ANDREW KING
Andrew King Dec 17, 2021. 4 minute read
Guardians of the Galaxy Cleverly Uses Flashbacks To Open Its World
Guardians of the Galaxy is linear. But it isn’t linear. An open-world game might say, “See that mountain? You can climb it.” But Eidos Montreal’s Marvel story smartly sets its exploratory sights on memory instead. When we say that a video game is linear, or nonlinear, we’re typically describing how…
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Andrew King Jun 30, 2021. 8 minute read
From Max Payne to Zeus: How Narration in Games Helps Developers Get Creative
It’s a concept as old as stories, but in games, you can mostly trace the use of a narrator back to a trio of indies released around the start of the last decade. In 2011’s Bastion, you were a little guy running around as your actions were described by a…
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Andrew King Mar 24, 2020. 6 minute read
The Protestant Reformation of the First-Person Shooter
Doom wasn’t the first first-person shooter. Depending on who you ask, that was either Maze War or Spasim. In fact, Doom wasn’t even the first FPS developed by id Software. The cutting-edge studio released Wolfenstein 3D one year prior. But it was Doom, of course, that really put the FPS on the map.…
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Andrew King Feb 7, 2020. 4 minute read
9 Shows Netflix Should Adapt Into Video Games Next
This week, Netflix released The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance Tactics — a strategy RPG in the vein of Final Fantasy Tactics. It’s a tie-in that dares to ask “What if Jim Henson really wanted Muppets to kick the most ass?” Unlike the brilliant source material, however, the licensed game is just okay. But if Netflix is…
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LISTS
Andrew King Dec 18, 2019. 5 minute read
Wattam Review: Rebuilding the World, One Weird Friend at a Time
Wattam asks you to play as a green, block-shaped mayor with a mustache on his upper lip and a bomb under his bowler hat. When you doff the cap, the bomb explodes, launching you and anyone nearby up into the air with a green smoke trail. All affected erupt in…
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REVIEWS
Andrew King Dec 17, 2019. 4 minute read
2019 Was the Year of Arena Combat in Games
Arena fights were everywhere in 2019. I don’t mean “arena shooters.” The style of FPS gameplay popularized by Quake is still alive and well, but I’m talking about a more specific trend. In 2019, video games made you fight for your life while an audience watched, clapped, gasped and applauded.…
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