Sep 18, 2014

Game Books From Transylvania to Na Pali

Reading is good for you, you know, and reading about games can be incredibly enjoyable too. Yes, odd, I know, but books about games do not have to be manuals on level or game design. Nor do they have to be about programming. They can be everything from wonderful strolls through alien worlds to exhaustive write-ups on classic series.

They can be just like HardcoreGaming 101 Presents: Castlevania or Escape to Na Pali. Two vastly different books I have really enjoyed reading and have somehow intrigued me enough to replay a game I had mostly forgotten and, well, properly give the Castlevania games a try.

The first of them two books, the first to be released that is, Escape to Na Pali: A Journey to the Unreal was written by Alan Williamson and Kaitlin Tremblay and is a 110 pages long exploration of the first cinematic FPS. It also is a very well written journey through Unreal's planet, history and culture, complete with essays on whimsical architecture, world building and even narrative design. Oh, and some interesting ideas on the fusion of fantasy and sci-fi elements.

Interestingly, I'm fairly certain that Escape to Na Pali can be enjoyed by people who have never heard of Unreal. I've even used it to convince a friend who hasn't played any games in over a decade, that some interesting things can and do happen in our interactive medium.

Surely, the same friend wouldn't be too interested in the book about Castlevania, but, being a huge fan of the detailed articles over at HardcoreGaming 101, I must admit I absolutely loved their Castlevania offering.

Yes, it's aimed at the gaming connoisseur, but it's brilliant, brilliant specialist stuff. It's complete, thoroughly research, exhaustive, lavishly illustrated and up to the usual lovely writing standard of HG101. And it does really cover everything there is to be written about Konami's genre defining classic, including more than a few installments I had never heard of.

Also, I'm out of words and very sleepy.


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