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A very Animal Crossing engagement story

Two years ago today, I asked a special woman to spend the rest of her life with me. This is the story of it all. I've told it before to people who have asked, but never written it down. It started more than five years ago. I worked in...

 
 
 

Liight finally out on WiiWare

Finally, a worthwhile WiiWare game that doesn't start with the word(s) "Bit.Trip." Liight debuted way back in September of 2009 as one of the PAX 10 finalists, and it seemed interesting enough for me to call it second best among the grou...

 
 
 

Gamejournos hates satire

This is the header image, because it's okay to use misogynistic images to drive hits as long as you condemn the image. Bad image! Bad! Game journalist journalist: n - And individual who writes (professionally?) about computer and videog...

 
 
 

The top ten PAX 10 for 2010

I mentioned in my PAX blog that a post on the PAX 10 would be coming. Here it is. In its third year now, the PAX 10 is a tradition at the Penny Arcade Expo, in which ten independently developed games are showcased as some of the best ex...

 
 
 

PAX memories and pictures from Dexter345

PAX Prime 2010 has come and gone, far too quickly, as usual. Everybody has slightly different memories of the extravaganza; indulge me for a moment to hear about mine. I got in on Thursday evening, and called up Wedge, because I was sta...

 
 
 

Aero Racer review (PSN)

With little fanfare, Aero Racer was released last week as a PS3 Mini. Indeed, so little effort is being put into marketing this bite-sized gem that developer Halfbrick Studios makes no mention of it on its website. This may have to do w...

 
 
 

On 'Splosion Man and great game design

In case you don't know, 'Splosion Man is an XBLA platform game that was released last year. Even if you don't have firsthand experience with it, you ought to know a bit about it, as it got a nine out of ten in the official Destructoid re...

 
 
 
 
 

Buy this game: Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes

So, an RPG, a turn-based strategy, and a puzzle game walk into a bar. There they meet some spiffy, yet slightly generic manga-lookin' characters. Everybody has a grand old boozy good time, they go home together, and the result of a nigh...

 
 
 

Defense Force: moral choice in games

Whenever a new game comes out that purports to offer the player moral choice, the comments blow up with one of two types of comments. People either come in with the hope that this new game will actually offer the interesting choices they...

 
 
 
 
 

Three 100-word reviews for free online games

As an application for a writing job elsewhere, I was tasked with playing some free-to-play, pay-for-premium-items games, and then writing up reviews on them. However, in a strange twist, (spurred by, I assume, the potential employer's de...

 
 
 

Review: The Lost Symbol

The Lost Symbol is the most recent text adventure by famous designer Dan Brown. It is his fifth published work, and the third chronicling the adventures of Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon. As a fan of Brown's text adventures, I was l...

 
 
 

Prototype and the definition of self

As originally posted on The Scholarly Gamer. As a game that is about killing as many things in as little time as possible, Prototype doesn�t immediately appear to be particularly good fodder for philosophical debate or in-depth analysis....

 
 
 

PAX '09: the top ten PAX 10

I know, "top ten" lists are cheap, and especially if there are only ten things to choose from. That said, I am going to rank the ten showcased indie games according to how much I personally enjoyed them, and you're going to like it. Or ...

 
 
 

PAX '09: Hands on with Scribblenauts

I mentioned the other day in my Left 4 Dead 2 impressions post that when I wasn't just hanging out with Dtoid people, or going to Dtoid panels, or attending concerts, or eating, or sleeping, I spent a fair amount of my time with L4D2, the...

 
 
 

PAX '09: Left 4 Dead 2 impressions

PAX is a wonderful, beautiful place, and I am sure you have heard a little bit about that already. What you may not have gathered is that in addition to hanging out with friends and drinking booze, one of the other things a PAXgoer can d...

 
 
 

Prototype review

Author's note: I realize this game is OLD and there are tons of reviews out there already. I mostly wrote this as part of a job application, and I figured I might as well publish it here too. There has been a recent influx of non-Grand ...

 
 
 
 
 
 

E3 2009: Epic party photo and video gallery

No words can really justify a lot of these. But that won't stop me from trying. Make sure you check the full gallery at the bottom, as I'll just highlight a few. The gallery comes from two events. The first was the pre-E3 party hosted...

 
 
 
 
 
 

About Darren Nakamuraone of us since 2:29 AM on 11.06.2006

Darren is a scientist during the day. He has been a Destructoid community member since 2006, joining the front page as a contributor in 2011.

While he enjoys shooters, RPGs, platformers, strategy, and rhythm games, he takes particular interest in independent games. He produced the Zero Cool Podcast for about four years, and he plays board games quite a bit when he can find willing companions.

FULL DISCLOSURE: Darren Nakamura knows several people in the video game industry, most of whom are Destructoid alumni. These include:

Anthony Burch, former writer for Gearbox Software
Ashly Burch, notable voice actor
Nick Chester, publicist for Harmonix Music Systems
Chad Concelmo, writer for Golin Harris
Aaron Linde, writer for Gearbox Software
Jayson Napolitano, publicist for Scarlet Moon Productions
Brad Nicholson, former publicist for Uber Entertainment
Alex Ryan, publicist for Kalypso Media
Jim Sterling, notable voice actor

Darren backs a lot of Kickstarter campaigns! If you want to see what he has backed, you can go here. If he ever reviews a game that he backed, that will be explicitly disclosed in the review.

Darren invested in Psychonauts 2 on Fig.
Xbox LIVE:Dexter345
PSN ID:Dexter345
Steam ID:http://steamcommunity.com/profil
Mii code:1257 7687 3747 6405


 

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