What movie do you consider to be “perfect?”

Faculty job — please help spread the word! At UC Santa Cruz we have two games degrees, one in Engineering and one in Arts. This is a job with the Arts folks, who include super cool creators like @mattiebrice.bsky.social & @swensen.bsky.social recruit.ucsc.edu/JPF01998

Just arrived! With this book, @paulcornell.bsky.social & @rachaelsmith.bsky.social have established the genre of "cute cryptid whodunnit." It's about as far from the drumbeat of bad news as I can imagine. I can't wait to discover Who Killed Nessie!

Well, well, well played @nintendousa.bsky.social ! @benjedwards.com and I wouldn't have predicted THIS banger of an announcement... We should plug our @mitpress.bsky.social book "Seeing Red: Nintendo's Virtual Boy" at this point., no? www.youtube.com/live/tWIEv_a...

My husband had a mild case of Covid, following which he has spent almost 4 years mostly flat on his back. This advice fills me with rage & horror.

How did Animal Crossing: New Horizons come to mean so much to so many? Travel back in time with me, five long years back, to the early days of ACNH and the Covid pandemic

It’s an honor to help launch this series with @anasalter.bsky.social

My jump reflexes aren't what they used to be, but I'm still enjoying the chance to imbibe some Cherry Cough Syrup from @altice.bsky.social ex-writer.itch.io/cherry-cough...

In honor of @brettbobley.bsky.social's retirement, I'm joining the #ThanksBrett clap out. Brett's a transformative leader for digital humanities — and a genuine, fun human being (he's the only colleague I've joined on the log ride at the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk)

My new science fiction novel is out today! A quirky band of scientists investigate a threat in a town riddled with strange events and science that pushes the envelope of what is possible. Awesome cover art by Kelly Lyon King! #BookSky www.amazon.com/dp/B0F5XXGDZ3/

To celebrate Psychonauts' 20th anniversary today we literally turned the sales knob as high as the system allowed us on Steam. Can't turn it any higher. You can grab it for... *91 percent* off! Dear god.. store.steampowered.com/app/3830/Psy...

My daughter and I have fond memories of Pratchett’s Tiffany Aching books as bedtime reading. Also Catherynne M. Valente’s Fairyland books.

So I think I need a new novel to help me limit doomscrolling. Any recommendations? I've previously found escape in the Teixcalaan books, Murderbot diaries, Rivers of London, Laundry Files, Children of Time, October Daye, Ruth Galloway, Thursday Murder Club, etc.

Excited to see my next monograph (a return to narrative game studies!) with an amazing cover and a pending release date this year - check out *Undertale: Can a Game Give Hope?* in the new Replay series at University of Chicago Press: press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

This is very fucking funny to me too on the heels of a discussion yesterday where someone said they thought of HCWs as an unambiguous force for good in this world lmfao like man, once you cross the line from "healthy" to "sick" or "able-bodied" to "physically disabled" it is a different WORLD

"No-one has been arrested in a Quaker meeting house in living memory." Utterly appalling.

Just saw — about five years since the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons — there's a page up for my forthcoming book on it. Exciting to see Chicago is springing for color images! press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

Don't be scared, it's just Qud! ✌️ Start your Caves of Qud journey by watching this beginner tutorial created by @sbmakesstuff.bsky.social

Playing Spiritfarer — because a cozy game about grief seems right about now — and I'm getting a pretty strong feeling that @thunderlotus.bsky.social has some #ACNH players on the writing staff

It’s trying, being a fan of something that the owners aren’t fans of. Though my chances of going to Florida were already very slim

Thankfully, I've now had a chance to review the authors' update based on my feedback, which addresses my concerns pretty well! Glad to see the incorporation of my feedback. arxiv.org/pdf/2410.18975

Listening to Game Studies Study Buddies do (to my knowledge) the first-ever podcast episode on one of my books. @ckunzelman.bsky.social & @ztul.bsky.social being insightful & also making me laugh. Unexpected shout-out to the books @patguy.bsky.social and I edited rangedtouch.com/2024/08/31/7...

The current offer on the Bundle of Holding is for the DRACULA DOSSIER, the massive improvised campaign I wrote with @kennethhite.bsky.social which remains the funnest and most ambitious project I’ve ever worked on. I remain immensely proud of it. https://bundleofholding.com/presents/Drac2024

It’s a monstrously good first day of panels at the Festival of Monsters Academic Conference, and we got written up in Good Times Santa Cruz! Learn all about us at www.goodtimes.sc #MonsterFest24

But giving more example sentences to a statistical language model is just not going to create emergent intelligence! That’s not how anything works, which these dudes would know if they ever effing spoke to a cognitive scientist.

The success of Animal Crossing: New Horizons seems to have widened the space for games that aren't twitchy or puzzly (though they're often grindy). I've been trying some out & the first I've finished is Haven Park. It's a profoundly weird game, by which I mean I think I recommend havenparkgame.com

A technology blog asked me to comment on this video showing off Roblox's new AI world generator...

