Tag: videogames

  • Zero Suit Samus: From Sexist to Strong

    Zero Suit Samus: From Sexist to Strong

    Zero Suit Samus is as old as Metroid itself. Since her introduction, she has become a character in her own right. Originally, she was an unlockable ‘reward’ in the first Metroid game. The closing sequence would see Samus remove her suit to reveal more skin the faster your time. The 1980s clearly have not aged…

  • Waiting for Animal Crossing

    Waiting for Animal Crossing

    The Nintendo Switch was released in March 2017. That makes the new console nearly a year and a half old; and quite the year and a half it’s been. We have seen long-awaited releases such as The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Super Mario Odyssey, and we are awaiting titles such as…

  • Should Trigger Warnings be Commonplace in Gaming?

    Should Trigger Warnings be Commonplace in Gaming?

    Video games have always been a type of media and entertainment that, in a way, combine books and films. You get to see what is happening to have a visual to go along with the storyline, much like a movie. You also get to come up with your own ideas, your own head canon to…

  • Honest Mental Health and Night in The Woods

    Honest Mental Health and Night in The Woods

    Video Games don’t have a fantastic record of depicting mental health. The increasing attention on plot focused games has shown the medium is pretty far behind. As well as fantastic LGBT representation, Night in The Woods depicts mental health in an honest and relatable way. It makes the characters seem real, while still not defined by…

  • Why are Gamers So Angry?

    Why are Gamers So Angry?

    Hey, dude raging in the voice chat, quick question: when did gaming stop being fun? No, seriously. When did the joy of playing a video game get sucked out of your life? I can tell you when it left mine. It’s when people like you started to become the loud minority of gamers that other…

  • Is There a Link Between Intelligence and Playing Video Games?

    Is There a Link Between Intelligence and Playing Video Games?

    The stereotype that gamers are lazy slobs has been floating around ever since video games were first invented. Although I don’t see anything wrong with leading a chill life, there’s now scientific research to prove the haters wrong. A recent study was conducted by the University of York (United Kingdom), on the link between video…

  • Horror Games That Don’t Rely On the ‘Mental Illness is Scary’ Trope

    Horror Games That Don’t Rely On the ‘Mental Illness is Scary’ Trope

    If I asked you to think about the average horror game setting, then chances are that your mind probably wandered to an abandoned mental hospital, or a spooky forest inhabited by “crazy people.” I know mine does. The horror game market is so overly saturated in games about mentally ill villains, that it’s clear many…

  • The Hypocrisy of our Love of Sheik: A Character to be Seen and Not Heard

    The Hypocrisy of our Love of Sheik: A Character to be Seen and Not Heard

    The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, wasn’t a very popular game in my social group. The Scottish kids I grew up with were more interested in soccer, boy-girl pop groups, and Furbys. As such, I never really heard the name ‘Zelda’ being thrown around. [SPOILERS For Breath of the Wild, Ocarina of Time, and…

  • Why We Need a Bigger Feminist Let’s Play Community

    Why We Need a Bigger Feminist Let’s Play Community

    If there’s one thing that I wish there was more of on YouTube, it’d be more feminism, specifically within the Let’s Play community. There are many Let’s Players out there who have called themselves feminists, or at least hold some feminist values, but imagine a video game channel that was dedicated purely to feminist discourse…

  • Maternity Leave and Democracy 3

    Maternity Leave and Democracy 3

    I purchased Democracy 3 on Steam in June 2014 after watching Sips play the game on YouTube and feeling incredibly frustrated with how he played the game. Everything was dandy. My first seven hours into the game were fantastic. During hour eight, however, I noticed the connections below when hovering over the “Maternity Leave” bubble in…

  • Safe Spaces For Dark Tasks

    Safe Spaces For Dark Tasks

    Videogames let us do some pretty fucked up things. Sometimes that’s part of their appeal, after all nobody played Postal for its gripping narrative. It was a rampage murder sim that garnered enough of an audience that it was far from the first or last of its kind. Videogames never made us subversive and terrible,…