Konami has been running a holiday poll asking fans to vote on best couple from a game for Valentine’s Day, and while several selections have been straightforward — actual couples — on their official @Konami Twitter (and I assume the associated poll, but the links no longer work), there have […]
Alisha Karabinus
185 posts
I’ve been thinking a lot about the continued impacts of GamerGate lately, though not perhaps in the larger sense of wondering what it all means, but how it jibes with my experience with and in gaming media. While it’s been several years since I did any writing about games outside […]
A recent post on the Feminist Frequency tumblr titled “One Week of Harassment on Twitter” detailed just that — a week’s worth of tweets directed at Feminist Frequency, at Anita Sarkeesian, and at feminists in general, especially those associated in any way with gaming critique. Some are wildly ridiculous, almost […]
Way back in early 2012, I bought my son a little mouse for his fourth birthday. He had played a few very simple computer games at preschool and at the library, and of course he loved the Xbox 360 and his iPad, but he hadn’t shown any real interest in […]
Last week, I wrote about the revelation that Mass Effect’s Commander Shepard was originally conceived as a woman, at least in visuals (not necessarily in terms of game content), a piece that sparked a bit of discussion on my Facebook page about the nature of the industry and reality. “Reality” […]
Late last week, Jonathan Cooper revealed on Twitter that, in the earliest animation tests for Mass Effect, the character of Commander Shepard was a woman, and the online equivalent of confetti was thrown by fans who played, and loved, Mass Effect through a female-centric lens. FemShep, after all, is the […]
So often, when anyone calls for greater diversity in video games, their requests are met with one very common answer: “You want something different? Make it yourself.” These days, we’re told, anyone can make a game. It’s so easy. The tech requirements have been reduced to almost nothing; with a […]
The new DLC for Undead Labs’ State of Decay is more than an add-on: Lifeline is, in some ways, a whole new game. Lifeline brings a new map, new strategies, new characters, new story, and nearly a whole new feel to the table, and while part of the new frills […]
With the third installment of the second season of Telltale Games’ take on the powerhouse Walking Dead franchise, the game seems to have finally hit its whole stride. This isn’t to say I didn’t love the first season, or the previous episodes in the follow-up, but the latest in the […]
In the first part of this study of Telltale Games’ The Walking Dead, I questioned whether the Bechdel Test was the best benchmark for judging whether or not a piece of media had something to offer in terms of good female characterization. Is the Bechdel Test enough, or does even […]
Warning: discussion of sexualized youth ahead. With the announcement of a US/EU version of Monster Monpiece, a Japanese Vita game featuring both a card game RPG and the vigorous screen-rubbing of virtual girls, some controversy has risen over the game’s cut content. As part of the localization, some of the […]
Recently there’s been a lot of discussion in the media about the top films of 2013 and the Bechdel test. Movies with real, rounded female characters are doing well, by the numbers, and with award season picking up, we’ll likely see more of these reports. Unfortunately, anyone who studies the […]
In my continuing look at game covers, I thought I’d explore the best-rated games of 2013 according to Metacritic’s compiled review scores. So far, I’ve looked at top-selling games instead of best-rated, or I’ve looked at a particular selection, as when exploring Xbox indies, and the results have been surprisingly […]
Possible triggers: sexual violence and assault. Game developer Brianna Wu of Giant Spacekat recently wrote a an essay that started as an examination of a game-of-the-year podcast and became a critique of gaming podcasts in general, an essay demonstrating how the dominant paradigm in gaming journalism — typically straight, white, […]
Okay, I promise, this is the last time this year I’ll talk about it, but after several fits and starts and test games, the epic playthrough of State of Decay: Breakdown has taken over my life. Something simmering on the stove? Knock out a mission. Taking a break from wrapping […]
At last: the game I’ve waited for all year, or at least, the beginning of it: the debut episode of The Walking Dead’s second season, All That Remains, starring the young and vulnerable Clementine. For me, this episode’s release was an Event (capital E), and so I hope you’ll forgive […]