[This week, our partnership with game criticism site Critical Distance brings us picks from Kris Ligman on topics including how Mass Effect's Krogan are analogous to white man's burden, and more.] The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated. Welcome to another fantastic week of gaming commentary, criticism and insights! It's This Week in Video Game Criticism! We kick things off with an essay from Shay Pierce, the lone Omgpop employee holdout who made news this week by refusing to join his company's merger with social game giant Zynga:
"When an entity exists in an ecosystem, and acts within that ecosystem in a way that is short-sighted, behaving in a way that is actively destructive to the healthy functioning of that ecosystem and the other entities in it (including, in the long term, themselves) — yes, I believe that that is evil. And I believe that Zynga does exactly that."
Also blogging against the grain, Harold Goldberg takes the Smithsonian game art exhibit to task for groupsourcing its selections by popular vote. And Joel Goodwin parodies the lack of nuance games exhibit in trying to model complex human behavior, like parenthood. Meanwhile, Evan Narcisse digs deep into why representation and gamer culture matter to him personally in "Why I'm Worried About My Daughter's Video Game Future":
"It's not enough to just make a protagonist—or worse, a sidekick—black. Why? Because of the Hunger. The Hunger is the angry growling in the pit of a black nerd's soul that asks constantly, "where are we in the big picture?" It manifests differently for everybody. Nevertheless, I don't want to pass on The Hunger to my daughter. I want the video games of the future to make her feel welcome."
Two articles took an unusual approach to design criticism this week. First we have Tom Francis in his tribute to Proteus
"a first-person exploration game in which the components of the music you hear depend on what you're standing near to. And the time of day, and what's going on in the rest of the music, and probably some other factors."
Meanwhile, Zach Alexander wonders if we can consider saving and saved games a part of the gameplay. Our good frenemy Eric Lockaby is at it with his latest installment of "How You Got Video Games Wrong," in which he explicates how the fundamentals of design (old media and new) go much deeper than we're used to discussing them. As the discussion on Mass Effect 3 plows onward, we're still seeing some noteworthy and original response articles popping up. Top marks this week go to Patricia Hernandez, who writes in Gameranx about the racial problem of the Krogan.
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