Download or read book Silent Hill 2 written by Mike Drucker and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2021-01-26 with total page 120 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A troubled man travels to a mysterious town from his past after receiving a letter from his wife... who's been dead for years. And while our "hero" explores dark corridors and battles countless disturbing enemies, his journey offers more psychological horror than survival horror. Welcome to Silent Hill, where the monster is you. Silent Hill 2 doubles down on what made the first game so compelling: The feeling of being lost in a foggy, upside-down town as unsettling as it is familiar. Nearly two decades after first experiencing Silent Hill 2, writer and comedian Mike Drucker returns to its dark depths to explore how this bold video game delivers an experience that is tense, nightmarish, and anything but fun. With an in-depth and highly personal study of its tragic cast of characters, and a critical examination of developer Konami’s world design and uneven marketing strategy, Drucker examines how Silent Hill 2 forces its players to grapple with the fact that very real-world terrors of trauma, abuse, shame, and guilt are far more threatening than any pyramid-headed monster could ever be.
Download or read book Postal written by Brock Wilbur and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2020-04-07 with total page 110 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1997, game studio Running With Scissors released its debut title, Postal, an isometric shooter aimed at shocking an imagined pearl-clutching public. The game was crass, gory, and dumb—all of which might have been forgivable if the game had been any fun to play. Postal gained enough notoriety from riding the wave of public outrage to warrant a sequel. And DLC. And a remake. And, perhaps most surprising of all, a Golden-Raspberry-winning feature film adaptation directed by the infamous Uwe Boll. In this thoughtful and hilarious tag-team performance, Brock Wilbur & Nathan Rabin probe the fascinatingly troubled game and film for what each can tell us about shock culture & mass shootings, interviewing the RWS team and even Boll himself for answers. Like it or not, Postal is the franchise that won't die—no matter how many molotov cocktails you throw at it.
Download or read book Resident Evil written by Philip J Reed and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2020-08-25 with total page 124 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Now a sprawling video game franchise, Resident Evil has kept us on the edge of our seats for decades with its tried-and-true brand of jump scares, zombie action, and biological horror. But even decades after its release, we can’t stop revisiting the original’s thrills, chills, and sometimes unintentional spills. Pop culture writer and horror cinephile Philip J Reed takes dead aim at 1996’s Resident Evil, the game that named and defined the genre we now call “survival horror.” While examining Resident Evil’s influences from the worlds of film, literature, and video games alike, Reed’s love letter to horror examines how the game’s groundbreaking design and its atmospheric fixed-cam cinematography work to thrill and terrify players—and why that terror may even be good for you. Featuring a foreword from Troma Entertainment legend Lloyd Kaufman and new interviews with the game’s voice actors and its live-action cast, the book serves as the master of unlocking the behind-the-scenes secrets of Resident Evil, and shows how even a game filled with the most laughable dialogue can still scare the pants off of you.
Download or read book Final Fantasy VI written by Sebastian Deken and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2021-06-01 with total page 136 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Terra the magical half-human. Shadow the mysterious assassin. Celes the tough, tender general. Kefka the fool who would be god. Each of the many unforgettable characters in Final Fantasy VI has made a huge impression on a generation of players, but why do we feel such affection for these 16-bit heroes and villains as so many others fade? The credit goes to the game’s score, composed by the legendary Nobuo Uematsu. Armed with newly translated interviews and an expert ear for sound, writer and musician Sebastian Deken conducts a critical analysis of the musical structures of FF6, the game that pushed the Super Nintendo’s sound capabilities to their absolute limits and launched Uematsu’s reputation as the “Beethoven of video game music.” Deken ventures deep into the game’s lush soundscape—from its expertly crafted leitmotifs to its unforgettable opera sequence—exploring the soundtrack’s lasting influence and how it helped clear space for game music on classical stages around the world.
