Joseph Bernstein

The game about shoving people gets even funnier

Yesterday, Unfinished Swan mastermind Ian Dallas told our Yannick LeJacq that deliberate humor in games is hard. He didn’t say anything, however, about pre-release mockumentary trailers. Rad Dragon, the indie behind Shove Pro, a new chase-scene and shove game, released this week a short about their

ESRB announces new self-report digital ratings, trolls cackle with delight

The Electronic Software Ratings Board announced a new, streamlined way to rate the flood of digital-download games washing into the market: The ESRB’s new “Digital Rating Service” gives developers and publishers access to a “brief but detailed online questionnaire” to define a product’s content, age

See, we aren’t the only people who didn’t like Dishonored

The INTERNET reacted with great anger and furious vengeance when we published Ben Richardson’s mixed-to-negative review of Dishonored.  You know what? We felt a little bullied. But then! Penny Arcade said the exact same thing, in succinct, comic form. And then! Internet treasure Yahtzee agreed.  So

Do game writers have the right vocabulary to do their job?

Michael Abbott has an essential post at Brainy Gamer today about the state of game writing as it relates to the experience of playing indie games. Game writing, he argues, has ossified into shorthand that does not capture what it is to play truly new-feeling games: What emerges is a stark and narrow

Are board games primed for a renaissance?

Edge reports that digital versions of popular board games, created to serve the booming tablet audience, have greatly boosted sales: While the popularity of the boardgame has never been in question, the growing number of touchscreen enabled devices – and the broad market reach of those products – ha