Yeah, I'm totally spoiled from the integrated voice chat for pretty much every online multiplayer game I own for the Xbox 360 and now the PS4. I can see why Nintendo would shy away from the kinds of design standards that allow for unchecked bullying and harassment online, but there has to be a way to make it opt-in…

Ha! I wasn't going anywhere. AFAIK, the game makes you commit to another race before you can say something, and I was really struggling to get any messages out before the next track started loading.

Oh shit! I just learned that Overcooked just got a free DLC pack called Festive Seasoning! Forget what I said, before. I'm only playing that this weekend! Time to chop!

I was and am Monk! I did get lucky with an early lead a couple of times, protecting my ass with a banana the whole way. There's definitely a slight advantage to frontrunning in our group. Though, it's tough to resist the temptation to shoot the person right in front of you when really you should save those red…

Yes, please!

That was tons of fun! I can assure you I didn't mind winning a good portion of our one-on-one races, especially since I knew you were right behind me waiting for that one missed turn or ill fated banana mishap. I though for sure you were going to win the last one on Rainbow Road when I blew the final turn into the…

This week, I dove headfirst into Competitive Mode in Overwatch as a solo-queuer! I had never done anything more than a couple of placement matches in Season 1, so I had no idea what to expect. After running through the ten placement matches in two sittings, I found myself at a respectable Gold Tier Ranking. A…

I've seen a lot of folks toss out the "you had to be there" defense when discussing their love of the Final Fantasy series, but I don't know if that tells the whole story. For some folks, it was the first game that really captured their imagination and expanded their notions of what a video game could be. I'm sure…

You end up fighting them both. It's pretty convoluted, but here's the short version:

I hear Mage Knight by Vlaada Chvatil is pretty great for single-player tabletop RPG fun.

I was really impressed by the hacking aspects of Gunpoint. At first it seems really simple and unimpressive: Hack wall panel to open security door, turn off lights, sneak past guards.

Two things at play:
1.a. Did they get an early review copy? 1.b. How early did they get it?
2. How freaking long is this interminable game?
(Gameological reviewers play their games to the end, and the reviews are better for it.)

It seems like there's an unquestioned mandate among American game marketing teams that [box art] = [main character in power stance]. They must flip out for games that don't have any characters. Even with Demon's Souls, where the character was already shown in the box art (albeit dead), they switched to the same…

Wow. This sounds like a powerful game that only needs a few nudges in the right direction to become a perfect game. It's disappointing that the devs let a few typical game design mandates get in the way of their vision. I feel like there's a pretty broad line between helpful hints for the truly stuck player and the…

I'd rather not try to decide what "counts" as a real relationship in games. In many of these games, the player is being served up a power fantasy and the devs are most certainly reluctant to add story elements that might disrupt that fantasy. Dudes can be friends, but not so friendly as to incite "gay panic" in the…

I'm not sure I follow. We get at least a handful of bromance tossed into everything from Gears of War to Uncharted. It might not be the only character development going on in a game with male protagonists, but it's pretty dang likely to show up. Probably the only experience that's more commonly represented in…

From what I've seen, this entry definitely feels like it's content to treat women as things to be observed, won as a prize, or otherwise used and discarded. A huge downgrade from the playable characters with stories, motivations, and real development.

It's fine if you happen to enjoy a good "male friendship" story. I just feel like so much video game code has been spent rendering a variation on the "male friendship" story for decades now, not to mention countless movies and TV shows. You really don't have to look hard to find a study in male experience in the…

I mean, she is the last Ancient, and being able to talk to the planet/dead people is pretty dang magical.

Yeah, so I've been MIA this week, but I promise I'm not dead! Just ridiculously busy (really I should be working right now). But I do want to weigh in on FFXV's decision to lose interest in female characters for anything other than ogling. I can only image how that conversation went.