"The small institutions, public figures and spaces that I lament might all seem insignificant but, collectively, used to and still could make a difference, despite capital's determined attempts to neuter their efficacy via co-option and divide and rule. I've often felt elements of the atheist left wing ought to tone down their strident hectoring and remember that social justice is at the heart of many Christian movements, especially Methodism. Similarly, many Christians should consider that Jesus told them to care for the poor, not peer judgementally into people's bedrooms." Amongst other things in this thoughtful, cogent article – which made a nice alternative from the yelling on social media and the yelling on media platforms from, well, pretty much everyone. (Also: Ramsgate Music Hall looks great; I did not even know).

Monster Hunter's success comes down to its local-only multiplayer, which has been a huge hit in Japan, but less so over here. To promote Freedom Unite, Capcom open a pop-up meeting-space on Charing Cross Road, simply to provide a space for Monster Hunters to congregate. You'll need a PSP to be allowed to enter. I have no idea if this is going to work out, but there's something about the idea – creating public spaces designed for the playing of videogames, together – that I rather like.

"LÖVE is an unquestionably awesome 2D game engine, which allows rapid game development and prototyping in Lua." And it all looks rather pretty, too. Must investigate further!

danah's PhD dissertation. I need to bookmark this, and have not read it yet, but am sure, at some point, I am going to plough through it, for work, recreation, or (most likely) a bit of both. Until then: just a bookmark.

"I still have nothing but respect for my more traditional industry colleagues, but I’ve stopped worrying about impressing the games industry and its pundits. Or at least, I’ve stopped worrying about impressing them first. Instead, I’ve started focusing more on the people who might be interested in different kinds of game experiences. People who fly for business more than three times a month, or people who read all of the Sunday newspaper, or people who have kids with food allergies, for example. I am sure these people read magazines and watch television and listen to the radio. But it would be short-sighted to label them ziners or tubers or airwavers. They are just people, with interests, who sometimes consume different kinds of media." Bogost is right, and I'm concerned I'm always going to be ashamed I chose to use that word.

"It is a commonplace that if it weren’t for computers we couldn’t fly to the moon, or even keep an accurate record of the national debt. On the question of how it does what it does, however, the computer has always remained essentially mysterious—unfathomable to all but a small handful of initiates. An officer of one major computer concern guessed recently that not more than 2% of his employees really know how it works." 2% seems awfully high these days. Detailed, technical article from Life in 1967.

"This is not intended to be a fun game. It has all the trappings of a LEGO game. It has the forgiving game mechanics. The ease of control. But it uses these elements to create a cognitive dissonance between the ease of the actions and the terrible nature of their real world counterparts." Corvus hypothesises what A Lego Clockwork Orange might look like. Thoughtful stuff.

"So why not embrace it? That's why You Have To Burn The Rope is fantastic… for games to become art there must be an awareness and a conversation with its own history. Film, music, and literary critic call this allusion, but for the creators, this isn't just a word, it's a dialogue. Which means it should invite participants. For me, I'm far more intrigued by stop-motion artist Patrick Boivin's attempt at turning a linked sequence of videos into Youtube Street Fighter." I'm not sure I agree with Wang on YHTBTR, specifically, but this paragraph is reasonably sensible.

65 years since the end of the siege of Leningrad, this LJ post shows photographs from the late 1940s merged with images of the location in the present. All are striking; some are very sad. Great contextualisation, though.