Game Design & Dev

Early on, Mass Effect establishes that the Citadel Council forced humanity to establish colonies in dangerous parts of the galaxy, then refused to offer aid when those colonies were inevitably attacked. The existing power structure is only interested in humanity's ability to serve as a buffer against its enemies, not in helping us thrive. Despite all this, humans get a comparatively sweet deal.

Uncanny valley? Kinesthetic projection? The guys at Extra Credits break down what's wrong with Microsoft's Kinect.

I Am Alive clearly wants to be a serious, adult take on post-apocalyptic survival, and in some respects it is. Unfortunately, the game's treatment of women, among other things, seems to devolve back to the attitudes of a teenaged boy. In I Am Alive, women are helpless objects to be fought over and protected by men.

Once again, the guys at Extra Credits go through some games that caught their eye but may have flown under everyone else's radar. Some obvious ones make the list like Dungeon Defenders and Recettear, but they also include some lesser known releases like Dear Esther, The Dark Meadow and Xotic to name a few. Check out the video to see they mentioned one of your under the radar releases.

It was the power of adorkableness that convinced me to buy Kingdoms of Amalur. Seriously. I tried the demo and was resoundingly apathetic towards it, but when Day9 streamed it with Felicia Day at his house, and with the ridiculous hilarity that resulted by their combined dorkiness, I was dazzled by the geekiness and shelled out a full sixty bones for the PC version.

Although I don't play PC games at all, many people that I follow on Twitter and around the Internet do… and with the release of Diablo III, there were a lot of upset people because of errors and server maintenance that seriously limited the amount of available playing time on launch day.

The announcement of the BioShock Infinite delay to late February of 2013 doesn't surprise me in the slightest. The original October 2012 release date seemed a bit risky, given the already-impressive lineup of software that is slated to ship near the same time. Assassin's Creed III, Halo 4, Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Wii U hardware, and other games would likely have eaten into potential sales for BioShock Infinite. Would these other software releases have led to disappointing sales for Infinite?

Since the days of Morrowind, players and game critics alike have often described Bethesda's beloved Elder Scrolls series as "an offline MMO." The titles have had many of the elements that make Massively Multiplayer titles like World of Warcraft a huge hit, but it's never allowed for other players to come together and share the experience—until now.

The guys at Extra Credits take a quick look at an idea that has been on the minds of game developers and publishers for years now. It's dubbed "transgaming" and it lets fans of different genres all play and exist within the same game world. There is a lot of potential there, so have a listen.

Just when you're ready to argue that no one is excited about the Wii U or its software, a video is leaked onto the Internet that appears to show Ubisoft's Rayman Legends running on a Wii U (development kit) and demonstrating Wii U-specific features.