Feature Excerpt Apocalyptic Pregnancy By Natasha Ochshorn • April 19th, 2024 Perhaps an emotional response to a presidential election year, the weather, uncontrolled rent, or genocide – people on a large scale are questioning parenting as an ethical choice.
Feature Excerpt It’s Not a Loop, It’s a Spiral By Autumn Wright • April 18th, 2024 Maybe Alan Wake is like me. Maybe I’m like Alan. Trying to write my way out. Maybe the writing is just incidental to this compulsion, something we’re drawn to.
Here's the Thing Why I Watch YouTube Reactions By Rob Rich • April 12th, 2024 React videos, as eye-rolling as the concept can be, are a way for me to relive important moments for the first time by proxy.
Forms in Light Disdain and Devotion By Justin Reeve • April 11th, 2024 Similar to how some videogame levels have been criticized but later hailed as masterpieces, many buildings have transcended their initial criticism to become beloved landmarks.
Noah's Beat Box Smashing Pumpkins – Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness Vinyl 4LP Boxset By Noah Springer • April 10th, 2024 Of all the albums from the ’90s alternative rock scene, Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness is one of the most deserving for a deluxe treatment like this.
Casting Deep Meteo Mega Man X Doesn’t Begin Until Dr. Light Sings “My Blue Suit” By Levi Rubeck • April 9th, 2024 Gamers have some idea of flow state but we do not debase ourselves with general gamerisms here.
Don’t Hurt Girls When You Dance (Or Any Other Time) By Juno Stump • April 5th, 2024 We may never know for sure, but I think there’s a reason that so many trans women have been able to identify with Kurt Cobain’s joy, pain and suffering, so strongly.
Area of Effect Some Questions I Personally Find Interesting About Paint By Jay Castello • April 5th, 2024 Cloud Strife might be a cleric. Yes, sorry, I’m talking about the yellow paint.
Rookie of the Year Beers of the Osa Peninsula By Matt Marrone • April 4th, 2024 Consumed at any temperature lower than brain-freeze cold, they are uninspiring at best. When found frigid on a deliriously humid day in the rain forest, however, they are a revelation.
Interlinked A 16-Bit Memorial Garden By Phoenix Simms • April 3rd, 2024 If All the World and Love were Young is not only a stunning elegy for Stephen Sexton’s mother, but an ekphrastic piece about the nature of play and memory.
Mind Palaces Lost in Translation By Maddi Chilton • April 2nd, 2024 I’m reading War and Peace for the first time, and probably the only time, and I’d like to do it right.
Past Presence Octopia is a Sweet Farming Sim That Rewrites Eastward’s History By Emily Price • March 29th, 2024 Simple stories don’t have to overcomplicate themselves to be good.
Funeral Rites Between the Skies and Beyond the Horizon By Justin Reeve • March 28th, 2024 Designer Huffa Frobes-Cross refers to Between the Skies as “rules minimalist, fiction maximalist.”
Feature Excerpt Ueda, Buddha & Me By Perry Gottschalk • March 27th, 2024 Don’t come to these games as experts of others, come to these games as someone who has never played one.
Feature Excerpt This is Your Badness Level: Lilo & Stitch and Mental Health By Orrin Grey • March 26th, 2024 Sometimes watching a cute little blue alien struggle with the same things we struggle with can make it a little easier, at least for a while.
Here's the Thing I Might Be Done with Dreams By Rob Rich • March 15th, 2024 Rob reflects on his previous hopes and dreams, as well as why he doesn’t really have any more of them now. (But not in a depressing way, promise!)
Forms in Light Weaving the Bountiful Threads of Being By Justin Reeve • March 14th, 2024 At what point does a bucket of bolts begin being a person? Does it ever?
Noah's Beat Box Watching Kubrick on My Phone By Noah Springer • March 13th, 2024 To be fair, I have never seen a Kubrick movie in theaters, so this entire thing may be flawed from the get-go.
Casting Deep Meteo Road House Ronin By Levi Rubeck • March 12th, 2024 Miyamoto Usagi and Dalton’s stories aren’t totally parallel, but they rhyme in a lot of ways.
