Avatars | With A Terrible Fate

Before the Law and Before Gaming: Kafka, Players, and Avatars

Kafka's "Before the Law" offers a new lens for meditating on the relationships between avatars, bosses, developers, and players in gaming.

By Aaron Suduiko, 1 month ago October 31, 2022

In Karen Travers, Scarlet Nexus tells the tragic story of how a character can become a villain by being cut off from the player's agency.

By Aaron Suduiko, 1 year ago November 8, 2021

This week on the podcast: analysis and discussion of Bandai Namco's "brain punk" JRPG, Scarlet Nexus.

By Aaron Suduiko, 1 year ago August 22, 2021

We interview Anh-Thu Nguyen on Kingdom Hearts as a digital Disneyland and discuss Dan Hughes' latest article on the nature of Xemnas in KH2.

By Stefan Heinrich Simond, 2 years ago May 16, 2021

Analyzing one of Xemnas' most puzzling lines in Kingdom Hearts II opens the path to understanding his character and the nature of Nobodies.

By Dan Hughes, 2 years ago May 11, 2021

Ni No Kuni quietly tricks its adult player into curing both herself and the White Witch of cynicism.

By Aaron Suduiko, 2 years ago February 4, 2021

The Wind Waker's music shows us how a century-old literary phenomenon blends the lived experiences of player and avatar into something more.

By Lauren Spohn, 2 years ago September 8, 2020

The ending of Final Fantasy VII Remake has turned the storytelling formula of challenging fate on its head—and all it took was a Whisper.

By Aaron Suduiko, 3 years ago May 7, 2020

Only EarthBound could marry the mechanics of dungeon-crawling with the themes of epic poetry.

By Max Gorynski, 3 years ago August 29, 2019

A puzzle about how much of Where the Water Taste Like Wine is true reveals an unexpected lesson about the value of folk tales.

By Adam Bierstedt, 4 years ago October 8, 2018