Playing the Narrative: ‘Celeste’
An imposing mountain looms overhead. A young girl has travelled a long way from home, planning to scale this mountain and reach its peak. She climbs not because she wants to, but because she...
Category: Features
Reflecting on Two Years as a Twitch Streamer
Though streaming can be mentally taxing, it is also one of the most rewarding things that I do in my daily life. Before being shuffled indoors over these past few months due to social...
A Boundless Adventure: A Heartfelt Review of ‘Final Fantasy 7 Remake’
How do you redevelop a five-hour moment from an original game into a new experience that easily reaches 30 hours without coming off as some bloated malformation of what used to be? The Final...
‘Doctor Who: The Edge of Time’ is the Most Broken VR Experience I’ve Ever Had – and I Kind of Loved It
I have never been terribly raucous about the potential for virtual reality (VR) games to pioneer the medium forward. But as chance would have it, I found myself purchasing a steeply discounted PSVR headset...
The Top 10 ‘Street Fighter’ Characters of All Time
Within the Epilogue Gaming community we have a monthly vote between games whose titles we as a whole regard as worthwhile experiences that warrant either initial playthroughs for some as well as replays for...
The Highlights of LudoNarraCon 2020
This year’s LudoNarraCon event – a showcase celebrating narrative games – was jam packed with indie games of all stripes. It’s a remarkable time for games that I’ve previously written about, like Neo Cab...
What ‘Kill la Kill – IF’ Gets Wrong About the Series
Kill la Kill is one of the greatest single-run anime series of all time, featuring an exaggerated parodical critique of fashion culture. Naturally, the idea of playing an incarnation of that universe in video...
The Left Behind Game Club: ‘A Short Hike’
When I began working on the Ludonarrative Podcast a few years back, one of the first things I did was look around for similar podcasts – shows that produced thoughtful, engaging, critical, and unique...
Playing the Narrative: ‘Bloodborne’
Beasts run rampant all over the city of Yharnam, terrorizing the populace. The Healing Church, the organization running the town, has recruited some hunters to keep the city safe. Unfortunately for the people of...
The Cost of Caring: The Powerful Impact of ‘missed messages.’
It’s often difficult to argue that certain video games are “important” in the same way that knowing how to read and write is important. It’s furthermore difficult to convince a skeptic that some video...
Elegant, Curious, and Spirited: A Critical Review of ‘Ori and the Will of the Wisps’
It’s Ben’s recommendation that you listen to the Ori and the Will of the Wisps score, composed by Gareth Coker and published by Microsoft Studios, while reading the review. It’s easy to get lost...
Escaping to ‘Mutazione’ Island
I recently felt like I needed a quick vacation from massive 50+ hour games, and Mutazione was the perfect getaway. Mutazione reinvigorated my spirits, creating a relaxing but compelling narrative adventure through one of...
Strikingly Good Level Design: ‘Ori and the Will of the Wisps’ Impressions
Ori and the Will of the Wisps has strikingly good world design. In my 15 hours with the game thus far, I’ve worked mercilessly toward seeing each and every corner of what Will of...
The Creative Library: A Critical Review of ‘Dreams’
Dreams is almost impossible to describe. Media Molecule’s digital sandbox, packaged as a video game, is one of the most unique additions to the gaming sphere in years. Dreams hits that same “weird” spot...
Day of the Demos: Highlights of the Steam Game Festival
In this spring’s Steam Game Festival – an event featuring dozens of demos mostly from smaller indie games – I found some incredible gems that have a plethora of potential and are worth paying...
Visualizing the Narrative: ‘Journey’
Introduction Journey greets us with stunning visuals of a desert landscape. An out of focus dune reaches skyward, silhouetted against the white-wash sun. A bright light streaks through the sky below thin clouds and...
The Perfect Pacing of ‘A Plague Tale: Innocence’
A Plague Tale: Innocence is a harrowing tale of familial love in the face of unimaginable and overwhelming tragedy. It is a story of life and death, of love and loss, of secrets and...
Playing the Narrative: ‘La-Mulana’
Arriving in a village outside the ancient ruins of La-Mulana, famed archaeologist Lemeza Kosugi is greeted by an elder, warning him of the dangers inside. The rumors say the ruins are the birthplace of...
Another Echo for a Timeless Legend: The ‘Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot’ Review
Though the story of Dragon Ball Z has been told countless times, I never grow tired of experiencing the tale. However, even a story as golden and beloved as Dragon Ball Z cannot carry...
Visualizing the Narrative: Introduction
Welcome to Epilogue Gaming’s first video series. We’re calling it “Visualizing the Narrative” because we want to explore how games use interactive visuals to tell their stories. To explore this concept, we will be...
The Top 10 In-Game Announcers
Many competitive games, and even some non-competitive games, give us some sort of disembodied voice to pair with our gameplay and drive the stakes just a little higher Some embrace the environment of the...
Is the First ‘Witcher’ Game Worth Playing? – Three and Out
When I got hooked by Netflix’s adaptation of the Witcher series, I was initially inclined to skip the first two games and dive into the universally acclaimed The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt. Against my...
Achievement Club: Play Games, Get Points, & Earn Prizes for your Accomplishments
Welcome to the latest evolution of Epilogue Gaming: The Achievement Club. After a lot of consideration, we’ve decided to shake up the process of our friendly competition. Below, you’ll be able to find the entirety of our small rule set and group of prizes. But to put it simply, Achievement Club lives by a single ideal:
Play Games, Get Points
A Case of the Post-GDQ Blues
Every time a Games Done Quick (AGDQ/SGDQ) event comes to a close, I feel a certain kind of melancholic sadness that reminds me of the end of summer break as a schoolkid. The GDQ...
