Dead Space: the graphic novel

Deadspace2BT: "Computer games are rapidly approaching the point where they and movies and music all merge into one strange and engaging beast. Computer games are certainly art. Just look at how beautiful some of them are. They are as much art as current cinema is, under the commercial system I mean, where it's all about the next popcorn blockbuster. Games have huge cultural value. Kids growing up attach great meaning and memory to their favourite games." (Ben Templesmith, Comics 101)

Ben Templesmith, the Australia illustrator of Steve Niles' 30 Days of Night (a comic book-movie that SHOULD be turned into a videogame) talks to Comics 101 about the upcoming Dead Space tie-in. I'll really looking forward to both - the game and the visual story.

Read more (via Kotaku)

Comics like Games

Hajdu "The meticulously researched evidence of how easily America can be gulled into trashing its defining ideals in the name of Americanism — as if we needed any reminders — are among the highlights of Hajdu’s book. The comics’ impact on American life is an inexhaustibly fascinating topic — which is probably why it has nearly been exhausted as a topic. Hajdu, the author of the well-received “Positively 4th Street” is but partly successful at making it fresh again. As his subtitle suggests, Hajdu intends to establish the transformative impact of comics on society. This is a well-worn path, and one that his own evidence stubbornly proves to be headed in diametrically the wrong direction. It was society that again and again transformed the comics; it was society, represented by churches, reformers and the United States Congress, that sought to all but eradicate the comics from the cultural landscape" (Ron Powers, The New York Times)

A wonderful review of a wonderful book (i.e. The Ten Percent Plague. The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America by David Hajdu) The analogies between comics history and videogame history are aplenty.

Read more

Mechademia

Mecha2 Frenchy Lunning is editing a wonderful book series called Mechademia for University of Minnesota Press. Issue 1 (The Emerging World of Anime and Manga) includes, among other things, "Assessing Interactivity in Video Game Design", a brilliant essay by J.P. Wolf, the author of a monograph on Myst for the videoludica book series. The recently released issue 2 of Mechademia,  subtitled Networks of Desire, "illuminates the techno-carnal fantasies, animalistic consumption, political nostalgia, and existential hunger underlying the most popular and influential expressions of Japanese popular culture today.". Highly recommended.

The official Mechademia website

Some Random Stuff Just Because

- Comics: Y, The Last Man - review (EW) I love this stuff

- Books: HarperCollins Will Post Free Books on the Web (The New York Times)

- Wi Fi Coffee - Starbucks to Offer Free Wi-Fi With AT&T (SF Chronicle )- Stabucks is always one step ahead

- Hi-Def - Now Netflix abandons HD-DVD - (MCV) How Long Before Microsoft Announces a Blu Ray player for the Xbox 360?

- Games: Games are (not) Art (Gamasutra)

German children taught graphic truth about Nazis

Diesuche372 "German students were yesterday given a colourful insight into the darkest chapter in 20th-century history, in the form of a comic book on the Holocaust. A far cry from your average history textbook, Die Suche (The Search), uses bold graphics to chronicle the fictional story of Esther, a woman who unearths the truth about her Jewish family who were deported to Auschwitz. "Through the comic format, the subject becomes more realistic and closer to home for young people," Julia Franz, from the Anne Frank Zentrum, told the Guardian. "There is definitely a huge knowledge gap among teenagers. Most know about the Third Reich but there are lots of myths, prejudices and misunderstandings." (Jess Smee, The Guardian)

I wonder when videogames will be used to give children a "colourful insight into the darkest chapter in 20th-century history". And no, I am not talking about Medal of Honor or Call of Duty. I also wonder when the cultural stigma against digital games will end. At least, France has recognized games as an artform. Considering that Italy copies everything the French do, I won't be surprised if a paradigm shift will take place in the Land of Persimmons as well. You read it here first.

Read more

The Best American Comics 2007

Lund2650_2 "The comics collected in this book range fairly far and wide, but the strong center of gravity is plaintive tales of everyday life, set in the present, and usually about the social groups that comic artists themselves belong to. The appeal of such work is its emotional directness — in this age of highly branded, executive-produced cultural output, comics promise a more resonant and unadulterated link between creator and reader." (Hugo Lindgren, The New York Times)

Read more

The Best American Comics 2007, edited by Chris Ware

Image source: The New York Times, "Comic by Art Spiegelman".

