This is the vault for gaming design, titles released in the past that are still relevant today for design or plot choices.
The Genesis Temple Podcast – Season 1 I did not really plan to start doing a podcast, the podcast planned to start doing me, apparently. There have always been so many people in the industry I wanted to have a chat with that, after the first episode was over and done with, I had a…
Sega was having a weird 1993. It was a moment in the Japanese company’s history where the shift towards the West had never been stronger, since the smash-hit sequel to their strongest franchise was developed by designer Yuji Naka, working with a team that mixed American and Japanese devs: the Mark Cerny-led Sega Technical Institute.…
Reviewing is an easy task, or at least, so it might seem from an external point of view. Just slap together some nice-sounding adjectives, a couple of hyperbole, some light sprinkling of sarcasm and voilà: done. Personally, since I consider that the end product should be useful for the reader, I find it one of…
For the first episode of the Genesis Temple’s podcast I got in touch with Mark Yohalem, of Studio Wormwood. I was impressed with Strangeland and the staggering amount of thought-provoking information provided in the developer’s commentary. We gscheduled a chat, then just went from there, touching upon several topics like Loom, Sanitarium, puzzle design in…
The discussion on storytelling in videogames, especially that around its inherent value, seems to be centered around whether interactivity seems to, somehow, lessen the value of such kind of fiction. Still, as early as the mid-60s, interactive fiction emerged as one of the earliest forms of gaming, going on to enjoy great success in the…
Shadowfire still is one of 1985’s most celebrated home computer titles, produced by young newcomers British developers Denton Designs (the Home of Happiness?), it also was (apparently) the first commercially released title by designer Steven Cain. He developed one of the first adventure games to feature an icon-based interface, that the player could use to…
In our current gaming discussion, questions about the value of “interactivity” seem to have taken a backseat. With Virtual Reality becoming an affordable and – mostly – reliable technology, the “headset and controllers” combination seems to be the end-all for interactive experiences. Not unlike the future imagined by writers and directors in the 80s and…
Futuristic sports have been a moderately successful gaming genre during the whole of the 80s and early 90s, with the Bitmap Brothers’ Speedball II being probably the last great title. Even though there have been some exceptions, even in the last years, it is safe to say that both public and developers have mostly moved…
Back in 2001 – as Dr. Frank N. Furter would put it – it wasn’t easy to have a good time. There were few alternatives, for a PC gamer, to full price titles bought on store shelves: the good free indie titles were still far on the horizon and Macromedia Flash wasn’t yet ready for…
Allow me the comparison: Skitchin’ was to Road Rash what Beavis & Butthead were to The Simpsons. Where Road Rash was direct, brash and kind of rude, Skitchin was rad, awesome and not afraid to flip the bird. Grab your skates, steal a ride on a car bumper and we’re off! Skitchin’, for once on…