Download or read book NBA Jam written by Reyan Ali and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2019-10-22 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When NBA Jam dunked its way into arcades in 1993, players discovered just how fun basketball can be when freed from rules, refs, and gravity itself. But just a few years after the billion-dollar hit conquered the world, developer Midway, publisher Acclaim, and video arcades themselves fell off the map. How did a simple two-on-two basketball game become MVP of the arcade, and how did this champ lose its title? Journalist Reyan Ali dives deep into the saga, tracking the people and decisions that shaped the series. You'll get to know mischievous Jam architect Mark Turmell, go inside Midway's Chicago office where hungry young talent tapped into cutting-edge tech, and explore the sequels, spin-offs, and tributes that came in the game's wake. Built out of exhaustive research and original interviews with a star-studded cast —including Turmell and his original development team, iconic commentator Tim Kitzrow, businessmen and developers at Midway and Acclaim alike, secret characters George Clinton and DJ Jazzy Jeff, Doom co-creator John Romero, and 1990s NBA demigods Glen Rice and Shaq—Ali's NBA Jam returns you to an era when coin-op was king.
Download or read book Super Mario Bros 2 written by Jon Irwin and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2014 with total page 126 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In perhaps the most famous switcheroo in all of game history, the Japanese version of Super Mario Bros. 2 was declared "too hard" by Nintendo of America and replaced with a Mario-ified port of the Famicom hit, Yume Kōjō Doki Doki Panic. The new game (dubbed Super Mario USA in Japan) was a huge success for its four playable characters, improved graphics, immersive levels, and catchy music, and eventually became the 3rd bestselling game for the NES. And yet. Because of its strange new villains, its wild gameplay, and its mysterious touches, SMB2 has for years been regarded as the Odd Mario Out, even as it has seen popular updates on the Super NES and Game Boy Advance. Irwin's Mario is not a simple retelling of a 25-year-old story, but instead an examination of the game with fresh eyes: both as a product of its time and as a welcome change from the larger Super Mario franchise. Along the way he searches for clues, pulling up a few vegetables of his own. What he finds is not at all what he expected.
Download or read book Final Fantasy V written by Chris Kohler and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2017 with total page 111 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Final Fantasy V was released for the Japanese Super Famicom in 1992, the game was an instant hit, selling two million copies in the first two months alone. With a groundbreaking job system that combined the usual character classes like knights, thieves, and mages with offbeat classes such as chemists, dancers, and bards, the game appeared to be a shoo-in for North American distribution. But the game was dubbed "too hardcore" for a Western audience and was swapped out with Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, a simplistic new game tailor-made for Americans. That didn't stop a teenage Chris Kohler from tracking down Final Fantasy V. The young RPG fan got a Japanese copy of the game, used it to teach himself Japanese, and with the help of some internet companions created the first-ever comprehensive English-language FAQ of the game. As the internet narrowed the cultural gap between the East and West more each year, the game was eventually translated into English for the PlayStation, Game Boy Advance, and iOS. Fans in the West finally got to learn what all the fuss was about. Now the acclaimed author of Power-Up and an editor at Kotaku, Kohler is revisiting the game that started his career in games journalism. Based on new, original interviews with Final Fantasy V's director, Hironobu Sakaguchi, as well as previously untranslated interviews with the rest of the development team, Kohler's book weaves history and criticism to examine one of the Final Fantasy series's greatest and most overlooked titles.
Download or read book Spelunky written by Derek Yu and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2016 with total page 147 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A game's creation as told by its creator, perhaps the best rpimer on game design.
Download or read book Chrono Trigger written by Michael P. Williams and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2014 with total page 123 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A deep dive into the classic SNES game many consider the high point in the entire RPG genre.
Download or read book Shovel Knight written by David L. Craddock and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2018 with total page 135 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Based on extensive original interviews with the Yacht Club Games team, writer David L. Craddock unearths the story of a fledgling group of game developers who worked so well together at WayForward Games that they decided to start their own studio.
