For Kotaku, Siddhartha Bajracharya wrote about his experiences working as a doctor during the current crisis, and the strangeness of devoting his evenings to The Division 2. It’s a heavy read, but packed with valuable insight into what life is like for those working inside hospitals. For The Washington Post, Stacey Henley spoke to various women about the widespread lack of pregnancy support within the games industry. As you might imagine, this manifests in many ways. For PC Gamer, Lauren Morton spoke to people who make animal noises. As in, for games, with Foley effects and techno-wizardry. Several mothers described similar closet pumping stories. Supposedly private pumping areas included meeting rooms in which the mother was mistakenly walked in on, restrooms, and rooms in the office where equipment had been arranged into a makeshift barrier. Also for PC Gamer, Joe Donally… “foiled an assassination attempt on the president in a GTA 5 flight sim roleplay server”. Joe’s GTA diaries are always a treat, and this one is a beauty. In moments like that, Clark’s ears perk up, and he knows it’s time to grab the microphone. For Ars Technica, Dan Thurot made a lovely list of board games that model the natural world. I realise lovely lists of board games are mostly only helpful right now to people who live with other people who are into that sort of thing, but at least everyone else can inspire their kids’ interest in ecology through vaguely educational board games. Here’s a neat Wired article from Daniel Oberhaus, about a man with a chip in his brain that circumvents the paralysis caused by his broken spine. He used to have almost no sense of touch, and now he can play Guitar Hero.
Curiosity, though, is easy to foster, especially once the kids figure out that board game night means staying up late and filling their bodies with unhealthy snacks. So, with Earth Day happening this last week, here are some of my preferred board games for inspiring curiosity about the planet and our role on it. Music this week is Bag Full Of Dreams by Lotte Walda.

title: “The Sunday Papers” ShowToc: true date: “2023-02-12” author: “Derek Brown”

For her blog, Emilie M. Reed took apart Western assumptions about visual novels. It’s a cracking piece, examining the central tenets of the genre in the context of people’s uncharitable interpretations. It’s also a review of Hashihime Of The Old Book Town. For Vice, Emanuel Maiberg wrote about the comfort of Call Of Duty: Warzone during Covid. I like how he latches on to the way winning or losing is secondary to battling royalley, and how the real joy can be found in self-contained adventures. For VG247, Griff Griffin spoke to Fallout 76 players about how they’re reacting to the pandemic. They are reacting strangely, and also exactly as you’d expect. For Eurogamer, Emma Kent tracked down a Red Dead Redemption 2 storm chaser. I’ll always enjoying reading about people who dedicate themselves to unusual and hyper-specific videogame hobbies, especially when they’re this romantic. For his blog, Game Discoverability Now!, Simon Carless ran through his five deadly sins of game attractiveness. Much of this advice is simple and obvious, but also necessary, based on the number of games in my inbox that my eyes glaze over. “[Storms] are predictable and in a way, guideable. Just gotta figure out how to read them. You’ll ride one direction and the clouds will get lighter, another and they’ll get darker. Gotta keep them dark and eventually they won’t go away.” For Aeon, professor of cognitive robotics Murray Shanahan attempted to puzzle out how we might understand exotic consciousness. It is 8,300 words and includes graphs, but it’s fascinating and I haven’t slapped an indulgent Aeon link here for ages. I can’t tell you what that bar is. But in addition to getting people to play early versions of your game, I recommend trying to get your friends & fellow devs to give you honest feedback on: ‘Does this game look good, visually?’ You’re competing against, for example, Industries Of Titan. Be a little scared. Music this week is In Dreams by Ben Howard.