How the Internet liked Our Personal Space

It's been two and a half months since we launched Our Personal Space and it has been a great success! We've had over 3,000 downloads so far. We've received reviews from videogame websites, mentions on tumblr, and someone even did a let's play. It's possible you're sick of hearing me sing praises of our praises, and if so consider this post "for the record."

Probably our biggest coverage came from Rock, Paper, Shotgun's Freeware Garden feature. Konstantinos Dimopoulos enjoyed the game:

It’s up to you and the choices you make to help this wonderful game tell a tale of hope. A tale of cooperation, peaceful, interesting lives, democracy, love and community in a science fiction setting that masterfully blends future technologies with historical frontier sensibilities; thankfully this time without the brutal slaughter of indigenous peoples.

After the article went up our server went down and I spent the morning chatting with my sister about how to fix things. I found out that I didn't have the most recent installer anywhere! That's what I get for using git. Notes for next time: have a mirror link ready!

 Kimberly at JayIsGames also reviewed the game:

The cast of characters are well drawn and their interactions and the sense of community feel real. While the sci-fi aspect of the game is wonderful, Our Personal Space is not just about physical survival, but ultimately about relationship survival.

On tumblr, the Utah Games Guild, and Fuck Yeah Ren'Py blurbed the game (I actually submitted the post for the Ren'Py tumblr). Gwen at Welcome to Otome Hell wrote a lovely review:

This is a game that allows you to create a character that reacts in the same way you would yourself, and shows legitimate consequences for your actions. Do you want to leave your husband? You can. Do you want to be a loving and devoted wife? You can. Do you want to dedicate yourself to your work and make the colony succeed? You can. Do you want to laze around, learning and doing as little of importance as possible and causing the colony to suffer in consequence? Guess what: you can. I honestly cannot communicate how in love I am with this game. Play it.

Andrea got the game on the Google Play store and we had some very positive reviews there as well. My favorite is from Ace Penguin:

It teaches me to trust people and forgive them . This game makes me feel warm and happy. I wish there are more games like this!

Additionally, SuperPaulGames has done a complete Let's Play on youtube! His commentary is very crass, with lots of sex jokes and fart-type jokes. I didn't watch all of it, but I found it simultaneously annoying and entertaining.

We're grateful to everyone who has played the game and especially those who have said nice things about it. We're planning to submit our game to Indiecade!

On videogame personal essays

I've been reading some of the Games Journalism 2013 shortlist ebook on my e-reader while exercising. First off, it is such a different experience to read games journalism in book-like form. If I feel a little bored, I can't immediately close the tab and start reading something else. So I'm a captive audience. I enjoy most of the articles too, especially the ones that focus on the psychology of videogames, like the one about freemium whales (users who spend lots of money on premium content in free games). There are some close readings of games, and also a fair amount of what I'd call personal essays centered around videogames.

Recently Jonas Kyratzes and Dan Cox (see the comments) mentioned how they're tired of these videogame personal essays. I know in other places people have said that such essays aren't journalism, or that the experience of reading them is unsatisfying. I agree that a personal essay is more like creative writing than journalism. I like reading personal essays about videogames though! I feel like reflecting on the experiences we have in games legitimizes them. It makes me feel better about playing games in my free time. 

I also think that the videogame personal essay is much more accessible than close analysis. Someone who has never played the game you're talking about can still enjoy a personal essay about playing it. It's a little more difficult to engage a naive reader in a technical discussion of a game's design points. For example, I skipped the piece in the games journalism e-book about silent hill savepoints, because it had spoilers for the series, and also because I wasn't sure if I'd really understand the analysis, since I've never played a Silent Hill game (even though I'm pretty sure I've read an article about how awful those save points are). I think this is why the most successful "close readings" of games are often focused on games that are already popular. 

