The Sunday Papers

Sundays are for eating chocolate spread straight from the jar and rewatching Better Call Saul. Before that, let’s read this week’s best writing about games (and game related things!)

Video Game Developers Are Leaving The Industry And Doing Something, Anything Else, writes Luke Plunkett for Aftermath. God I love Aftermath. You should be reading Aftermath.

"The games industry is just such a mess", she says. "There's WAY too much enthusiasm around generative AI and generally scammy vibes coming from the C-suite at these companies. Creators and developers are just being abused left and right. The community is amazing but the management is awful. I'm also disillusioned with tech more generally right now, and am just not sure where to go from here".

Anna is now working as a line cook. "My current role was kind of just…I needed some money and knew I wanted as physical a job as possible. I've been at a desk for 20 years. It's wreaked havoc on my body and brain. My brother was working for a family friend at a country club restaurant and I was like…please let me do some manual labor, I need to move my body [laughs]".

I appreciate Oli Welsh’s overview of Game Of The Year trends for Polygon, even if they’re a bit depressing.

In 2021, the year It Takes Two won, there was a popular, mainstream game from a big publisher with a 92 Metascore, with critical consensus and public support behind it, that didn’t even get nominated: Forza Horizon 5. At The Game Awards, it seems some genres are eligible for Game of the Year consideration, and some aren’t.

There has never been any overlap between the nominees for GOTY and Best Sports/Racing Game, or Sim/Strategy Game, or Fighting Game, or Mobile Game. Overlap with the nominees for Best Family or Action Game is rare.

On the other hand, for the last three years, four of the six GOTY nominees have also been nominated in the Action/Adventure category. And, while role-playing game nominations are less common, if an RPG is nominated, it stands a great chance of winning. Of the 10 winners so far, four have been RPGs and four action-adventures. These genres have a complete stranglehold on Game of the Year — similar to the primacy of dramas winning Best Picture at the Oscars over blockbusters, comedies, and genre movies.

This stung to think about especially because my personal GOTY is Tactical Breach Wizards, by the simple virtue of it being the best game I’ve played this year.

For NPR, Dara Kerr writes about How Memphis became a battleground over Elon Musk’s xAI supercomputer

“We have been deemed by xAI not even valuable enough to have a conversation with,” says KeShaun Pearson, who grew up a few miles from the facility and is president of the local nonprofit Memphis Community Against Pollution. “To not even be included in conversations about what is transpiring in our own backyards.”

Musk and xAI did not return requests for comment.

AI brings soaring emissions for Google and Microsoft, a major contributor to climate change. The limited oversight and rushed nature of this project have allowed xAI to skirt environmental rules, which could impact the surrounding communities. For instance, the company’s on-site methane gas generators currently don’t have permits.

“Artificial intelligence may be a cutting-edge technology,” says Amanda Garcia, a senior attorney with the Southern Environmental Law Center. “But it’s imposing the same kinds of pollution burdens on communities that industrial sources have been for the past 100 years.”

Here’s the secret to good worldbuilding. Alice Bell (RPS in peace) has a newsletter. I learned about Mouse Guard this week and I love it. Here's a fine collection of photographs that look like Project Zomboid. Music this week is Moss Covers All / Take Me Home by Knocked Loose. Have a great weekend!