LEO BOIX recommends a film that portrays how fascism feeds on ignorance, machismo and myth in isolated communities abandoned by the state
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Slim pickings
An ominous dark cloud has descended over the video games industry in 2024 still, SCOTT ALSWORTH finds a handful of silver linings
Helldivers 2
[Arrowhead Game Studios]
Chris Searle speaks to Syrian/French flautist NAISSAM JALAL
With thousands of AI‑written, edited or ‘polished’ books being sold, LAURA BEERS hears an eerie echo of Orwell’s ‘novel‑writing machines’
ANDY HEDGECOCK is entertained by a playful novel that embeds a fictional game at its heart
Death comes for Liberals, entitled murder, Vatican hit squads, and fraternising with the Blitz killer
New releases from Public Image Ltd, William Basinski, and John Luther Adams
GABRIELE NEHER draws attention to an astoundingly skilled Flemish painter who defied the notion that women cannot paint like men
THERE’S an expression doing the rounds in the videogame industry right now; survive till ‘25. And that’s not an age thing. This year’s seen more studio closures and mass layoffs than the last.
To add that those of us in the biz are getting angry is something of an understatement. And yet, our anger’s failing to hold capitalism to account in the games we’re creating.
A glance at this month’s Game Awards says it all. The latest cash grab of overly ludocentric games, centring on cutesy robots and infantile, male fantasies, apparently developed for the likes of undiscerning shut-ins, aren’t really doing it for me.
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