Tech-Gaming Technology, Gaming, and Culture

Although survival is a pervasive theme in interactive entertainment, the first two entries in the Dead Space franchise provided a pair of remarkably engrossing depictions of the struggle for existence. Pitting protagonist Isaac Clark against packs of perversely resilient monstrosities, ...

Back in 2007, D3 Publisher released one of the Xbox 360′s first budget-priced games; a giant bug/robot/U.F.O./kaiju-blasting third-person shooter named Earth Defense Force 2017. Much like many older Japanese monster movies or the original Ultraman TV show, the third Earth ...

The premise of two factions of massive, shape-shifting, robots stuck in eternal strife like some sort of cybernetic Capulets and Montagues seems like a near-perfect premise for a game. Yet, as titles such as 2009’s Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, ...

What is the concept? Far too often competitive shooters suffer from the malaise of homogeneity.  Employing traditional run and gun conventions, the genre habitually delivers faint variations on a theme instead of offering comprehensive innovation. Developer 5th Cell (Lock’s Quest, ...

Over its decade long legacy, the Ghost Recon franchise has endured a succession of substantial changes. Once a taut, tactics-heavy simulation tasking players with managing multiple teams across vast battlefields, more recent entries in the series have gradually gravitated toward ...

Track the trajectory of most console-based, competitive shooters and you’ll discover more evolution than revolution. Mercifully, that’s not the case with LightBox Interactive’s Starhawk. Although born from the fundamental design philosophies which propelled Warhawk past its fly-and-frag peers, the near-faultless ...

In contemporary fiction, few things can slow the relentless pandemic of a zombie takeover, where lifeless hordes routinely proliferate in exponential numbers. Similarly, the undead have overrun gaming; shambling their way into the shooter, survival horror, and even music-rhythm genres. ...

Save for the fiddly segments found in Uncharted: Golden Abyss, Vita owners aching to exercise their trigger finger have been out of luck. Mercifully, solace has been supply-dropped into stores with the release of Unit 13. Using experience gleaned through ...

What is the concept? Although 2010’s Alan Wake received praise from critics and consumers alike, initial sales proved to be sluggish. Fortunately, an aggressive price drop and the inclusion of the game (via digital voucher) into holiday console bundles was ...

Before I came across a cartridge-only copy of Ranger X for the Sega Genesis while out shopping one day, I was completed unaware of the game’s existence. This, I had no idea what the game was like or if it ...