The article is paywalled but I don’t want people to think the approach as suggested by the headline is a good idea. It could be a very bad idea! We know from the experience of ME/CFS sufferers that “pushing through” and not avoiding crashes can permanently lower our baseline and increase disability.

Registration for the 2024 Festival of Monsters Academic Conference (Oct. 16-18 in Santa Cruz, Calif.) is coming very very soon. Meanwhile, you can check out www.youtube.com/@ucscmonster... to see videos from last year's talks.

We have an opening for a tenure-track Assistant Professor in Artificial Intelligence and Media at American University, housed in the School of Communication. PhDs in a broad range of field will be considered (mentioned in the call: comm, media studies, STS, CS, IS, sociology, anthropology, history).

There's a super cool game studies bundle right now, all books from @mitpress.bsky.social — like @patguy.bsky.social & @mkirschenbaum.bsky.social's Zones of Control, @shirachess.bsky.social's Play Like a Feminist, & @kcisbister.bsky.social's How Games Move Us www.humblebundle.com/books/all-ab...

I've just learned that I can officially announce my next book will arrive in the Fall 2025 publication season It's exciting, but also a reminder of how long publication timelines can be

Register for ELO 2024 the online conference by July 8. No additional costs! Just join ELO or renew your membership, and you will get access to all the content! stars.library.ucf.edu/elo2024/

"Dear Editor, I have incorporated all suggestions from reviewer 2, and I hope you find the changes an improvement to the manuscript as a whole."

👋For the past couple months, you’ve likely seen me posting extra hard abt ROMchip. We got a Twitch fundraiser this Saturday 5/11, 11AM-11PM EDT. But most of y’all probably don't even know what ROMchip is. Today I want to clear that up. I want you to see it the way I do. 👇

The #IndieAuthor Spring Spectacular is where over 200+ authors across multiple genres dropped their prices to free or 0.99 between April 12th-15th, 2024! Support #indieauthors, add to your endless TBR #indieauthorspringspectacular #indieevent #indiebooks

The key to our species success is quite possibly superior #craft www.theguardian.com/science/2023...

We got another lovely bump of support today. Cosy whodunnit about Loch Ness Monster murder, anyone? Such cute @rachaelsmith.bsky.social art! zoop.gg/c/whokilledn...

Airline travel is one of the underreported nightmares of being #Disabled in America, a country which very much has the resources to change or fix it. But nothing changes. Why? You guessed it—#ableism! That’s why it was so amazing that my boss even thought to ASK the question.

If 100 donors support the MIT Press and #MITops during today's 24-Hour Challenge, they will unlock a $10,000 match! We are now more than halfway to our goal. Consider donating to support #OpenAccess today! bit.ly/3I9Wn6g #PiDay

“I was admitted the following Monday for a week of tests. I cannot tell you how happy I was that week. Now there would be an outcome.” Perfectly expressed. I know this feeling To be so happy there might be an outcome The medical staff baffled when you’re depressed the tests are negative

I've said it before, but AI is the new bureaucracy, the new blackbox decision-maker the purpose of which is not to make decisions, but to obscure accountability and prevent any purchase in arguing against those decisions

I loved @aptshadow.bsky.social’s thoughtful, engrossing exploration of intelligence in the Children of Time series So I picked up Shards of Earth, expecting more. But instead it’s (so far) more like a complex space romp, running pell mell across cultures and factions And just as compelling!

At the bottom of this page, you can find details of Chris Crawford's new interactive story project (with another remarkable name): Slubberdegullion. The aim is to create an easy-to-use encounter-based storyworld editor, a community around it, and a contest! www.erasmatazz.com/library/slub...

I agree with @mackeza.bsky.social. It's far past time www.theguardian.com/games/2024/m...

Still thinking about this today. Divinity: Original Sin 2 actually trains you to approach social situations w/ your character who has the best Persuasion skill I can imagine a different game that teaches you to approach situations with the character whose skill fits best. But #DOS2 isn't that game

I've become someone I never thought I'd be: a save-scummer I place the blame on Divinity: Original Sin 2 (the game #Larian made before #BG3) Here's an example (🧵w/ info about a single side-quest)

ICYMI, with already over 8k layoffs in gaming, 2024 is set to exceed 2023’s 10k. Disabled employees caught in the aftermath are now forced to sacrifice lifesaving meds, crucial procedures, and even forgo treatments. Read my @ign.bsky.social report about the layoffs here:

You can basically draw a straight line from the on-demand generative worlds of @codingcrafter.bsky.social's Endless Web to the Realm Cards in @playnightingale.bsky.social's Nightingale A decade from research prototype to deployed game is pretty cool! dl-acm-org.oca.ucsc.edu/doi/10.1145/...

Please check out this sheet of the current team members who are now looking for new opportunities. We've been honoured to collaborate with them, both on Saltsea Chronicles, and on our unannounced prototype. Jump at the chance to hire them! docs.google.com/spreadsheets...