Distinctly Human: A Critical Review of ‘Death Stranding’
Death Stranding is one of the most important games of this generation. So rarely does a game intentionally and successfully challenge the form to any memorable extent. Death Stranding is a mainstream title that...
Playing the Narrative: ‘Majora’s Mask’
Many video games have distinct differences between the narrative and gameplay elements. Each has a purpose, and sometimes they work at odds with one another. In games such as Bioshock and Uncharted, the player’s...
Epilogue’s Game of the Year for 2019
2019 was not an easy year to narrow down Game of the Year picks. When we had a meeting to discuss our Epilogue staff picks for this year, it became clear that many games...
An Epilogue to the Video Games of 2019: Our Highlights
As we wrapped up 2019, our staff members wanted to discuss our favorite games from the year. We agreed on some categories that allowed us all to highlight the treats that 2019 brought our...
The Top 10 Winter Themed Levels in Gaming
With the winter season upon us, I figured that it was a good time to look at some of the best winter levels that video games have brought us throughout the years. Through the...
‘Sayonara Wild Hearts’ is More Than a Playable Pop Album
Music has been a dominating force in my life for as long as I can remember. I picked up my first guitar when I was in 7th grade, and by 9th grade, I was...
Epilogue’s Guide to the Steam Winter Sale
Oh, the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful. So come inside, grab some hot cocoa, and let Santa’s special helper guide you through the 2019 Steam Winter Sale! It is...
Relishing the Opportunity to Be a Star Wars Game: A ‘Jedi: Fallen Order’ Review
It is Ben’s recommendation that you listen to Stephen Barton and Gordy Haab’s score of Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order while reading the review Jedi: Fallen Order relishes the opportunity to be a Star...
Paved With Good Intentions: A Series Review of ‘Life is Strange 2’
Life is Strange 2 is an awkwardly paced adventure game developed by Dontnod, a spiritual successor and sequel to the original Life is Strange, which fails to improve on nearly anything that made the...
Crossing the Border: ‘Life is Strange 2: Wolves’ Review
After a year of traipsing through the uninspiring world of the sequel to Life is Strange, I felt conditioned to expect that “Wolves” would be a flat note to a dull story. At first,...
‘Halo: Reach’ Finds a Home on PC
It seems clear that Reach is one of the biggest launches of the year. Subsequently, it now seems entirely possible to me that Halo just needed a new audience, and perhaps a new home.
A Video Game Thanksgiving: What We’re Thankful For
Thank you readers, viewers, and community members for making 2019 such a memorable year for us at Epilogue Gaming. To show our gratitude, we have compiled a list of video game things we are...
An Old Friend Back Again: A Review of ‘Pokémon Sword’ and ‘Pokémon Shield’
The Pokemon series is a juggernaut that, after seven generations, holds about as much history within it as it does have unique Pokemon (about 890 with Sword and Shield). With that history comes an...
‘The Outer Worlds’ is a Universe Worth Caring About: A Review
The Outer Worlds can feel really empty on its surface, but by digging into the characters and each of the words they have to share, it’s one of the deepest experiences the genre has offered in years.
‘Death Stranding’ and Depression
For many people like me, depression is an ongoing involuntary struggle with everyday life. Though most of the time I can course-correct by adjusting my habits, sometimes depression descends like a raincloud that can...
The Top 10 Video Game Chests
Chests have become so commonplace in video games that they are almost expected to appear in some fashion, especially when games like Fortnite infest the waters with their multitude of generic loot chests, diluting...
The Polarizing Reception to ‘Death Stranding’
Death Stranding has invoked some of the most exciting discourse that the gaming community has to offer this year, with some lifelong Kojima fans prematurely lauding the game as a masterpiece and industry skeptics...
‘The Outer Worlds’ is Good, But It’s Missing Something
Obsidian’s The Outer Worlds may be this year’s best reminder of how good storytelling can be in video games, but something has become abundantly clear to me a few dozen hours into the game:...
‘Call of Duty: Modern Warfare’ is Unflinching: A Review
There are very few first-person shooter games nowadays where I find myself more excited for the campaign than the multiplayer. Growing up, the original Call of Duty: Modern Warfare on the Xbox 360 was...
How ‘Luigi’s Mansion 3’ Charms with its Scares: A Review
Few games exercise their ability to transform what would be menial chores like vacuuming or cleaning into an experience that exceeds expectations. Luigi’s Mansion 3 serves as an example of what can be achieved...
Yooka Laylee’s “Impossible Lair” is the Hardest Boss You’ll Face All Year
Yooka Laylee and the Impossible Lair isn’t always a hard game. Just getting from the beginning to the end of a world is pretty simple, especially when you consider the available tonics that can...
The Forgettable Home Run of ‘Astral Chain’
Astral Chain wasn’t immediately on my radar for 2019, but it instantly smashed through all expectations as review after review praised it as a contender for game of the year. And the hype of...
Epilogue’s Guide to the Steam Halloween Sale
It’s that time of the year again, where ghosts and ghouls lurk around every corner. That’s right! Halloween is upon us and with that we have another Steam Sale to survive. Zach’s list will...
Sixteen Times the Irony: The Curse of ‘Fallout 76’
I’m not a superstitious person, but I am sure of one thing: Fallout 76 is cursed. Every time the game enters the news cycle, I uncannily feel like I’m reading news from a satirical...
2019’s Most Perfectly Punishing Platformer: A ‘Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair’ Review
Among all of its flaws and triumphs, Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair is a complete experience that doesn’t leave a stone unturned. Its levels are lengthy, packed with secrets and challenges, and its overworld...
How ‘Concrete Genie’ Paints its Narrative: A Review
When Concrete Genie arrived at my doorstep this week, I dropped everything and binged through the game. It’s a brilliant concept that focuses on wholesome themes, a unique art style, and fun painting mechanics...
