Delirium Corp
A variety of ramblings on a variety of subjects

Yeah, I know I said I wouldn’t be doing anything productive for two weeks, but there’s something I wanted to talk about real quick.

So, 2013 comes to a close. I hope you had a good year. I sure did. I thought about doing some “year in review” thing, but I got lazy, so I figured I’d just write about what I think is the best game of 2013. And by that I mean the game I played in 2013 that left the largest impact on me, and not which game released in 2013 is the best. Every media outlet and their dog does that, so if you’re looking for that, just go to Polygon or Kotaku. I’m betting that Grand Theft Auto V will top most charts.

Exactly four months today, I published my first article! Hurray, clap clap, I’m so proud of myself. How about some introspection then?

So, there are a bunch of discussions that come up once in a while about how violence in video games might be bad because it might turn people into killers by “training” them. If you want my opinion, that’s a load of radioactive bullshit. But that’s not what I want to talk about here, because I’m really sick of all those scare mongering jerkwads bringing the issue up over and over again despite overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary.

Anyway. I want to talk about the use of violence as a literary device, in the context of interactive media. That’s right, good use of violence can make your game a better one! But not always.

I’ve been playing a bit of The Stanley Parable recently, and it gave me pause for thought. Then I played Gone Home, and it added to my thoughts. So let’s talk about interactive stories.