Review: The OnLive Cloud Gaming System

All right, maybe one final post for 2011.

I did spend a few weeks with an Onlive system, got to play Braid through, got to try out Assassin's Creed: Revelations and Amnesia, got to be spied on by other players while playing aforementioned titles.

The system worked exceptionally well for me on PC, and in many ways, it feels like the future of gaming--something akin to streaming video and the like. I don't know that they have all the kinks worked out, but I like the library of games and the structure feels right.

The OnLive Cloud Gaming System

The Problem of the Female Gangster

Kind of a weird post to wrap up the year, but it probably is my last post until January.

This time out I consider the recent talk arising from the release of the Grand Theft Auto V trailer about the possibility that some fans were holding out for a female protagonist for the upcoing title. This is something that I have given some thought to in the past, and in the post, I hope that I articulated a lot of my thinking about it.

To me, writing a credible female gangster is problematic because Rockstar tends to rely on historical and cultural precedents. The female gangster and really women and criminality are both actually rather alien or strangely handled concepts in Western history and media.

Here are a few more thoughts on the potential pitfalls of trying to build this type of character:

The Problem of the Female Gangster

Moving Pixels Podcast: The Curse of 3s, or the 2011 Holiday Gaming Season

This will be the last podcast of the year, so we decided to just chat a bit about the state of games during the holiday season. I observed a couple weeks ago that a kind of overly polished quality marks a lot of the sequels of this season, which includes an awful lot of games that are the third in a series. So, basically we used the idea of questioning the value of sequels in the industry as a jumping off point about the year in gaming.

Moving Pixels Podcast: The Curse of 3s, or the 2011 Holiday Gaming Season

The Moving Pixels Podcast Discusses Deus Ex: Human Revolution

A lost Moving Pixels podcast of sorts this week. This episode was recorded way back near the release of Deus Ex, so its responses are fresh--even if its topic is not.

The Moving Pixels Podcast Discusses Deus Ex: Human Revolution