On the other hand, a skillful writer can make game design analysis interesting, usually through the use of diagrams and screenshots. But man, those things are a lot of work! Especially since there isn't a way to take screenshots on the PS3/Wii in the console's software (but even if there were, it would still be a pain to move the files somewhere I could use them). Some day I will do a great game analysis complete with screenshots. 

All games have values and send messages about those values

I was discussing with my husband how Redshirt made some of its players uncomfortable for having sexual bigots as NPCs you can't block (I think that's what went on? Also I want to play this game even more now). In real life you can usually block annoying people online, and it usually doesn't impact your social life too much, unless they're people you know in real life. By having harassment as a sometimes unavoidable occurrence, this game was saying that sometimes you have to pay a price for social status, which is being harassed online, and often there's nothing you can do about it (but often IRL there are things you can do about it, from blocking offenders to changing your e-mail address).

Every game has some type of value assumption. In Chess, once the king has been captured, the other pieces are powerless (just like a real monarchy?). In Go, preserving and marking the most territory is the way to win. I know I'm not the first person to notice that game mechanics convey ethical information, but it's still kind of fun to take things apart and look at their assumptions about the world.

Mario: Other animals in the world are hostile. You can defeat them by becoming higher than them. You can only move forward.

Match-3 games: The world is a better place when you group identical objects together. Spending your time grouping these objects is worthwhile.

TinyWings: Even if your dreams are impossible, aspiring to them is still fun.

Many JRPGs: If you come across an insurmountable boss/obstacle, constant practicing will let you beat him eventually.

Most "freemium" games: Time = money

I find that story-based games are more difficult to classify this way. Much of the time, the values of point-and-click adventures rely on what the story is saying and not on the level of mechanics. In some ways, mechanics-based values feel like a deeper way of communicating; it's not just that someone told you that everything in this world would try to kill you, it's that you experienced it that way.

We are revitalizing games journalism.

There's a piece over at Nightmare Mode by Alan Williamson about how people who are writing about videogames for free are killing games journalism. I disagree with the article in multiple ways.

First off, I don't understand why Alan is so down on people writing about games for free, since he's writing for free for Nightmare Mode and has his own games site, which he explicitly states isn't making anyone money (I've contributed to Nightmare Mode in the past, so I'm going to refer to Alan by his first name). I always thought that Nightmare Mode could at least pay its server costs from ads, but it doesn't. I honestly thought the piece was going to end with Alan telling us they couldn't afford to continue publishing like this and Nightmare Mode was going to be a thing of the past, since that's the logical continuation to me. I think he was more frustrated that good videogame criticism often goes unpaid.

Alan's cognitive dissonance notwithstanding, I disagree with him on principle. Full disclosure: I've been working as an unpaid intern for Killscreen this summer, and I've been following videogame blogs for about two years. I believe that videogame journalism needs the casual, amateur, unpaid voices. 

For game reviews, the wisdom of the masses is more useful than the opinion of a rushed journalist. When I'm thinking of buying a videogame, I overwhelmingly trust things like Amazon reviews, which have little vested interest in maintaining a relationship with a PR contact for more review copies. Amazon reviews have a great variety--people who are fans of the series, people who play lots of games casually, and people who bought the game for their offspring. Basically the only thing professional game journalists have over Amazon reviewers is that they get to have the game sooner, and have an excellent grasp of the politics surrounding the publication of certain games. 

Really good game criticism is hard to find. I'm not talking about "yes! you should rent this game!" I'm talking about criticism that makes me appreciate a game I thought was terrible, or that helps me see the world in a different light. To me, reading really good game criticism is almost more fun than actually playing games. I think big game outlets are gradually realizing this, since they've been snatching up my favorite bloggers. Free games journalism isn't killing paid journalism; it is revitalizing it. 

You don't have to pour hours of research into writing a really good analysis of the level structure in Wolfenstein or a feminist critique of Monkey Island. You do need a good background in literary theory, though almost any liberal arts degree can give you that. Basically, I think videogame criticism can be really good even if it wasn't paid criticism. In fact, I think that unpaid articles are often less frought with "what does my editor want to see on the site?" and "what will give us the most hits?" and more concerned with what individuals writers are passionate about. 