Area of Effect Seasonal Space By Jay Castello • March 8th, 2024 I played one section of Beasts of Maravilla Island and then I got on a bus, and the naked tree branches seemed more interesting than ever.
Rookie of the Year Atomic City: U2 Go Nuclear at the Sphere By Matt Marrone • March 7th, 2024 If I lived in Las Vegas, I wouldn’t be writing this column at all, because I’d be at the show. Again. (And then again.)
Interlinked Making Leaps By Phoenix Simms • March 6th, 2024 Sometimes a certain long-running series will grow alongside you, its relationship with you and your associated subtexts with it morphing over time.
Here Be Monsters In Defense of the Jump Scare: A Manifesto By Emma Kostopolus • March 5th, 2024 Jump scares function as a necessary pressure-release valve for the experience of watching horror, thus allowing the experience to be less unrelentingly tiring.
Mind Palaces And the Crowd Goes Wild By Maddi Chilton • March 4th, 2024 It’s never quite established what Rollerdrome’s sport is reflecting in the society that watches it.
Past Presence What Time Loops Mean to Me By Emily Price • February 29th, 2024 Time loop games give us the opportunity to grow alongside the main character.
Run It Back 1995 By Oluwatayo Adewole • February 28th, 2024 In both Fallen Angels and The Doom Generation we follow dreamers.
Noise Complaint Militarie Gun Rings the Bell By Ben Sailer • February 27th, 2024 A punk song appearing in a Taco Bell commercial forces Ben to hit the drive-thru while reconsidering the gatekeeping attitude of his youth.
Funeral Rites Embarking on a DuckQuest By Alyssa Wejebe • February 26th, 2024 “What if ducks weren’t the comical sidekick? What if ducks were the heroes of the adventure?”
Feature Excerpt Made With Love: Anime Mashups and Their Creators By Justin Kim • February 23rd, 2024 They’re not just shitposts!
Feature Excerpt Fortnite, Eminem and Kidproofing Media in the Age of Content By Holly Boson • February 22nd, 2024 Eminem’s presence in The Big Bang can be interpreted as an apology to the players following their disastrous attempts at childproofing.
Letter from the Editor Unwinnable Monthly – February 2024 By David Shimomura • February 19th, 2024 The really weird stuff happens in February.
Here's the Thing Growing Pains By Rob Rich • February 16th, 2024 Rob revisits his thoughts on toy collecting and how his loose but still focused approach is great, but can also be a real pain at times.
Forms in Light Pacific Palettes By Justin Reeve • February 15th, 2024 Games like Alan Wake 2 provide a glimpse into the Pacific Northwest, allowing us to experience the multifaceted architectural identity of a region largely untouched by modern media.
Noah's Beat Box Museum Piece By Noah Springer • February 15th, 2024 A pilgrimage to “The Culture: Hip Hop & Contemporary Art in the 21st Century” at the St. Louis Art Museum.
Casting Deep Meteo PAX Unplugged 2023 By Levi Rubeck • February 14th, 2024 Breakfast tacos, cloudy donuts, Dark Souls on cardboard and one really, really big organ.
Area of Effect The Call is Coming from Inside the Courtroom By Jay Castello • February 13th, 2024 Great Ace Attorney, set in Meiji era Japan and Victorian London, manages to upend the sacred space of the courtroom.
Rookie of the Year Mysolda: Renewing My Wedding Vows … with an NPC By Matt Marrone • February 13th, 2024 In many ways, my exploits in Skyrim remain the greatest achievements of my pathetic little life.
Interlinked Now You’re Playing with Privilege By Phoenix Simms • February 9th, 2024 With times being as turbulent as they are in real life, sitting and appreciating a game’s artistry feels distinctly useless at times.
Here Be Monsters Loading the Gun: Simulation and Realism in Horror Mechanics By Emma Kostopolus • February 8th, 2024 Horror in game mechanics arises from the difference in how we interact with things that are realistic versus things that absolutely are not.
Mind Palaces Mostly Normal People By Maddi Chilton • February 7th, 2024 In the past few years of weird and superficial social media-based media criticism, a character’s relatability (or, used not synonymously but often close to it, likability) is shorthand for how successful they are within their text.