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Author: Khee Hoon Chan

Feature Excerpt

Still Fallen: The Delicious, Open World Mystique of Fallen London

By Khee Hoon Chan • June 5th, 2020

Failbetter Games’ impeccable prose has kept this browser game alive for a decade now.

E-soterica

The Quiet Sleep is a Messy and Emotional Tower Defense Game

By Khee Hoon Chan • January 31st, 2020

Our emotions are messy and complex enough – perhaps the pared-down approach of The Quiet Sleep would help us confront – and sit with – the full spectrum of our human emotions.

E-soterica

Attack of the Earthlings Bakes Humor Into Its Freakish DNA

By Khee Hoon Chan • August 13th, 2019

Attack of the Earthlings wants to be a wise-cracking asshole and will keep tossing punchlines if that means you’ll continue to laugh your belly raw.

Navigating Through Grief in La Dispute’s Panorama

By Khee Hoon Chan • May 16th, 2019

As an creative extension of their latest record Panorama, the post-hardcore outfit La Dispute released an ephemeral but evocative game that accompanies their music

E-soterica

Broken Reality Represents The Drudgery of Internet Culture

By Khee Hoon Chan • April 10th, 2019

What fuels Broken Reality’s bizarro universe is the same kick of dopamine we get from the positive feedback from social media.

Feature Excerpt
Mirror's Edge

A Legacy of Movement

By Khee Hoon Chan • March 1st, 2019

Doom may have defined the first-person shooter, but Mirror’s Edge made it flow.

Exploits Feature

The Importance of Preservation

By Khee Hoon Chan • January 3rd, 2019

The preservation of videogames’ short, albeit eventful, history is fraught with challenges, its very value undermined by the industry’s biggest companies

E-soterica

The Contradiction of Language in Subserial Network

By Khee Hoon Chan • December 19th, 2018

The use of language is instrumental to Subserial Network, and it’s refreshing to see how certain words are used to subvert our expectations of this world.

The Gentle Furor of GDJYB’s Math-Folk

By Khee Hoon Chan • December 13th, 2018

Asian math rock band GDJYB has all the intricate musical structures of regular math rock, but centers soft, politically charged vocals.

Solace Amidst the Wreckage of Kursk

By Khee Hoon Chan • November 29th, 2018

It is a strange thing when a game about a submarine disaster is a calming experience and potential sleep aid.

E-soterica

Cheap Golf Is An Ode to Inelegance

By Khee Hoon Chan • November 20th, 2018

Snarky, amoral AIs and retro aesthetics are nothing new, if not wearisome among today’s growing library of games, but at least Cheap Golf has the gumption to be peculiar and honest about it.

E-soterica

Three Shades of Depression

By Khee Hoon Chan • October 25th, 2018

The candid portrayal of depression in these itch.io games is both striking and devastating.

Butterfly Soup and the Myriad Asian Identity

By Khee Hoon Chan • October 18th, 2018

I see flickers of my childhood in the characters’ experiences—from the astronomical expectations Noelle’s parents have of her, to her parents’ severe disappointment in Min-seo’s less-than-feminine hobbies and appearance.

E-soterica

Foul Play in an Elementary School

By Khee Hoon Chan • October 10th, 2018

“I wanted to work with something fun and lighthearted. I was actually watching a lot of Mindhunters on Netflix, so I wanted to do something detective-adjacent but still semi-family-friendly,” said Pico, the developer behind P.E. Noire.

E-soterica

Going Through The Motions of Work in Fortune-499

By Khee Hoon Chan • September 26th, 2018

How does one introduce themselves to a disinterested stranger and exchange suggestions on “honing competitive advantages through collaboration”?

E-soterica

Sunless Skies Rewards Imagination

By Khee Hoon Chan • August 29th, 2018

Roguelike elements convey the harshest qualities of Sunless Skies. They carry the relentless trials and tribulations their protagonists face in nautical fictions and literary voyages like Moby Dick and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.

The Boxes and Paraphernalia of Captain Spirit

By Khee Hoon Chan • August 16th, 2018

Objects carry with them an innately human connection; but in Captain Spirit, what’s left behind when these items are taken away also conjures an achingly compelling narrative.

Elon Musk’s iPod Submarine Throws So Much Shade

By Khee Hoon Chan • August 7th, 2018

Elon Musk, patron saint of mansplainers everywhere, now has another achievement he can unabashedly lay claims to.

Why Are Videogames And Its Community So Terrified Of Women?

By Khee Hoon Chan • July 10th, 2018

Some felt Price’s supposed aggression was uncalled for, but this grossly overlooks the context that women working in videogames and tech often have unsolicited advice tossed to them by men with far less or zero experience in that field.

The Mathematical Brilliance of WarioWare

By Khee Hoon Chan • July 4th, 2018

The annals of math rock is a motley of multifarious influences, from the understated sounds of minimal music to the aggressive intensity of post-hardcore.

E-soterica

The Enigma of Personality Quizzes In Cosmonet

By Khee Hoon Chan • June 19th, 2018

Realizing that my spirit animal (food?) is a pinto bean had definitely transformed my outlook on life, and the indie title, Cosmonet, is tapping on such observations to steer its narrative flow.

