Julianne Greer: Editor's Note: Editor's Choice
"We're suckers for a great article, but we have built, and love, our editorial calendar. It is the foundation upon which the whole of The Escapist is built. However, we have learned in our first year of publishing The Escapist that sometimes it is best to have a little flexibility built into the mix …" Editor's Note, Issue 60
Articles include:
Mur Lafferty: D&D Therapy
"It's becoming so ubiquitous that the hatred is old hat to us. Don't allow your kids to play videogames. It deadens their imagination, makes them more violent, exposes them to boobies and ruins their social conditioning with other kids. Most gamers are tired of hearing this, so tired they're numb to the criticisms. But what we don't hear enough of is the truth of the matter: Gaming is good for you." Mur Lafferty reveals to truth about gaming in "D&D Therapy."
Max Steele: Three Under 30
"Like film and television, gaming has its wunderkinds, young stars that shatter expectations of accomplishment. I've assembled profiles of three of the best and brightest of these gamemakers, our industry's future game gods. One is an independent publisher, the second a revolutionary risk-taker, the third a graphical prodigy. Each is under 30 years old. Here, then, are three under-30 next generation gamemakers to watch." Max Steele presents "Three Under 30."
Pat Miller: They're Everywhere!
"Normally, I would show up to school in a T-shirt, jeans and sandals; hopelessly underdressed by the standards of most Sophia students, but I didn't particularly care. The exception to all of this was my bright green 1UP mushroom T-shirt, which inspired even the most tenuous of acquaintances to comment, with genuine curiosity, 'So, you know Mario?'" In "They're Everywhere!" Pat Miller bridges the culture gap - with games.
Shannon Drake: There's a Lot More to Tell
"Chainsaws and gore pass for cutting-edge in gaming, but Silicon Knights' Eternal Darkness takes the craft of horror further. A Call of Cthulhu-style Sanity system plunges characters into madness, but the game also reaches out into the life of the player as his character goes mad. Instead of zombies out of nowhere, there's that cold chill in the pit of the stomach, that little shudder as the game announces 20 hours of gameplay has been deleted. There's the unsettling feeling of realizing the bug crawling across the TV is on the inside." Shannon Drake delves into the mind of the madmen behind "Eternal Darkness" in " There's a Lot More to Tell."
Matthew McKeague: Epic Yard Sale Tale
"In an effort to combine my hardcore gaming hobby, my journalism degree and a mild curiosity in yard sales, I decided to see what kind of videogame-related items were to be had amidst the assorted knick-knacks being cleared from the garages around Central Pennsylvania. I searched the lands for gems of the videogame world with only a pen, a notepad, a wallet full of small bills, the newspaper classifieds section and my Monty Python-esque haggling skills, and discovered a bit about gaming's history and perhaps my own in the process." Matthew McKeague goes on a search for ghosts of videogaming's past in "Epic Yard Sale Tale."
The Letters to the Editor also make a return. If you have a comment on The Escapist or its content, send an email to editor@escapistmag.com and you might be featured in the next issue.
About the Escapist
The Escapist covers gaming and gamer culture with a progressive editorial style, with articles and columns by the top writers in and outside of the industry. A weekly publication, its magazine-style updates offer content for a mature audience of gamers, entertainment enthusiasts, industry insiders, and other "NetSet" readers.
Each issue, The Escapist explores a central theme, addressing head-on the topics relevant to gamers.
Combining print-quality writing and magazine-style aesthetics with the accessibility of the web, The Escapist is available online, via PDF, and through RSS for broad syndication. For more information, visit
www.escapistmagazine.com.