No words, … it’s Gears!!! (The Coalition, 2016)
Video Game Tourism E05: Rise of the Tomb Raider’s astounding beauty
Having played Uncharted 4 (Naughty Dog, 2016), it is hard to dive into an action-adventure game without expecting too much from it. But Rise of the Tomb Raider (Crystal Dynamics, 2016), surprisingly, gets the job done—though with a different focus. The game involves the player in the role of Lara Croft venturing on a most…
Video Game Tourism E04: Nature and the Sublime in Firewatch
Firewatch (Campo Santo, 2016) is video game narrative whose experience is something rarely achieved in video game fiction. It begins in the form of a classic text-adventure to then move into the realms of modern versions of the genre. The game, thereby, sets the player into the role of Henry, who struggles with personal issues…
Video Game Tourism E03: BioShock Infinite Part I, Wish-Fulfillment and The Journey to Utopia
Welcome to the first out of three parts of Video Game Tourism on BioShock Infinite (Irrational Games, 2013). As the game is diverse, and to offer you a “complete” experience of it, the segmentation in three episodes seemed necessary. The first part thus deals with Booker DeWitt’s journey to Utopia, where he encounters the enigmatic…
Video Game Tourism E02: Vistas, Gaps, and Thieves: Drake’s Search for Inner Peace
In the second episode of Video Game Tourism, I wish to share with you my personal moments from Uncharted 4 (Naughty Dog, 2016) as I accompany Nathan Drake on his search for inner peace–and on the more tortu(r)ous route he takes until he finally discovers the treasure he so desperately has been searching for.
No Man’s Sky Diary_Log Entry_02: The Euclidian Galaxy_Spacetime_12.08.2016
The hyperdrive was purring as the Rasamama S36 jumped to another system of the Euclidian galaxy. The space that lay before me was vast, and I soon accepted the unfathomable magnitude of the universe; accepted to never see beyond the bricks and puzzle stones of a greater totality—if such a thing even existed. Confronted with…
The Game Tourist: Impressions from The Last of Us
https://www.instagram.com/thegametourist/ The Last of Us (Naughty Dog, 2014 Remastered) is perhaps storyplaying in perfection. It sets the player within a post-apocalyptic world and has him experience the dystopia it simulates. Probably the most important aspect of the game is the relationship between Joel and Ellie, which on a basic plot level illustrates the struggles of fatherhood…
No Man’s Sky Diary_Log Entry_01: The Rasamama S36_Spacetime_10.08.2016
No Man’s Sky Diary The following notes are brief. Nonetheless they describe my venture into the vastness of the universe, in search for … I don’t know yet. The Rasamama S36; Spacetime 10.08.2016 August 10th, space year 2016… The Rasamama S36 had crashed, and I was forced to reassemble it, collecting materials from the…
The Success behind Super Mario
“It’s a me, Mario!” In a recent article, Super Mario: The Success behind the Jumping Video Game Plumber (original title: Super Mario: Deshalb ist der hüpfende Videospiel-Klempner so beliebt), Sebastian Richly investigates upon the reasons behind Mario’s ongoing success. I had the pleasure of helping in the process, and was asked several questions. We discerned several reason…
The Stanley Parable: Dystopia and the Implied Player (DiGRA 2015 Diversity of Play)
At this year’s DiGRA, I had the pleasure of giving a talk about „The Stanley Parable: Dystopia and the Implied Player”. To give you a brief summary: The talk mainly aimed at uncovering dystopia’s implied warning within the game itself. Every dystopia is inherently didactic, in that it tries to warn us of a potential…
Agency and Personal Responsibility in Telltale’s The Walking Dead
The article was previously released in the January issue of Making Games magazine and online at www.makinggames.de. The present atricle shows some minor corrections. In an attempt to evolve the medium of the video game on an aesthetic level, Telltale’s post-apocalyptic vision in The Walking Dead steps away from competitive combat and lays strong emphasis on meaningful narrative…
Happy Birthday Good Old Friend!
To celebrate the 25th anniversary of the original Game Boy, I took the liberty of posting this picture. The original Game Boy was my first gaming console (or system) and I hereby want to thank Nintendo and the Game Boy for introducing video games to my life. Happy Birthday good old friend!