E-soterica

Exploring Japanese Transgender Themes in One Night, Hot Springs

By Khee Hoon Chan • June 12th, 2018

“I didn’t want the game to be too heavy or dark because there are already too many games out there with bad endings for LGBT+ people,” shared KC. “I wanted to approach the topic in a way that would leave players with a lighter heart”

Feature

The Mass Effect Issue: Romancing the Krogan

By Khee Hoon Chan • June 8th, 2018

Why can’t Wrex get some love?

Pato Box’s Fisticuffs Lack Punch

By Khee Hoon Chan • June 5th, 2018

Perhaps the point of Pato Box is less about its story and setting. Perhaps it’s more about its exploration of the Punch-Out!! mechanics, and how that can be reimagined as a means of experiencing a stylish crime drama about double-crosses and revenge.

Exploits Feature

Art vs. Artist

By Khee Hoon Chan • June 1st, 2018

There comes a point where death is too good for the artist.

The Painfully Quiet Demise of The Flock

By Khee Hoon Chan • May 22nd, 2018

“What if we could evolve the game over its life cycle, perhaps through new levels or through changing its narrative? We wanted to let the community experience what they would normally experience in a single player story—where their actions and events will have a tangible impact on the game universe.”

E-soterica

Exploring Spaces in These Indie Platformers

By Khee Hoon Chan • May 15th, 2018

In most platformers, we waffle a little, and then take a leap of faith from one scaffolding to the next, and perhaps over a deadly pit of lava and spikes.

Geralt of Rivia, Anthropologist

By Khee Hoon Chan • May 8th, 2018

Like a cultural anthropologist, Geralt uncovers more about this universe through these contracts, keenly and patiently listening to villagers as they share their joy and woes.

E-soterica

Umiro Is The Relief of Recovering Lost Memories

By Khee Hoon Chan • May 3rd, 2018

In Umiro, seeing the hues of color seep back into the city is more than just the exhilarating thrill of completing another level in a game. It’s the bittersweet relief of recovering a missing memento, of finding something you thought was lost for good.

Feature

Humor and the Homicidal Octopus

By Khee Hoon Chan • April 23rd, 2018

Never aggravate an octopus.

Embody An Unspeakable Horror in Sea Salt

By Khee Hoon Chan • April 10th, 2018

To Lovecraft fans, the unspeakable horror of the Old Gods is already common knowledge, their motives so unknowable and unthinkable that any attempts to understand them would surely lead to insanity

E-soterica

The Quiet Exclamation of ASMR

By Khee Hoon Chan • April 3rd, 2018

“We don’t really choose our bodies, or the way they fail us, and I feel this is one reason trans people seem to connect with the theme of body horror,” said Soria. “For me, it’s mostly the way I’m seen that feels different from who I am.”

Modern-day Cyberpunk Is Already Here

By Khee Hoon Chan • March 20th, 2018

So what stories should cyberpunk tell today? As the foreshadowing of dystopian societies inches closer and become less of a distant future, our games should also reflect our conflicting relationship with technology today.

Getting Hot Under The Collar with Superhot: The Card Game

By Khee Hoon Chan • March 13th, 2018

Given the game’s primary conceit of time moving only when the player does, Superhot feels like it will translate well into a tabletop game, with replicating Superhot’s central mechanics of letting players pause and parse their next move a natural fit.

an overweight hog faced creature lays prone on the ground, a dumpling in its hand.

Feast and Our Personal Stories of Food

By Khee Hoon Chan • February 20th, 2018

Feast feels more of an intimate look at the array of emotions we associate with food, an cultural element of great significance to most of us.

E-soterica

Experience Melancholia In Just Two Minutes

By Khee Hoon Chan • February 13th, 2018

30 Seconds to Midnight brings to mind the sublime but sorrowful Lars von Trier film Melancholia, which depicts the world’s end in an unorthodox manner—a inevitable planetary collision, devoid of typical Hollywood bombast.

A small figure climbing down a set of stairs, a bunch of willowy hands rising up from the blackness. This is a still from Yume Nikki

The Appeal Behind Yume Nikki’s Unplayability

By Khee Hoon Chan • January 30th, 2018

We are all thirsting to find out what may have caused her to dream up the hideous monsters and disembodied ghosts in these surreal worlds.

A robot like figure with a hand outstretched, screen on its head depicting an emoticon of joy wearing a pink tshirt that reads "Rad Bot with a Dad Bod"

Exploring Multiple Shades of Gender in Genderwrecked

By Khee Hoon Chan • January 26th, 2018

In this post-apocalyptic universe about meeting grotesque monsters, adorable meat boys and a sexy dad bot, you’re also somehow compelled to learn more about the meaning of gender.

A blonde man in a blue one piece leotard punches out with a boxing fist towards a dark skinned man in an American flag boxing outfit.

The Heart of Fighting Games

By Khee Hoon Chan • January 16th, 2018

It’s these technicalities and the breakneck speed of play that heighten the range of emotions players experience during a fight, like frustration, cool-headedness, arrogance, despair and even elation.

a diver rising through a spiral of fish rusing up through the ocean.

Abzu Is Beautiful

By Khee Hoon Chan • January 9th, 2018

Abzu lets me explore the ocean depths without fear, but it also makes me envious of those who can witness the vast biodiversity of the sea themselves.

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