Best O' 2015

2015 was a huge year for me. I got a new job at Phil Collins Magazine, met a lot of cool new people, and moved to a New York City. But as all that was going on, I still had time to consume, and even create, some new media. Here are the best.

Best Video Game that Almost Made My Eyes Bleed- StarCraft II: Legacy of the Void

Some other cool games- Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain, Super Mario Maker, Splatoon, Her Story

Best Movie that Almost Made My Eyes Water- Creed


Some other cool movies- Mad Max: Fury Road, The Big Short, Anomalisa, Star Wars: The Force Awakens (the best Daniel Craig film of 2015)

Best Parody of the Best TV Show Ending of 2015- Don Draper Invents Pizza Bagels



Best Wholly Legitimate Phrase of 2015- Famous Star Wars Franchise Character Emperor Sheev Palpatine

Best Things I Wrote in 2015-

The Cards Against Humanity Tabletop Deathmatch Interviews

Valve’s Movie Brats: Inside the Source Filmmaker Community

Heroes of the Storm Review (or Why MOBAs are Bad and You Should Feel Bad)

Games to Go (Video Reviews of Cool Mobile Games)



Of Art and Oven Mitts: The Death and Life of Followers (a Postmortem on the Tortured Production of My Silly Student Short Film)

Four Years of 148Apps, or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love iOS Games


Best Time I Spit On Camera

Games to Go

Check out "Games to Go," my new video series on PCMag.com covering mobile games, something I've been doing a lot of these past few years. This first episode is on Fallout Shelter.

Four Years of 148Apps

Today was my last day writing about iOS games for 148Apps.com. I wrote a big, sappy essay about the four years I spent there. Enjoy! And stay tuned for BIG EXCITING NEWS regarding my future career in nerdy journalism VERY SOON!

The Lego Movie's secret gaming roots

When The Lego Movie came out last year I was curious if the creators had been influenced by the similarly wacky storytelling of the Lego video games. So I did some investigating. What did I find? Read this feature on Geek.com, a site I've been recently writing for, to find out!

http://www.geek.com/games/the-lego-movies-secret-gaming-roots-1615688/

Stuff I Wrote in 2014

The end of 2013 was a turning point for me as far as my writing goes. I couldn’t be more grateful for the great response to my Kotaku feature story on the Chicago indie gaming scene, and my fantastic internship at PC Mag made my actual journalism school graduation six months later feel like just a formality. In 2014 I tried to keep that freelance momentum going and ended up writing a bunch of stories for a ton of awesome publications that, a few years ago, I never imagined I’d break into so soon. I think I did some of my best work in 2014, and it just so happened to fit in a nice, chronological, top ten list.

Best O' 2014

Obligatory Blog. Obligatory Awards.

Top 5 Games of 2014

5. Mario Kart 8

It’s the most beautiful Wii U game, it’s the best playing Mario Kart to date, the DLC is fantastic, and it dominated my free time towards the end of my college career. Too bad they ruined battle mode.

4. Transistor

I didn’t love Bastion as much as everyone else did. It was pretty and sounded nice but the style was incoherent and the fighting was dull. Transistor took everything good about that game and fixed all the flaws with a brilliant, creative combat system and haunting, ruined, yet still classy cyber world.

3. Bayonetta 2

Above all else, I am a fan of ridiculousness, and there was no other game this year that featured more, better ridiculousness than the continuing adventures of gaming’s favorite sexy librarian dominatrix bullet hair witch in Bayonetta 2.

2. Threes!

You can read my thoughts on why this is the best mobile game of the year over on 148Apps.

1. Super Smash Bros. for Wii U

Still hate the name, but Super Smash Bros. for Wii U is the best entry in my favorite series so how could it not top my list, even if its 3DS counterpart doesn’t feel entirely necessary.



More after the break.

The "Good" Gamer's Dilemma

My first, and hopefully last, article on GamerGate, specifically the untenable position of its moderates. There's a lot to it.

Check it out!

Milestones

I wrote a feature called "Milestones" about pivotal moments in game developers' careers. Download this week's issue of Unwinnable and check it out!

Entering the Thought Processes Behind the Weirdest Video Games Titles Around

Check out my latest feature, Entering the Thought Processes Behind the Weirdest Video Games Titles Around, on The A.V. Club. Hope it's as fun to read as it was to write.

The Rise of Facebook Games and Teaching the Game Developers of Tomorrow

In 2011 I wrote a pair of features I'm very proud of for Yahoo's contributor program. Unfortunately, the program has now been shut down leaving these stories without a home. So I fixed that. Here they are!

The Rise of Facebook Games and Teaching the Game Developers of Tomorrow

Video Games' Afrofuturism Frontier

My first feature for Media Diversified examines what video games could stand to learn from the Afrofuturism artistic aesthetic. Check it out!

http://mediadiversified.org/2014/07/19/video-games-afrofuturism-frontier/

From Big Screens to Touch Screens

Movie tie-in games have been making the move to mobile... for better or worse.

Check out my latest feature for The Escapist!

On the Politics of Pikmin

You know what's awful and tedious about being a journalist? Transcribing hours of interviews. You know what's a great distraction from transcribing interviews? Having a wonderfully thoughtful conversation on the nature and ideology of Nintendo's Pikmin series with my good friend and fellow recent Medill graduate Anna "Anne" Frank. So here it is, mildly edited.

Hands On With Super Smash Bros. for Wii U

I got to play the upcoming Super Smash Bros. for Wii U and wrote about it for Paste Magazine. It's gonna be really fun. Check it out!

http://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2014/06/hands-on-with-super-smash-bros-for-wii-u-new-faces.html

Watch "Who Wore it Best?"

Remember when I said video was the future? Well the future is now! Check out my new video show for 148Apps where similar iPhone and iPad games go head to head and I pick a winner.

http://www.148apps.com/news/wore-gnarbike-trials-bike-mayhem-mountain-racing-motoheroz/

Coding Clementines: Black Girls Make Games, Too

Here's my new, big video game feature story! This time for The Escapist. Just in time for Black History Month, I wrote about what it was like teaching game design to minority children at The Generation Station summer camp last year as well as the world of educational games in general.

Enjoy!

Best O' 2013

Another year over, another collection of media to judge…

I Have No Console, and I Must Buy One

Twine is a free, super easy to use program that lets users create little "choose your own adventure" type stories. Most people seem to use it for making weird little art games, but I thought it might have potential to make more engaging and accessible long form articles. So as a test, I taught myself the program by making this "interactive opinion article" about my thoughts on the current video game console war.

Play "I Have No Console, and I Must Buy One"

Chicago's Gaming Renaissance

This in-depth feature story on Chicago's gaming scene is the big thing I've been working on for a while so I'm happy to share it with you all on Kotaku.

However, next week I'll be sharing another big career announcement.

Here's this Metroid/ Daft Punk thing I made

Also news on my future online whereabouts is coming soon.