“What actions are ideal in a jump curve?” asked Playdead level designer Martin Fasterholdt to a sizeable crowd for his panel at the Game Developer’s Conference. In a discussion that stemmed from Fasterholdt’s own master thesis, the “You Say Jump, I Say How High?” panel explored the varying degrees o
There’s something perpetually charming about tangible crafts in videogames. Whether it’s the hand-made wool in the iOS space-travelling title Voyager (2012), or the ever-customizable papercraft charm of Tearaway (2013), crafts-turned-aesthetic in games always adds an extra layer of tangibility to an
You’re a kid in a dust-ridden bookstore. The bookshelves rise high, nearly touching the ceiling, with ladders that slide the perimeter. Buried in the back of the store is the oldest of bookshelves. The color’s faded from the bindings of the books that sit within it, the text made hard to read by the
Surrealism, by its least-detailed description, is the illogical illustration of one’s dreams. Be it through painting, writing, or anything else in the art realm. From the works of surrealist pioneer Max Ernst, to the ubiquitous Salvador Dalí, the textbook surreal aesthetic is known far and wide—and
“Shit, this game is hard.” It was the jesting gripe heard ‘round the panel room at the Game Developer’s Conference on Monday, March 14th. A grievance that, surprisingly, came from game developer Ojiro Fumoto himself while playing a live tech demo of an early prototype of his own game: Downwell. Fumo
