Reading List - December 2016 (Patreon)

Hello! Need something to read or watch over the Christmas / holiday break? This lot should get you started. 

Just a note: there's a few things on here this month about gender, identity, politics, and whatnot. I know that's not to everyone's tastes and while I reccomend them all, do skip the "identity" section if you're not interested in that sort of writing.

Deep Dives

[Video / CC] Titanfall 2 - Mobility and Momentum - Turbo Button goes in-depth on the movement systems that make Titanfall 2 so much fun to play online. [Video] Super Bunnyhop  also did a video about, well, bunnyhopping in TF2. 

[Video / CC] DOOM Resurrected - To Hell & Back - Noclip returns with another polished, engrossing Making Of video. This time, the hard road towards this year's terrific Doom game. 

Are guns in video games holding the medium back? - A slightly sensationalist title, I think. But combat, in all forms, is certainly extremely prevalent in the triple A space. This is a topic I'm going to explore next year so consider this a primer, of sorts. 

Why hasn't anyone copied Shadow of Mordor's Nemesis system?  - A bloody good question by PC Gamer. This is one of the most bold and innovative bits of game design and it deserves to be emulated and refined. 

[Video] Past Mortem: Mighty No. 9 Kickstarter Debacle Explained - A interesting look at the absolute disaster that was Keiji Infaune's crowdfunding campaign. As a crowd-funder myself (hi!), the thought of disappointing your backers makes me pretty mad. 

One on one

Q&A: Skyrim Creator Todd Howard  - Bethesda starts their games with a tone, says Howards. Skyrim's tone? A Conan action figure. Presumably "the Barbarian" and not "O'Brien".

Fumito Ueda - Glixel and Game Informer both have good interviews with The Last Guardian director Fumito Ueda. Simon Parkin posted the entire transcript of the interview  he conducted with Ueda for a New Yorker piece. 

Q&A: Shigeru Miyamoto  - Good interview, which also highlights something I spoke about earlier on Patreon: the parallels between Nintendo and Apple make Mario Run an ideal partnership. 

From the devs

How We Design Games Now and Why - Katharine Neil offers a rather grim, but important overview of the way big budget games are made - and the need for more formal game design vocabulary.

[Video] 'F*** Ladders', And 19 Other Design Mantras For Arkane's Prey - Here's one more reason to be excited about Prey: the team at Arkane have good game design rules printed out as posters. Sounds like my kind of studio. Make sure to pause the video when they appear on screen. 

Making Platforming Games - Kynan Pearson used to work at Retro Studios, and did design on Donkey Kong Country Returns. Here, he shares tips and insight for making platformers. 

Take a look behind-the-scenes with design documents from The Legend of Zelda! - A random reminder that Nintendo worked on Super Mario Bros and The Legend of Zelda - two of the most important games of all time - simultaneously. Bonkers. 

The principles guiding Deus Ex: Mankind Divided's level design - Lots of good stuff on the building blocks of a good level. Mostly for DX's unique brand of watered down immersive sim, but still interesting. 

Why the Food in ‘Final Fantasy XV’ Is So Damn Realistic - I haven't played FFXV yet but I have seen lots of screenshots of ridiculously realistic nosh. Eater interviewed director Hajime Tabata to find out how they pulled off those perfect dishes. 

Reflection and Anticipation

From Overwatch to Firewatch: the best video games of 2016 - chosen by developers - A diverse bunch of devs weigh in on their favourite games of the year. Indie games are big hits (Firewatch, Reigns, Stardew Valley and others got the most nods). 

[Video] 2016 in Gaming: The Year in Under 2 Minutes - Nice supercut of all the major games that came out in 2016. There's a list of games in the description if you want to test your knowledge.

The man who made a video game inspired by escaping the secret police - One to keep an eye on in 2017. As my one-time employee Chris writes, the idea of merging the driving and survival horror genres is an exciting one. 

Antioch: Scarlet Bay  - I'm also massively intrigued by this game, which promises to be a multiplayer, cooperative text adventure. I don't know what that means but I can't wait to find out. 

Identity

What Gamergate should have taught us about the 'alt-right' - To anyone who had to deal with this weirdo online movement a few years ago, current political events feel like deja vu - but massively amplified. Matt Lees explains more. 

Josh Sauchak - Why he’s so important to me - Why is representation important? Just ask this gamer, who was overjoyed to find a character on the autism spectrum in Watch_Dogs 2. 

[Video] Gender Ex Machina - Idea Channel takes on the difference between reviews and criticism, looks at The Sims and Rimworld, and talks media and politics. Lots to chew on here. 

Some thoughts on Tracer - Gay writer Patricia Hernandez offers her thoughts on Overwatch hero Tracer being gay - and how it puts the community st a crossroads. 

Super Mario Run’s Not-So-Super Gender Politics - Short thing on how Super Mario Run keeps up the boring tradition of Mario rescuing Peach. 

Shigeru Miyamoto is frequently called the Walt Disney of video games. He may have a little too much Uncle Walt in him and not enough Hayao Miyazaki, whose Studio Ghibli movies like My Neighbor Totoro and Spirited Away are filled with adventurous young heroines.

Oddity

WARNING! This game is not compatible with this system - A surprisingly exhaustive collection of warning screens that show up when you try to play a Game Boy Color game on a black and white system. I love that this exists. 

What virtual toilets can teach us about the art of game design - A toilet in a game is different from a toilet in a film. Someone on the dev team had to painstakingly render, texture, and animate that bog. Games are weird. 

Our Video Game Book Holiday Gift Guide 2016 - Might be too late for Christmas presents, but perhaps a way to spend those Amazon gift vouchers? Destructoid recommends a bunch of gaming books, including my favourite game design time: Derek Yu's Spelunky post-mortem.

15 Incredible Street Fighter Stages You Can Visit in Real Life on the Cheap - Your 2017 travel plans are now sorted. Go beat up a hairy Russian man, a dude with Mr Tickle arms, or a defenceless car.

[Video] Atari 2600 Emulator in Minecraft - I mean, why not?

[Video] Drifter Smashified - 3D Model Time Lapse (No Commentary) - I'm a big fan of this channel, which puts out CGI mock-ups of dream Super Smash Bros characters and trophies. The images are gorgeous and the behind-the-scenes look at the rendering (or, in earlier episodes, painting) process is fascinating. 

Beyond Games

How Arrival's designers crafted a mesmerising alien alphabet - The alien language in the engrossing linguistics thriller Arrival isn't just a bunch of squiggly lines. Lots of thought went into those coffee stain symbols. 

Wide and Tall Simpsons Caps - "A collection of images from those times The Simpsons couldn't fit all its jokes on one screen."

[Video] Editing in Storytelling - Lots of good stuff on how the edit can be used to tell stories. Perhaps relevant to games, too, as Virginia brought real-time editing to the forefront this year. 

The movie that doesn’t exist and the Redditors who think it does - A bizarre story about Sinbad's non-existent genie movie, and the quirks of collective memory. 

[Video] The Dark Knight (2008) - Movies with Mikey - Mikey's videos are emphatic love letters to his favourite films. And they always find some interesting new way to see a film. This time, he makes his case for why The Joker is the protagonist of The Dark Knight.