I Killed Adolf Hitler

Hitler "A depressed hit man. A time-travel machine. The ultimate mission. What could possibly go wrong? Today on the Comics Page, we're proud to present an excerpt from I Killed Adolf Hitler, a freaky, deadpan comic adventure by award-winning Norwegian artist Jason, out now from Fantagraphics Books." (NY magazine)

Read more

Tomine's Shortcomings

41vwryv1mpl__ss500_ "Ben Tanaka has problems. In addition to being rampantly critical, sarcastic, and insensitive, his long–term relationship is awash in turmoil. His girlfriend, Miko Hayashi, suspects that Ben has a wandering eye, and more to the point, it's wandering in the direction of white women. This accusation (and its various implications) becomes the subject of heated, spiralling debate, setting in motion a story that pits California against New York, devotion against desire, and trust against truth."

Read more - available on iBs

Adrian Tomine on Believer mag

Page28middle_short "BLVR: The realism in your stories has brought comparisons to Raymond Carver, who also dealt in tales of ordinary people, the marginalized and desperate. It’s not surprising, too, that you’re involved with Yoshihiro Tatsumi, whose work you’ve helped introduce to U.S. audiences. You share with him a penchant for the downtrodden and their everyday tragedies.

AT: Carver’s stories are more austere and subtle than my stories, and, on the other end of the spectrum of realism, Tatsumi is more dramatic and daring. He goes big sometimes. Those are both artists that I’ve enjoyed." (The Believer)

Great inteview. The Believer talks to Adrian Tomine. Clever exchange of ideas ensues.

Read more (via Waxy)

In merito a Bokurano...

696 "È giunta al terzo capitolo l'avvincente saga di Kitoh Mohiro, Il nostro gioco (Bokurano), edita in italiano dalle inimitabili Kappa Edizioni. A metà tra Il gioco di Ender e Gundam, Il nostro gioco racconta le vicende di un gruppo di quindici ragazzi e ragazze che si trovano a difendere il pianeta Terra da un'invasione aliena con l'ausilio di potentissimi mecha robot." (leggi)

...Riceviamo e volentieri pubblichiamo:

"Ciao! 

Dovresti aggiungere questo:

L'edizione italiana e' della kappa edizioni, ma fa veramente cagare, parlando della qualita' pietosa della stampa. Sopratutto si nota la differenza abissale fra i primi 2 volumi e il terzo. I primi 2 infatti sono stampati non da master, ma da scansione al pc, e si nota perfettamente l'effetto moire del pasaggio digitale da scanner alla stampante al laser, una roba da ricovero immediato, che per quel prezzo non vale assolutamente! E' una vergogna e una presa per i fondelli ai lettori. Questo andrebbe detto, anche perche' chiunque con un po' di cultura in anime e manga che legge anche gli originali se ne accorgerebbe...

E correggere questo:

"Nel terzo capitolo, appena pubblicato, scopriamo che il gioco è effettivamente letale: perdere la partita finisce significa perdere la propria vita. Quindici round, quindici battaglie, quindici capitoli. Metafora del beta testing come pratica estenuante, Il nostro gioco esamina la natura iper-competitiva del videogame e l'agonismo nichilista della guerra. Da non perdere."

Perdere la partita significa condannare la terra alla distruzione totale, mentre vincere la partita significa salvare la terra ma perdere la vita, in ogni caso il partecipante di turno crepa qualsiasi sia l'esisto, non c'e' salvezza e speranza, almeno fin dove abbiamo letto...

Sono in attesa del 4 ma come al solito la Starcomics, (son sempre loro), preferiscono far uscire sozzeria come tonnellate di shoujo che manga seri come questo, in giappone son gia' 6 i volumi usciti, qua ne usciranno 2 all'anno ad andar bene, e con tutta la pietosa qualita' di adattamento di sempre.

Ci tenevo solo a dirti l'amara verita'... " (MyoMyoChan)

My Photo
AddThis Social Bookmark Button

Schermi interattivi

videoludica (Italian)

videoludica (English)