There was a moment on location last year while filming the BBC2 documentary series The Virtual Revolution when I realised we were actually creating two projects. I was uploading a photo I had taken on the shoot to my Flickr site, or dispatching another update to my Twitter followers, when the director of photography asked: “Why?”
Guardian
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[Guardian] The challenges of filming The Virtual Revolution
Monday February 08, 2010 @ 08:49 AM (UTC) -
[Guardian] This gamesblogger is movin' on, plus Tech Weekly in the New Year
Saturday November 14, 2009 @ 06:20 PM (UTC)For eagle-eyed readers of my contributions to The Guardian’s Game Theory column and my gamesblog posts over the past few years, it may come as no surprise that, upon my return to The Guardian after Digital Revolution production is over, I am moving on from games coverage to technological pastures wider. I have been skirting around the mainstream games industry news for a long time, writing more about play than PlayStation, more about the Web than the Wii, and more about creative uses of technology than controllers. Although I am still passionate about the extraordinary joy and power that fun can produce, it’s time for me to cover another area of interactivity. I’m looking forward to treading new ground with The Guardian, the details of which will be unveiled soon. However, with the sanction of the gamesbloggers, I may throw a few games-related posts on their blog if the story is suitable.
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[Games Theory] Here is the news: videogames hysteria is just for the kids
Wednesday September 02, 2009 @ 08:50 PM (UTC)Aleks Krotoski
The Guardian
Wednesday 2 September 2009I have, in effect, been living under a videogames rock for the past three months. My self-imposed exile at the hands of a looming PhD thesis submission date and the subsequent two weeks in a recovery position has rendered my bleeding-edge knowledge of computer gaming obsolete. When confronted with the headlines announcing trends, new releases and banal news, I feel like an OAP outpaced by the young whippersnappers who’ve staked out their turf in my neighbourhood: “Get offa my patch you little devils!” I want to shout, while shaking a gnarled PlayStation 1 controller at them. “Whateva, grandma,” they’d throw back, casually cool with their Wiimotes and iPhones. Harumph.
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[Games Theory] Time to press pause before hitting another level
Wednesday August 19, 2009 @ 08:44 PM (UTC)Aleks Krotoski
The Guardian
Wednesday 19 August 2009There are few things more satisfying in life than levelling up. That, after all, is what games are all about. As a long-time player, I have a tendency to look at the world through console-coloured glasses. Recently, I had one of those mini-boosts in XP when I was on a train. I had quite happily, furiously, been scribbling in the margins of a document, drawing spaghetti arrows from one end to the other and back again, jotting down incomprehensible notes for myself and scratching out passages of text, when out of the blue my pen ran out of ink. It wasn’t blocked, it hadn’t dried up: I had used the entire charge of red in my ballpoint pen, from the moment it was first de-capped through to its final stroke. When I realised just what had happened, I heard that telltale little “ding” and knew I had a new trophy for my achievements shelf.
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[Games Theory] Why World of Warcraft may be the future of the Nation State
Thursday August 06, 2009 @ 09:15 AM (UTC)Aleks Krotoski
The Guardian
Wednesday 5 August 2009World of Warcraft and its ilk represent the next phase in human social evolution. Seriously: those people who spend their (virtual) lives dressed up like trolls or people with pointy ears, who feel a sense of accomplishment from smacking digital rats around for hours each night – they are creating the new sovereignty, establishing a nation-state that transcends borders, that challenges traditional ideas of governance, that threatens economic structures and upsets power hierarchies. People, the future is in the hands of a bunch of trolls.
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[Games Theory] Look to the web to save British games studios
Thursday July 23, 2009 @ 07:58 AM (UTC)Aleks Krotoski
The Guardian
Wednesday 22 July 2009Last week, the city where I live was overrun by the British games industry. To be fair, the per capita population of Brighton is disproportionately digital; Black Rock Studio, Zoë Mode, Relentless, Littleloud and many other top-quality development studios are located there, plus several games news sources have set up shop within spitting distance of the pier. But when the Develop Conference plops itself into the city centre in the middle of July, things get a bit silly. Yet this year there were definitely fewer geeks in the bars and clubs of West Street talking about their latest AAA game projects; it seems the crunch is finally taking its toll.
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[Games Theory] Retro classics may save Hollywood
Wednesday July 08, 2009 @ 11:27 PM (UTC)
Aleks Krotoski
The Guardian
8 July 2009
It’s the news we’ve all been waiting for: Universal Pictures has secured the film rights to the 80s vector-based space shooter Asteroids. Yes, that Asteroids – the white-on-black arcade classic. The news arrived via the pen of fellow Game Theorist Keith Stuart and the phrase “scraping the barrel” comes to mind. But rather than mock, I’m going to play devil’s advocate for a moment and propose that getting into a bidding war for an outdated, nostalgia-laden computer game is a good thing for the film studios to do. No, a great thing. Believe it or not, I have three reasons. Hear me out.
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[Tech Weekly] Chris Anderson on 'Freemium'
Tuesday July 07, 2009 @ 12:43 AM (UTC)In this week’s Tech Weekly, Charles Arthur meets Chris Anderson. His day job is the editor of the US version of Wired, but is famous for his internet theory in his book The Long Tail. His latest book Free discusses the notion of content being freely available online, and how that business model works for the content creators.
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[Gamesblog] For the next two months, I am otherwise engaged
Friday July 03, 2009 @ 01:08 AM (UTC)
Aleks Krotoski Friday 3 July 2009 11.00 BST
As you may have noticed from the dearth of posts on the gamesblog about odd academic issues, quirky indie games, obscure gaming culture and bizarre interactive ephemera, my contributions have recently been obscured by the impending submission of my PhD thesis. Well, my deadline is finally upon me, and I have until 14 August to finish the behemoth.
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[Tech Weekly] Intellectual property advice and AudioBoo
Wednesday June 24, 2009 @ 07:43 PM (UTC)This week we hear from AudioBoo founder Mark Rock. AudioBoo is the latest new media trend to capture the attentions of the digerati – and celebrities – allowing users to record snippets of audio using your iPhone and send it out to the world via the internet.
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