Writing requires both talent and craft. Talent is something you are born with (the recent tendency to reject this comes from confusion regarding the origin of human value), but it’s worthless without the hard work of learning the craft. – Having a talent does not make you a better or …
This is a topic that I’ve written about before, but it continues to be a source of frustration, so I’ll give it another go. Critical/analytical writing about games is almost never about the actual games. That is, despite claiming to be game criticism, it is built on the assumption (sometimes …
The issue of sex work and how it should be treated by society has long been controversial, particularly on the Left. While generally rejecting the conservative view that sex workers are themselves immoral (and filthy, dangerous, evil, etc.), progressives and liberals of various stripes have nevertheless struggled to find a …
Years ago Michael Brough gave a talk in which he used the concept of working with or against a game’s grain. That idea, of thinking about game design in such physical terms – a game’s texture, grain, surface, shape – has fascinated me, particularly given my own thoughts about the …
Omegaland is now available! I wrote this about its history: Omegaland has been a long-term side project for me. I’ve been very lucky to get to work on some big projects like The Talos Principle, Serious Sam 4, and Phoenix Point, but sometimes I missed the strange freedom we had …
There’s a reason that unconditional support for the concept of free speech has been a defining characteristic of left-wing thought for centuries. Beyond the principle of the thing – and the principle certainly matters – there is the matter of power. And there’s a very simple fact about power: when …
Here are two more stories I wrote for Phoenix Point. Semper Fidelis. An ex-marine finds himself reenacting history in Antarctica. The Second Step. A journalist interviews two radical scientists in Moscow while the world teeters on the brink of catastrophe. Someone commented to me on the amount of effort going …
Perhaps nowhere do the great philosophical issues of civilization become more evident than in how society treats the disabled. Take the current obsession with the notion of the “natural”, for instance. Human civilization is repeatedly criticized for being unnatural; the natural world is taken to be morally superior. But what …
Far Out There is another short story I wrote for Phoenix Point. This one is a bit shorter, but it has a flavour all of its own. (The most important aspect of writing a story, I’ve always felt, is voice. I can’t write a story without having found the right …
The Tomb of the Phoenix is a Lovecraft-inspired short story I wrote for Phoenix Point. I had a ton of fun writing it and I’m really pleased with the result. Sorry if that sounds smug, it’s just one of those stories that show up in your brain almost complete and …
