The IGDA Casual Games SIG has just released its annual
whitepaper (PDF). The IGDA whitepapers are always a good read.
The Commandments of Online Worlds
(Visited 29798 times)- Thou shalt not mistake online worlds for games, for they encompass far more; nor shalt thou forget that play is noble, and game is no epithet.
Back to lit crit
(Visited 5962 times)Once upon a time, this website contained a section of academic literary criticism papers. They were all written while I was in graduate school getting my MFA; mostly on Modernism, but also on a few other topics.
Well, at some point — probably when we launched this bloggy version of the site — the section fell away, and resided only in old backups. Which is somewhat of a shame, because believe it or not, something like my essay on Bharati Mukherjee’s short stories was one of the few available online, and therefore was cited from time to time.
It’s all back now, even though I imagine most of you who read the site could really care less. Probably the only ones who will care will be college students who have found a small trove of fresh papers to plagiarize. The whole thing is linked off of the Writing section of the site.
The Sunday Poem: Scavenger Crow
(Visited 5886 times)His claws and beak, tools of hunger, classify
Kernels on a tree powdered into gold.
I wish I did not recognize myself in him.
Where is his murder? He marks his boundaries,
Removing wood from corn, placing corn
In gullet, no flock beyond the sky and caw
Of hunger. A metal thing, he is,
Ball-bearing eyes and hammered feathers
Rusting away. He sorts to understand,
Desperately separating grains from wood grain,
A glutton wasting half his food.
This is a poem about analysis, I think, about the impulse to understand, and about what we lose and gain in the process. Mostly lose, in this case.
Today is a big day, because yesterday, my contract with Sony Online expired.
Alas, I now officially have no paycheck either. 🙂