With the ones that are about a game (Mario, APE OUT, Outer Wilds), it’s usually me having one moment in a game that inspires me and then trying to figure out what else I can rope in. With the ones that are about something (Haunted Houses, Headshots, Modern Art), I’ll typically get inspired by an outside source and then find games that demonstrate my point.

How do you typically hear about the games you write about?  I've heard about a lot of games for the first time from you.

A lot of my indie picks have actually come from Rock Paper Shotgun’s “Have You Played…?” series, which highlights a lot of obscure games. Heterotopias, the online zine, is another great source. My brain also just kinda remembers games forever; sometimes I’ll think like, “that game’s popular, I read an article about it in Kotaku!” and then realize that the article was from 2013 or something. 

I doubt I need to tell anyone about him, but Chris Franklin (Errant Signal) is really really good about covering little games, and I highly recommend him for interested parties. 

That's all for this month! Much love to you all. L'shana tova!