Reading List (November 2017) (Patreon)

You know the drill by now. 30-odd articles and videos that I discovered in the last month, ferociously curated for your intrigue and entertainment. Lemme know what you liked reading most in the comments below.

Odyssey! Ya see!

What are devs saying about the design of Super Mario Odyssey? - Heaps of praise for Mario Odyssey from devs of all stripes. There’s a lot of love, in particular, for the assist mode which opens the game up to a wider group of players without harming the core experience. 

A Brief History of Mario’s Jump Delay - I talked a tiny bit about how the cap throw keeps you in mid-air for longer. A Patron pointed to this blog post from Nintendo, which gives the thing a name and context. 

Peach’s Tiny Taste of Freedom: Gender in Super Mario Odyssey - Ending spoilers for Mario Odyssey in this piece about Peach and gender roles. 

[Video | CC] The Secret behind Super Mario Odysseys Boss Design - Nintendo’s boss design has often involved a lot of waiting. A lot of switching between attacking and defending. Odyssey breaks this pattern, beautifully. 

Design talk

Frictional on designing SOMA's new monster-free Safe Mode - PC Gamer talks to Frictional about SOMA’s upcoming “no-enemy” mode. An interesting step in the discussion about developer intent and player choice.

Perfectly solving Opus Magnum's puzzles is impossible, but that's OK - A piece about how problem-solving games (like Opus Magnum) let players chase their own goals and play styles.

The Gunsmiths: how MachineGames create the feel of Wolfenstein 2's weighty guns - I’m beginning to find the pursuit of great-feeling guns to be a bit discomforting. But if that’s what you wanna do, then check out this new column about, ahem, “gunfeel”. 

[Video | CC] Who is PLAYERUNKNOWN? - Noclip Profiles - Danny’s back, with a mini documentary / profile piece on - arguably - the most important game designer of 2017, PlayerUnknown. 

Heat Signature’s Fair Points Update: Reacting To Good Reviews - Tom Francis is always transparent about his design process. So it stands to reason that he’d go into full detail about the decisions in Heat Signature’s first major update. Also: more designer intent stuff!

The Modern Design of 3D Platformers (ft Snoman) - HeavyEyed takes a look at this year’s four major 3D platformers - Snake Pass, Mario Odyssey, A Hat in Time, and Yooka Laylee - to discuss their strengths and weaknesses.

Gaps of the Imagination - SOMA developer Frictional talks about the power of leaving things to the player’s imagination. 

Critical hit

[Video | CC] Why Resident Evil 7 Works - Games D offers some insight on the strengths of Resident Evil 7. I’d like to add: VR, VR, VR. 

[Video] Saving the World... 1000 Times Later - Raycevick explores the unimaginative “save the world” storylines seen in way too many games.

Culture club

Inside FIFA 18's Weekend League, the gruelling mode that's consuming players' lives - Video games are so weird. 

Why 'Wolfenstein II' Marketing Has More Social Commentary Than the Game - A question I had, now answered. Thanks, internet! Now I need to know why I have to manually pick up every scrap up ammo and armour in the game. My E key is wearing out. 

[Video] The Stylistic Influences of Cuphead - A deep dive into the 1930s cartoons that inspired Cuphead, from specific references to thematic pulls. This video’s good too, if you’re craving more. 

Cuphead and the Racist Spectre of Fleischer Animation - But neither video really delves that deep into the racist imagery of that era’s animation. This is a tough read, but certainly thought provoking. 

Game history

Rediscovering History’s Lost First Female Video Game Designer - The early days of gaming are filled with female pioneers. Fast Company tells the story of one who has nearly been forgotten. 

[Video] Halcyon Dreams: The Legacy of Dragon's Lair - H Bomberguy looks at the weird and twisted history of Dragon’s Lair. There’s more to the story than Don Bluth, as it turns out. 

A People’s History Of The FPS, Part 1: The WAD - Robert Yang has a three part series on the way FPS games have been driven and defined by user-made modes. Here’s parts two and three. 

Business talk

The future of adventure games - Andy Kelly talks to notable adventure game designers about where adventure games will go next. 

Bossa scraps Decksplash after free weekend failure - Bossa said it would cancel its skateboarding game if it couldn’t get 100,000 people to play a free demo. What happens next may surprise you!

The Collapse Of Visceral's Ambitious Star Wars Game  - Important research from Kotaku. EA probably didn’t kill off Visceral’s Star Wars game because it was singleplayer (well, maybe that was also a reason) but because the project seemed like a complete mess. 

Financial Slam Dunk: The Numbers Behind Virtual Currency in NBA2K - Wanna know why so many games have aggressive micro transactions? Look at the graphs in this piece, showing how much money 2K’s made from selling virtual currency. Sobering reading. 

[Video | CC] Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice | Dev Diary 30 | The Launch - But here’s some good news! Ninja Theory’s “indie-AAA” game Hellblade has been a success for the studio, and already turned a profit. We need more games like this, from smaller teams with modest budgets. 

Game over

[Video] Get Out | Challenging White Fragility - Discovered a cool new film analysis channel, with more of a focus on indie and drama films. This one on Get Out is a good introduction.

[Video | CC] Wall-E as Sociological Storytelling - An interesting look at the villain of WALL-E, and also some good stuff for game design nerds during the bits on Monopoly.

The Financial Realities of Going Viral - This artist’s work went super viral on social media. Here’s how much money she made from it. 

[Video | CC] Emergence – How Stupid Things Become Smart Together - A cool video about how simple creatures can work together to create complex structures and societies. Also pretty useful for game designers. 

[Video | CC] The world is poorly designed. But copying nature helps - Nature’s got a few million years’ worth of iteration under its belt. Take notes!

[Video] Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Genres Tell No Tales - Everything I know about Disney films, I learned from Lindsay Eliss. 

[Video] Erasing My Awful Book From The History of the Internet - Before, Austin talked about his horrible movie. Now, he’s talking about his horrible book. Hey, at least his YouTube channels gold!