interview

Researching for my piece on visual innovators in games, I sent a few questions to Alientrap Games, developers of the fabulous Apotheon, the world's first and finest sidescroller inspired by ancient Greek pottery. Here's what the game's art director Jesse McGibney had to tell me.

In your own words: What makes your game's visual style unique?

In your own words: What makes your games' visual style unique?

In the series WORD/PLAY we look at the fusing of literature and games. The link to the the written word is almost as old as the videogame itself, and recent developments both on the side of literature and the videogame have shown that the relationship between the two media is as vital and strong as ever. Note: This interview first appeared for Haywire Magazine.

Icaught up with Jon Ingold, creative director and one half of inkle studios, for a chat about about presentation, mechanical transparency and procedural prose. Jon’s fantastic GDC talk is available online and you can find him and inkle on Twitter.

SPIEL/FILM is a series of articles by Ciprian David and Rainer Sigl on the differences and similarities between and the convergence of two media - games and movies. 

It is no exaggeration to state that John Hyams is a cult director in the making. The son of Hollywood veteran Peter Hyams has already been called the best action director working today and has proven his extraordinary talent in his few full-length genre movies - a talent which has as yet remained under the mainstream's radar.  Discerning critics have compared his work on the "Universal Soldier"-series with that of influential cult directors like John Carpenter, Gaspar Noe, David Cronenberg, Werner Herzog or David Lynch:

Universal Soldier: Day of Reckoning is the most exceptional movie of 2012 in part because it has no right to be as good as it is. ... [Hyams] made a strange, haunting, sometimes even beautiful odyssey that lingered with me more than any American movie in recent memory. Despite a few surprised critical notices (like this and this), [Universal Soldier: DoR] was too disreputable to be talked about during awards season, but that’s okay. Anything this unusual deserves its own conversation.

In the series WORD/PLAY we look at the fusing of literature and games. The link to the the written word is almost as old as the videogame itself, and recent developments both on the side of literature and the videogame have shown that the relationship between the two media is as vital and strong as ever.