Reviews
Alex Bullock
Writer
United Kingdom
Journalism graduate and writer of words on games, sport and pop culture.
United Kingdom
Journalism graduate and writer of words on games, sport and pop culture.
Reviews
My rag-tag, six-man squad of escaped convicts and lone wanderers is in pretty decent shape. Sneaking below an overpass we manage to hack into a mech, then snipe his lone alien lookout in one fell swoop. Cover blown, I have the mech sprint towards the objective to do some damage while my squad repositions.
My review of the opening episode in DONTNOD's take on teen drama
Episodic games are an interesting evolution. If you're being cynical, they're a legitimisation of the 'early access' format: a way to secure investment based on a glorified demo of a game, with a larger windfall when all the chapters are finished.
If episode two of Life is Strange showed what games stand to gain from the episodic format, the third deals with a familiar problem: the mid-season lull. With the plot established and time travel puzzling shorn of its novelty value, the greater part of episode three falls to character development.
There are a few convenient parallels between Dark Room and Inside Out, my two cultural outlays from this past week. Both address the inner monologues and daily travails of young women with almost remarkable success. Both are sharply written, addressing weighty concepts with a funny, humane edge. And both are completely emotionally devastating.
A couple of hours and several frustrating misdirects into Life is Strange's finale - tellingly titled Polarised - and I'm a bit worried. A customary but ill-timed sag in the writing and a lack of agency have taken the sheen off episode four's great reveal, and the plot has only plodded from here.
Opinion
Does anyone truly dislike CD Projekt Red? I want to be more reserved, more pessimistic. Google's increasingly liberal interpretation of its infamous 'don't be evil' pledge has proved the dangers of canonising good intentions. Yet it's hard to see a chink in the Polish developer's doublet.
With the latest instalment in EA Sports' most domineering franchise only a week away, suggesting improvements may seem a little futile. For me, they would be anyway. FIFA is an annual addiction, and as such, my only recourse is to reflect on the ways I vainly hope that this next year won't frustrate me.
There was a sad inevitability about the reaction to The Gamechangers, the Grand Theft Auto documentary which aired yesterday on the BBC. It seemed to come into being all too quickly, from Daniel Radcliffe's surprising casting a few months ago to its cliff notes adaptation of an already spurious book, to the awful pun of a title; a reprise of every lame video game related news article from the past twenty years.
University work
Writing and layouts on the theme of international politics, from a final year magazine project (not to be confused with the intl. police task force)
My three part series on the state of eSports, looking at the rise of League of Legends, Twitch and problems in the amateur scene. Inc. quotes from players and journalists
A feature on Nintendo's fortunes at the launch of the PS4 and Xbox One, inc. an interview with former MSN Tech editor Paul Lamkin
Written for uni and posted on Fortitude Magazine, this feature on game movies includes an interview with RPS & Edge writer David Valjalo
A poorly structured long-form piece on the development of narrative structure. First published on Gamer UK, and featured in Rock Paper Shotgun's Sunday Papers round-up