1. What’s your favorite kind of video game to play with your family?
MMOs or music games like Rockband
2. What’s your favorite quality in a male game character? Female game character?
I appreciate it when game authors give me characters, male or female, who aren’t afraid to admit that they are unsure of what lies before them. Ordinary people who find themselves in a position to do extraordinary things are my favorite heroes. Male characters too often are so overconfident the threats in the game do not feel real. Female characters similarly are too often presented as lacking agency to the point that the characters feel false.
Good example of a male character would be Rook in Banner Saga—he cares about his daughter, he’s unsure of what lies ahead, and he’s not born to be a hero but will end up being heroic.
Good example of a female character would be Kreia from Knights of the Old Republic 2. While she is villainous at times, she is complex. She has an internal logic that makes sense to her. Even if you disagree with her reasoning, you can never say that she hasn’t thought things out and you can never say that she lacks control or power.
3. What kinds of game do you avoid?
I avoid any game that valorizes a violent event that happened recently or is a fantasy of something horrible that could happen soon.
4. What’s your favorite quality in your gaming buddies (kids or not)?
A focus on having fun. If you focus only on beating the other team, taking out an entire raid, or something other than just fun, you’re going to have a bad time.
5. What’s your main fault as a gamer?
I have way too many alts spread over my several MMOs… I also treat all games as roleplay games. In my world Lizardman from SoulCalibur has serious backstory and motivations. Some warmbloods trampled her eggs, which triggered a lifelong devotion to revenge. She will continue to slaughter the warmbloods until she finds *their* nest and eats *their* eggs.
6. How has gaming shaped your identity?
I have learned so much from so many different games, but probably the greatest overarching themes are the lessons about teamwork. Finding ways that you and other players—or even AI controlled allies—can work together to achieve something great is my favorite part about gaming.
Railroad Tycoon taught me to hate debt, too. That’s probably the most concrete lesson I’ve gotten out of gaming.
7. What’s your idea of a miserable gaming experience?
Those times you have to sit down and report/ignore several people at time who are being racist/sexist in public chat.
8. In which virtual world would you choose to vacation?
Who doesn’t want to find out what goes on in the Pac-Man ghosts’ cave? I wouldn’t mind visiting Rapture (from Bioshock) in its heyday either.
9. Which game did you find most visually appealing?
Games that can pick a distinct art style and manage to be really consistent with it are my favorites. Monument Valley, Banner Saga, and Bioshock immediately spring to mind.
10. Which game soundtrack would you listen to on repeat?
The Secret World. It’s great music to write to.
11. Which game has your favorite story?
Oof! So many to choose from! I can’t pick which game has my favorite story. Bioshock, Banner Saga, the Old Republic series, Loom, Secret World, Neverwinter, Mass Effect, the Elder Scroll series—all of these have amazing, well-thought-out plots.
How about I tell you one of my favorite stories from a game instead?
When I played Star Wars: The Old Republic I was in a heavy roleplay guild on a RP-PvP server. In SWTOR there are no limitations to communication between factions, so this meant you could have some brilliant interactions with the other side. I got a frantic message over guild chat that a group of our players were being attacked by Republic troopers. My imperial agent arrived at the scene just as the troopers were taking those who had not escaped captive.
I approached showing that I was unarmed. While some were itching for a fight, nobody fired a shot. The group dynamic was perfect. My character felt truly threatened. You could feel the lower ranking troopers oozing hatred as I began to appeal to the better nature of their commander. My character was able to eventually talk his way to a release of his co-worker and plant seeds of doubt among the enemy faction.
It was all done in conjunction with the Republic faction players, of course. Nevertheless, in a world PvP zone, opposing players actually came together to create a story that was infinitely more compelling than just blasting away at each other. They had the satisfaction of winning the PvP battle while permitting us a small narrative victory.
12. Which video game character would you choose to be a hero for your kids?
I always liked Sylvanas Windrunner’s refusal to accept defeat even in bodily death. I also think that her message that the Forsaken are worthy of respect and honor regardless of others’ assumptions about them is a powerful one. They’ve made her more villainous in recent expansions, but I just don’t buy that as part of her real character.
13. What are your favorite gaming snacks?
Coffee
14. Who’s your favorite video game villain?
Kreia from Knights of the Old Republic is a great villain. She is sympathetic and understandable. GlaDOS from Portal is truly amazing. Handsome Jack from Borderlands—there was no villain I enjoyed defeating more.
15. Which video game ability/item/superpower would you most like to be gifted with?
I’m going to have to go with Seeds of Confusion from City of Villains/Heroes. Imagine. You throw a bunch of seeds at people, and instead of getting mad, they go make you a sammich.
16. What video game character would you pick to cosplay if you had unlimited time and resources?
Hamidon from City of Heroes. I would be in a nucleus the side of a house and surrounded by several city blocks worth of gelatinous goo.
17. Most interesting way you’ve ever died in a video game?
There was bug in a Neverwinter Nights mod that I was playing once that reset spawn triggers in a crypt very quickly. Soon the room was overflowing with zombies and/or skeletons. We fought them off as best we could for a while, but they kept coming. We withdrew to one room and I had the idea to let them all come close to me. As dozens and dozens of undead piled in around me—and I threw up every form of protection I could think of—I cast Turn Undead.
The PBAoE obliterated the unholy horde in the glorious name of my sun god! Unfortunately, the divine wrath hit the server too. Calculating that many zombie deaths at once crashed it for a while. When it was up and running again I was in the underworld anyway—but at least my character knew that he was one of many newcomers to the fugue plane!
