Ep. 193 - The Gex Hive, with Ian Bogost and Ash Parrish

Writer, game designer, and professor Ian Bogost joins the panel along with Kotaku and Insert Credit regular Ash Parrish to cover Hairizon Zero Dawn, Gex vs. Bubsy, and Sonic Actually Being Back. Original music by Kurt Feldman, including the all new Violence Island theme! Questions this week: From Liz Ryerson: What’s your favorite romhack? (06:04) Which video game metrics and features do critics tend to ignore? (11:17) Which games were most affected by ESRB ratings? (16:34) What are the best non-Bonk Turbografx platforming games? (21:58) Now that Facebook games are mostly gone, how do you explain Cow Clicker to somebody who wasn’t there? (26:23) Violence Island: forums.insertcredit.com Submissions (32:49) Has a video game ever changed your opinion about something outside of video games? (41:47) What was the most ambitious video game to actually deliver on its promises? (47:13) Who is the Slavoj Zizek of video games? (51:47) LIGHTNING ROUND: Dirtbag Driftglass presents: Casting call (55:29) Have answers of your own, do you? Share them in the forums! A SMALL SELECTION OF THINGS REFERENCED: Crush 40 Sonic Shoes Peter Piper Pizza Grand Poo World Sonic 3D Blast Directors Cut Super Mario Clouds I Shot Andy Warhol Horizon: Zero Dawn Lucio from Overwatch Marvel Spider-Man: Miles Morales Monsters, Inc. (2001) Megatextures Rage Hot Coffee Indivisible Blanka American McGee’s Alice Let Cloud Strife Pole Dance Doki Doki Literature Club Plus trigger warnings Grounded’s Arachnophobia mode Trypophobia Chicory: A Colorful Tale Keith Courage in Alpha Zones Jackie Chan’s Action Kung Fu The Legendary Axe Cross Wiber P47 Ninja Spirit Rygar Cow Clicker WIRED’s piece on Cow Clicker XBLIG Parkour Tapwave Zodiac N-Gage Servbot Lemming DeBlob Inkling Francis York Morgan Raz Fred Dukes Gex Bubsy Dragon Age II Black & White Minecraft Death Stranding Sonic Mania No Man’s Sky Destiny 2 Bioshock Infinite Inside Out Coco Slavoj Zizek Roger Ebert Steak-umm’s Twitter Recommendations: Brandon: dedeco VGM DJ, Kino Lorber’s Cool As Ice blu-ray Ash: Chicory, Kotaku Splitscreen Podcast Ian: Drink an Americano, play Psychonauts Edited by Esper Quinn. Original Music by Kurt Feldman.