Unwinnable Monthly – January 2020

This is a reprint of the letter from the editor in Unwinnable Monthly Issue 123. You can buy Issue 123 now, or purchase a monthly subscription to make sure you never miss an issue!

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Happy new year! I hope your 2020 is going well so far. We’re still collectively recovering from the holiday, to be honest, so you’ll note a couple columnists are missing. Fear not, they’ll be back next month.

However, we’ve got some new stuff this month. I’d like to introduce our newest columnist, Harry Rabinowitz. Once upon a time, Harry was Unwinnable’s managing editor. Now he’ll be showcasing lesser known, non-super hero comic books worthy of your attention. This month: Middlewest.

We are also pleased to mark the return of a partnership with Epic Games, though in a different format. We kicked things off by revisiting Dead Static Drive to talk about horror and cars with developer Mike Blackney. Hope you dig it!

Our other features aren’t to be missed. Oluwatayo Adewole takes a look at the recent shift in the Nigerian film industry spearheaded by women directors. Don Everhart, meanwhile, hunts for a game that both does and does not exist, and in doing so investigates the world of online game swapping. Finally, we chat with artist Cobysoft Joe about his very squishable work.

Hey, did you know that Outer Wilds and The Outer Worlds are different games? I feel like it is 2006 and The Prestige and The Illusionist are both in theaters. Anyway. Yussef Cole takes a look at the beauty of the end of all things in Outer Wilds. Meanwhile, Justin Reeve investigates what the sorry state of architecture in The Outer Worlds says about that game’s society and Adam Boffa critiques its treatment of progressive alternatives to capitalism.

Noah Springer kicks off his 2020 hip hop recommendations. Amanda Hudgins has advice on what to do with dead doves. Deirdre Coyle sings the praises of Control’s Jesse Faden (and her leather jacket). Ben Sailer stumbles upon a troubling sidequest in Grandia. Matt Marrone gets an obscene high score in Snake vs. Block. Rob Rich would like Hasbro to stop going back to the well of the original Transformers for new toys. And rounding things out, Jason McMaster ponders the digital ghosts we’ll leave behind when we die.

And that’s that! See you February 3 in the next issue of Exploits!

Stu Horvath
Kearny, New Jersey
January 13, 2020