Kill Screen Magazine's Blog, page 265

June 4, 2015

June 3, 2015

Invisible, Inc. and the brutality of stealth

You'll find no safety nets here.

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Published on June 03, 2015 05:00

Heroes of the Storm is a MOBA for people who hate eSports

The least user-friendly genre in games gets refined, but at what cost?

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Published on June 03, 2015 03:00

June 2, 2015

Decaying New York Pavilion reminds us of the 1960s vision of the future

In 1964 and 1965, people flooded into the newly built, brightly-coloured New York State Pavilion in Queens, N.Y., to get a glimpse of new innovations, like telephone modems and computer terminals with keyboards, for the 1964 World’s Fair. Today, the New York State Pavilion resembles the ruins of an amusement park. The colours of the Tent of Tomorrow have faded to an eerie murk of “what-used-to-be,” the roof, which used to resemble the interior of a 1960s home, has been completely blown off, the world's largest map of New York sprawled across the floor has been obliterated and the space surrounding is pretty much desolate, save for a few wandering souls. Today, the New York State Pavilion serves as a crumbling representation of the ‘60s envisioned future.



the colourful merry-go-round like structure has greatly decayed



The pavilion was built by architects Lev Zetlin and Philip Johnson between 1962 and 1964, and is composed of three different structures: the Tent of Tomorrow, the Astro-View Observation Towers and the Theaterama. The Tent of Tomorrow was used as a performance space and housed the exhibition. The Astro-View Observation Towers, which are now completely inaccessible, provided an overhanging view of the tent and New York City, the highest tower standing at 226-feet. Theaterama, which used to house a 360-degree panoramic film, is the only structure that has found any use today (other than providing the scenery for movies like Men in Black and Iron Man 2), housing community theatre Queens Theatre in the Park.



So, it hasn’t been completely desolate. People have ventured inside to explore the different areas. It opened to the public for it’s 50th year anniversary in 2014, only to require those who took the tour to wear hardhats because of the structure’s instability. That being said, the structure still needs a ton of work to be fully open to the public.



$40 million will provide much needed upkeep for the pavilion



To return the pavilion to its former state, more than $40 million will have to go toward refurbishing and stabilizing the structure, though, it’s not without its supporters. Matthew Silva, a school teacher from Long Island, co-founded People for the Pavilion, a group trying to raise awareness about the benefits of restoring the structures, and created a documentary, Modern Ruin, released May 22, about the history and the potential future of the pavilion according to New York Magazine. Last summer, the Met donated a portion of their ticket sales to the remodeling of the structure, according to the New York Daily News, and later this year the pavilion will receive a paint job at no cost.



The real task seems to be placed in figuring out the use of the pavilion. There has been no formal proposals for the use of the venue. Silva suggests the venue have a public-private ownership, and serve as a venue for concerts and weddings one day, while being open to the public the next. Whatever the use is, here’s to hoping we never find the truth behind observation towers.

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Published on June 02, 2015 07:00

A hot date with a pug reminded me why I hate dating

I went on a hot date with a pug. He stared into my soul, and found it lacking.

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Published on June 02, 2015 06:30

Perception vows to enhance your vision using echolocation

The terror of Perception, a first-person horror game currently raising funds on Kickstarter, is that entire world around you appears to be hewn from stone. What chance do you stand in a universe where everything is so unnervingly solid?



The manor in which Perception is set is not actually hewn from stone; it just feels that way. You play as Cassie, a blind young woman with an extraordinarily attuned sense of hearing. By default, the screen is pitch black, but every step you take sends sound waves reverberating around you, which bounce back at variable speeds to provide a brief glimpse of your surroundings. Echolocation can actually be used for navigation, though it is manipulated to achieve somewhat sinister ends in Perception.


At its core, Perception is a game of hide-and-seek, the sort of activity where you’d like to know what you’re in for before advancing. That is, however, impossible in Perception. Moving forward is the only way to learn about your surroundings. There is no such thing as peeking around a corner. In most horror films or games, forward progress feels like a necessary evil. The whole exercise appears designed to make you yell “No, don’t go in there!” Not so in Perception: What other choice do you have?



 Moving forward is the only way to learn about your surroundings. 



Plenty of games advertise the opportunity to see everything through a stranger’s eyes—this is the promise of VR, a promise that Perception simultaneously promises to realize and subvert. On the one hand, Perception promises to run counter to the maximalist notion of seeing everything. It is attempting to derive its frights by doing just the opposite. In a sense, however, Perception is also a realization of the “seeing the world through someone else’s eyes” maxim. The game may not offer an entirely accurate depiction of echolocation but it translates the navigation technique into the language of videogames. Sensory deprivation can be both a handy narrative tool and a way of experiencing the world as others do. There should be plenty of horror in Perception, but that promise is almost cheerful.

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Published on June 02, 2015 06:00

The aesthetic of games meets the language of comics in Sam the Alien

What can games bring to the medium of comics? Sam the Alien attempts to find the answer.

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Published on June 02, 2015 05:00

The convergence of role-playing and dress-up games

Those capes have always meant something.

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Published on June 02, 2015 05:00

Glasswork mammoths bring a little bit of Syberia���s world into our own

This exhibit uses AR to bring a classic adventure game to life.

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Published on June 02, 2015 03:00

Telltale���s Game of Thrones is looking more and more inconsequential

Meet mean Danaerys and uncaring Jon Snow.

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Published on June 02, 2015 03:00

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