Author: Michael Lee

  • Shovelware, also good for developers

    So much crap, so little time Chris Kohler, writer for Wired and generally awesome guy, posted today a provoking opinion piece on the “questionable” quality of some releases on the Wii. After a recent Game|Life video podcast where he looks at a number of these titles it’s not surprising that he has an opinion on…

  • Leap Day (or weekend) away

    One of the intriguing ideas I walked away with from this past GDC was creating a Leap Day game. The premise is simple: take that extra day we’re given once every four years and use it as a day to simply make something. In this case, to rapidly prototype a game within a single day.…

  • Has it been a week already?

    And thus ends another Game Developers Conference. The lack of updates corresponded pretty directly to how awesome a week it was. Lots of great people, great sessions, and most of all, great games. There were two nights with far too much alcohol involved for me so I apologize to: Derek Yu, John Swisshelm, Tommy Refenes,…

  • Adventure as textual exploration

    This article was originally written on October 13, 2005 for The Next Quarter gaming blog. It has been unmodified except for the addition of images. This week brings the release of one of my more personally anticipated games, Gyakuten Saiban: Yomigaeru Gyakuten or otherwise known to Americans as Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. To get the…

  • Unpacking the game

    As a kid I was incredibly anal about handling the packaging my games came in. Growing up before there were CD/DVD cases most games — in particular anything for a Nintendo system — were packaged in relatively flimsy cardboard boxes. I took great pains to carefully remove the tape sealing the box; making sure to…

  • A start

    Because even the grandest of journeys start with a single step. In a few days I’ll get around to a proper About Me post, but first things first. The last thing the world needs is another blog. Especially another blog where the author gets to pontificate for a few weeks or months, gets bored after…