Download or read book Galaga written by Michael Kimball and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2014 with total page 89 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For fifteen seconds of one of the highest-grossing films of all time, The Avengersa (TM) plan to save the world comes to a grinding halt when Tony Stark calls out a low-level member of S.H.I.E.L.D. for playing Galaga on the job. Acclaimed novelist and lifelong Galaga player Michael Kimball knows the compulsion: Hea (TM)s set and re-set high scores on Galaga machines all across America. What many call the greatest fixed shooter arcade game in history, Galaga broke the Space Invaders mold with superior graphics, faster firing, bonus rounds, tractor beams, and advanced enemy A.I. Since its 1981 release, Galaga has inspired numerous sequels, bootlegs, hacks, and clonesa "and some version of Galaga has been released for nearly every gaming platform. Kimball shares his obsession with Galaga through a discussion of the innovative gameplay it introduced (including lots of tips), its extensive cultural legacy (including collectibles, movies, rap songs, drinking games, and sex acts), and how Galaga got Kimball through a difficult childhood--and maybe saved his life.
Download or read book Kingdom Hearts II written by Alexa Ray Corriea and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2017 with total page 91 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A close reading of a surprisingly deep Disney/Square mash-up.
Download or read book You Can t Win a Fight with Your Boss written by Tom Markert and published by HarperCollins Entertainment. This book was released on 2006 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whether you are a recent graduate just entering the workforce or already part of the corporate game, this title provides the tips and know-how you must have in order to succeed. It presents 56 practical rules that every employee, manager and executive must follow in order to find corporate success.
Download or read book Silent Hill written by Bernard Perron and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2012-01-03 with total page 171 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The second entry in the Landmark Video Games series
Download or read book Pilgrim in the Microworld written by Neil David, Sr. and published by Grand Central Pub. This book was released on 1984-01-01 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exploration of the human mind and body's interaction with the computer in its most compelling form, the video game, focuses on the author's own obsessed immersion in a computer game and its possibilities
Download or read book Stay and Fight written by Madeline ffitch and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2019-07-09 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Like Bastard Out of Carolina, ffitch's electrifying debut novel is a paean to independence and a protest against the materialism of our age." —O: The Oprah Magazine "Delightfully raucous." —Sam Sacks, The Wall Street Journal Helen arrives in Appalachian Ohio full of love and her boyfriend’s ideas for living off the land. Too soon, with winter coming, he calls it quits. Helped by Rudy—her government-questioning, wisdom-spouting, seasonal-affective-disordered boss—and a neighbor couple, Helen makes it to spring. Those neighbors, Karen and Lily, are awaiting the arrival of their first child, a boy, which means their time at the Women’s Land Trust must end. So Helen invites the new family to throw in with her—they’ll split the work and the food, build a house, and make a life that sustains them, if barely, for years. Then young Perley decides he wants to go to school. And Rudy sets up a fruit-tree nursery on the pipeline easement edging their land. The outside world is brought clamoring into their makeshift family. Set in a region known for its independent spirit, Stay and Fight shakes up what it means to be a family, to live well, to make peace with nature and make deals with the system. It is a protest novel that challenges our notions of effective action. It is a family novel that refuses to limit the term. And it is a marvel of storytelling that both breaks with tradition and celebrates it. Best of all, it is full of flawed, cantankerous, flesh-and-blood characters who remind us that conflict isn't the end of love, but the real beginning. Absorbingly spun, perfectly voiced, and disruptively political, Madeline ffitch's Stay and Fight forces us to reimagine an Appalachia—and an America—we think we know. And it takes us, laughing and fighting, into a new understanding of what it means to love and to be free.
Download or read book EarthBound written by Ken Baumann and published by Boss Fight Books. This book was released on 2014 with total page 131 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An RPG for the Super NES that flopped when it first arrived in the U.S., EarthBound grew in fan support and critical acclaim over the years, eventually becoming the All-Time Favorite Game of thousands, among them author Ken Baumann. Featuring a heartfelt foreword from the game's North American localization director, Marcus Lindblom, Baumann's EarthBound is a joyful tornado of history, criticism, and memoir. Baumann explores the game's unlikely origins, its brilliant creator, its madcap plot, its marketing failure, its cult rise from the ashes, and its intersections with Japanese and American culture, all the while reflecting back on the author's own journey into the terrifying and hilarious world of adults.