It's perfectly possible to create good writing and get paid for it, I'm just saying that getting paid for writing adds a layer of external concerns. Sometimes those external concerns are about maintaining relationships with videogame developers, whereas an amateur who isn't making a career in games journalism might be more free in their criticisms simply because they don't have a working relationship with the publishers.

Alan's best case against free games journalism is when he states that investigative journalism requires more time and research than a casual interest can justify:

Researched writing is valuable. Investigative journalism is an essential check on the powers of the state, and games journalism is vital to protect us consumers from the motives of greedy corporations, never mind moving the artistic medium forward. I love writing, but frankly I can’t carry out that kind of research and hold a full-time job as well. If that research is your full-time job, whether salaried or freelance, your work will be better for it and readers will appreciate it more. Without the insightful criticism and investigative work that paid journalism allows, you’re left with ten thousand trite reviews and a smattering of Top Ten lists.

Alan's correct in that really good investigative journalism requires a lot of effort, and that the videogame industry would benefit from it, but the majority of stories have nothing to do with investigative journalism beyond "oh so-and-so posted this unpolitic thing on Twitter/Facebook." The most recent debacle with OnLive seems like it could have used some investigative journalism. The Escapist, which prides itself on doing journalism right, noticed that PopCap studios was also having some layoffs, but concluded that "the issue may warrant further investigation." It kind of feels like no one is doing this investigative journalism that Alan speaks of. Maybe there is some good investigative journalism out there and I'm not hearing about it?

so much... investigative journalism?

I think the bigger issue is probably that readers simply aren't as interested in company layoffs as they are in the teaser trailers from Gamescom. Sites that have paid content have plenty of top ten lists--to what mythical paid journalism does Alan refer? I believe he's thinking of more "highbrow" publications...

Alan ends in urging us to put our money where our mouth is and pay more money for existing, impressive magazines like Edge and Killscreen. I think that's a great idea, but Mattie Brice's piece on how our monied culture excludes those who can't afford to vote with their dollars haunts me. If we can't afford such publications, why not support good, free writing by reading it, thinking about it, and responding to it? To me, a community of critical thinkers is much more valuable than my subscription to Killscreen. I agree that the features we used to have daily on the Killscreen website were often really good videogame writing, but I also believe that Nightmare Mode has had articles that are just as good. Your voice matters to me even if you are not paid for it.

"Extra Credits" makes me feel like I'm sitting in class instead of having a discussion with other adults

There's a game commentary cast/video thing called Extra Credits that some of my friends like. I watched a few episodes, and while I completely agree with most of the ideas, for some reason it annoys me. It's not aimed at people who are already caught up in video game philosophy, but for people who might not read the Brainy Gamer. If you've read a few books on gaming or have read any of the "brainy gaming" blogs, it's a given that we're tired of games that re-hash the same old ground only with prettier graphics than before (you know the type--you're usually a white male saving some helpless thing with a big sword or something).

I take it for granted that the people I discuss games with agree on a few things, like that women are often oversexed in games and it would be good to have more diversity in race, age, personality and gender in games, and that well-developed characters are superior to ones that are completely predictable and caricatured. We all know that games could use better writing and that it's an emerging art form, many facebook games are practically unethical in their hacking of human reward psychology, etc. It's hard for me to believe that anyone would disagree with these notions or even not think about them.

Still, the existence of a show like Extra Credits shows me that there is a large audience of gamers who doesn't automatically think of these issues and probably doesn't have a background in literary criticism, and don't mind being lectured  about why diversity and character development in games is important (I prefer a discussion format). I'm glad that there is a sort of middleground for them, appropriately pitched through Penny Arcade. I think that with the proper education, most gamers will agree that there is a great potential for games to be more awesome in the ways Extra Credits describes.