I found the concept of this interesting, a playable essay on game design, and I'd love to see more things like it. Going through the examples, and seeing moments from other games recreated to illustrate the definitions was really effective. The artstyle was neat, though it certainly had some serious drawbacks (the handwritten font in particular being almost unintelligible at times, enemies completely blending into their surroundings, etc). I'm glad I took the time to experience it, I wouldn't mind it leading to more things like it. Unfortunately, like a lot of essays though, it does end up hinging on what the essayist's opinions actually are, and at the end of this, nothing really new or insightful here.

essentially another jonathon blow-esque claim that only pure interactivity and systems is TRUE 'video game'. and just, yawn? thought we left this tired take behind a decade ago. begging game designers to take some art + humanities classes.

i think the funniest thing for me personally was just that the title in my mind evoked what could've been a radical essay redefining what we even view as meaningful 'interaction' in games, but instead it's literally just the game crit status quo as always believed. oh well.

Reviewed on Feb 12, 2024


1 Comment


2 months ago

idk if it's really trying to say or even imply that interactivity= true video game or anything tbh, just presenting some ideas and whether those ideas are new or exciting or not is down to your experience with reading/engaging in game crit i suppose. for me these were fairly new ideas as I'm still kinda green to this medium.

curious what you mean by "begging game designers to take some art + humanities classes" too?