On March 25, 2015, the weather in Bellevue, Washington was just warming up enough to play hacky sack, a favorite activity of the employees at the game development studio Her Interactive. That morning, they had something more pressing to think about, though: they couldn’t log into their computers. Server problems,…

In the final year of development on Red Dead Redemption 2, the upcoming Western game, the top directors decided to add black bars to the top and bottom of every non-interactive cutscene in hopes of making those scenes feel more cinematic, like an old-school cowboy film. Everyone agreed it was the right creative move,…

Metal Gear wants the player to fail. The game’s rough edges are part of the growing pains of an early genre, but taken in the context of the entire Metal Gear series, these challenges also feel like horrifying defense mechanisms. As Solid Snake infiltrates Outer Heaven, the player intrudes upon the game’s world.…

Charlie Brown is hesitant. Marcie is shy. Lucy is cruel. Schroeder is aloof. But Franklin is just…perfect.

I hated fighting Faith Seed, the highest-ranking woman in Far Cry 5’s fictional cult. She was confusing, annoying, and—like all the game’s enemies—wanted to kill me. I was supposed to hate her, but I didn’t relish winning our final battle. Faith embodies the ugliness of the game’s cult, The Project at Eden’s Gate,…

Lucy’s relationship to Schroeder was unfulfilling. She craved emotional validation from the one character who was least equipped to provide it. It was both humorous and sad—a contradictory message that Charles Schulz’s Peanuts conveyed so well.

I never pass up the opportunity to drink in a game. I’ve visited every bar in The Witcher 3. I’ve filled Adam Jensen’s pockets with booze in Deus Ex; I’ve chugged those drinks in the bars in Hengsha and Prague, alone in his apartment, or on street corners just because. I’ve gotten Commander Shepard blackout drunk in…

In mid-2016, a few months before the release of their first game, Mafia III, the developers at Hangar 13 in Novato, California gathered for an all-hands meeting. There, according to two people in attendance, Christoph Hartmann, president of the game’s publisher, 2K, told employees that their bonuses would be tied to…

In the first years of my career as a games writer, I got used to a certain reaction from my parents’ friends when they were told about what I was doing for a living. It was usually along the lines of “what a waste”. I imagined them shaking their heads as if they’d just been quietly informed that I was shooting heroin.…

SAN FRANCISCO—Without his mask, Yoko Taro looks like anyone else at the Game Developers Conference. He has a thin grey beard and wears a black hoodie with short, flowing sleeves that wouldn’t seem out of place at Hogwarts. His head is shaved, and his face is round, but otherwise he doesn’t resemble the giant Nier mask…

Overwatch features characters with body types and backgrounds that are not often seen in pop culture, let alone first person shooters. For many of us who rarely see ourselves reflected in media, this cast can seem radical and even life-changing—especially in my case. Zarya, Overwatch’s Russian strong-woman tank,…

It seemed like a surefire hit: a Star Wars take on Uncharted, published by Electronic Arts and developed by the longrunning studio Visceral Games. But nothing is sure in the video game industry, and on October 17, 2017, when employees of Visceral were told that the company would be closing, some who had worked for the…

Video games aren’t what kept José Muñoz in his parents’ basement for much of the past seven years, slipping into depression. They aren’t why the former honor roll student dropped out of college, and they aren’t why he couldn’t get a job. Video games aren’t what sent him to a therapist’s couch, and video games aren’t…

This is an excerpt from my upcoming book, BLOOD, SWEAT, AND PIXELS, which comes out on September 5 and tells the stories behind 10 different games including Diablo III, Uncharted 4, and Star Wars 1313. You can pre-order the book at your favorite bookstore.

In 2012, as work on Mass Effect 3 came to a close, a small group of top BioWare employees huddled to talk about the next entry in their epic sci-fi franchise. Their goal, they decided, was to make a game about exploration—one that would dig into the untapped potential of the first three games. Instead of visiting just…

In the 15 years I worked at Toys “R” Us, I sometimes leaked information about video game sales and posted them on message boards. I even took games home early to try them and then post impressions, which was very much against the rules. I did this because I’ve always been excited about video games and because,…

The Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland recently celebrated its 50th anniversary. The attraction has a timeless appeal, and its greatest strength was its lack of storyline. But then, Disney added Jack Sparrow to the ride in 2006. Sparrow’s inclusion, and the intrusive manner in which it was done, detracts from…

One day in the late 1990s, Myria walked into the Irvine High School computer room and spotted a boy playing Final Fantasy V. There were two unusual things about this. The first was that Final Fantasy V had not actually come out in the United States. To play the 1992 Japanese game in English, you’d have to download a…

There’s an old commercial for Westwood College that’s become something of a running joke in the video game world. Two young men sit at a couch, hammering away at PlayStation controllers. A woman walks in. “Hey guys, finish testing that game yet?” she asks. “I’ve got another one I need designed.”

The date is April 19, 2021. In my bizarre alternate dimension, it’s LeBron James’ first playoff game as a Philadelphia 76er.