Gaming Round-Up: May 25, 2015

"DEADSHOCK" by Romania-based Nagy Norbert

News: The Strong National Museum of Play and the Center for Games Studies and Art Research at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto, Japan are collaborating on an awesome exhibit celebrating the 30th Anniversary of the NES!

Any Key To Start is an interesting blog dedicated to reviewing game interfaces, such as Shadowrun, Shadow of Mordor, or Hearthstone.

Are these really the 50 Greatest PC Gaming Setups of All Time




Bryant Francis of Gamasutra asks where the blockbuster educational games went?
Critical Switch takes a closer look at the JRPG genre.

David Mullich at this year’s GDC on ageism in the game industry.

Derrick Sanskrit of The AV Club considers something you don't often stop to think about - how games use hair to define characters.  The article is illustrated with a hairless Mario.

Devin Vibert suggests creating music for tabletop game sessions

Edwin Evans-Thirlwell of Vice makes a fairly convincing argument for Why EA’s ‘Star Wars’ Games Need to Betray the Fans.

G. Christopher Williams at PopMatters says that what is missing in competitive video games in an inherent behavior of sportsmanship: "In a sense, League of Legends players lack good coaches, who step in to define the boundaries and etiquette of competition, not just how to play the game."

Holly Nielsen explains that the game industry does indeed have a dress code

Jeffery Matulef of Eurogamer discusses the urban legend of Polybius being a government experiment, and the people making a documentary about it.

Kaitlin Tremblay of Dorkshelf talks about her choice of characters in Borderlands

Katie Chironis explains how Big Indie Kickstarters Are Killing Actual Indies.  

"The notion that 'consumers don't actually understand the real cost of game development' isn't a new one, but the true price tag is actually kind of scary, and the illusions put up by large Kickstarters are having a measurable negative effect on Kickstarter as a whole."

Pac-Man turns 35: Six facts on the video game legend

Richard Cobbett argues that Doom 3 isn't the classic that its predecessors were.

Richard Moss of Polygon remembers the very first First Person Shooter, Maze Wars, and how a group of college students made gaming history at the dawn of personal computing.

Shel Shepard of Femhype uses Krem in Dragon Age: Inquisition as an example of how much representation matters.