The Seven Hour City
Half-Life 2’s City 17 remains a masterclass of subversive game design.
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The powerless reality of Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture
An inability to interact with the world of Rapture forces players to pay attention.
Game creator Erin Robinson Swink on the challenge of creating meaningful games
You cannot fail in Gravity Ghost, but it can still move you.
Rambling Through the Garden
A conversation with the makers of The Talos Principle.
Behind the Sega-core racing tunes of Horizon Chase
These screaming synthesizers are more revival than retro.
The Technical Challenges of Virtual Reality
Why a basic computer won’t let you step into virtual worlds.
A Two5six conversation about surveillance, in games and out of it
The game designer as hacker
The Literary Heritage of Sunless Sea
Or: why all those poor captains had to die.
The horror of Resident Evil 2’s police station
The impossible spaces of Resident Evil 2 recall The Shining’s Overlook Hotel.
Who We Aren’t Anymore
A look back to understand who we are now.
The bittersweet pleasures of patriarchy lite
The post-masculine media, from TV to games.
A Two5six conversation with Forza’s Dan Greenawalt and BMW designer Chris Bangle
The future of car culture, in a world where kids don’t even want driver’s licenses.
The future of communication is the .gif
On the convergence of Facebook and Magic: The Gathering.
Drawing in the 21st Century
Thinking about drawing as coding.
Feeling Alone in Everbody’s Gone to the Rapture
Who are you in Everbody’s Gone to the Rapture?
Mario: A Memoir
We relate to each other through culture—until we can’t.
Tearing the Fabric
Some psychedelic implications of Super Mario World.
Mario Maker: The Platformer Platform
Mario Maker feels less like a Kyoto product than a Silicon Valley one
The ruthless capitalism of Wario Land: Super Mario Land 3
How Nintendo slipped a critique of Western values into its mega-hit series
Forget Mario. Let’s talk about Peach.
Mario and Peach’s relationship is #complicated.
The terrifying comedy of Mario glitches
A conversation with the main who distorts and defiles your favorite childhood game.
Does Mario have a penis?
A philosophical enquiry into the existence of Mario’s penis.
The cultural origins of the Mushroom Kingdom
Mario’s mythological background is a tribute to Miyamoto’s creativity.
The 100 Million Deaths of the Martyr We Call Mario
What happens to Mario when he dies?
Wa?
Degrees of duality in Mario, vis a vis Wario.