{"id":57756,"date":"2013-08-13T13:30:51","date_gmt":"2013-08-13T17:30:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=57756"},"modified":"2013-08-13T15:08:58","modified_gmt":"2013-08-13T19:08:58","slug":"hell-is-other-gamers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/13\/hell-is-other-gamers\/","title":{"rendered":"Hell Is Other Gamers"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/videogamelarge.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-57757\" alt=\"videogamelarge\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/videogamelarge.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/videogamelarge.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/videogamelarge-300x169.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I am perfectly willing to believe that <a href=\"http:\/\/steamcommunity.com\/sharedfiles\/filedetails\/?id=144549818\" target=\"_blank\"><em>The Novelist<\/em><\/a>, a video game that follows the quotidian struggles of a writer named Dan Kaplan, is a thought-provoking exercise for anyone who plays and an interesting evolution in the way we think of gaming. I also believe that, for anyone who writes, playing it would be an existential nightmare. <a href=\"http:\/\/kotaku.com\/a-game-about-what-really-matters-in-life-1065975282\" target=\"_blank\">Says the game\u2019s creator<\/a>, Kent Hudson,<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>There\u2019s no winning or losing \u2026 You play through and get a story that my hope\u2014and this sounds so pretentious\u2014but my hope is that as you\u2019re presented with the same fundamental question in nine different ways over the course of the game, that you start to learn about your own values. And by the end \u2026 maybe your guy has written the greatest book ever but his wife left him and his kid is getting in trouble at school at the time. Well, I guess when push comes to shove you\u2019ve decided that career\u2019s more important than family. Or vice versa.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>I wanted to test the game out, but just reading this induced a sense of crushing panic about all my bad life choices. (I\u2019m also terrible at games and my Dan Kaplan would obviously be a sad sack who ended up alone in an SRO.) That said, do read the entire, thoughtful <a href=\"http:\/\/kotaku.com\/a-game-about-what-really-matters-in-life-1065975282\" target=\"_blank\">Kokatu<\/a> piece on <em>The Novelist<\/em>\u2019s development; it\u2019s fascinating stuff. I\u2019ll be in the corner, weeping.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I am perfectly willing to believe that The Novelist, a video game that follows the quotidian struggles of a writer named Dan Kaplan, is a thought-provoking exercise for anyone who plays and an interesting evolution in the way we think of gaming. I also believe that, for anyone who writes, playing it would be an [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[419],"tags":[11603,11602,11601,494,75],"class_list":["post-57756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-culture","tag-kent-hudson","tag-kokatu","tag-the-novelist","tag-video-games","tag-writing"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Hell Is Other Gamers by Sadie Stein<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"August 13, 2013 \u2013 I am perfectly willing to believe that The Novelist, a video game that follows the quotidian struggles of a writer named Dan Kaplan, is a\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/13\/hell-is-other-gamers\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Hell Is Other Gamers by Sadie Stein\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"August 13, 2013 \u2013 I am perfectly willing to believe that The Novelist, a video game that follows the quotidian struggles of a writer named Dan Kaplan, is a\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/13\/hell-is-other-gamers\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-08-13T17:30:51+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-08-13T19:08:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/videogamelarge.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"338\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sadie Stein\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sadie Stein\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/13\/hell-is-other-gamers\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/13\/hell-is-other-gamers\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Sadie Stein\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/a1aef49f81bfc540a37e03590f3bb4d9\"},\"headline\":\"Hell Is Other Gamers\",\"datePublished\":\"2013-08-13T17:30:51+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-08-13T19:08:58+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/13\/hell-is-other-gamers\/\"},\"wordCount\":245,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/13\/hell-is-other-gamers\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/videogamelarge.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Kent Hudson\",\"Kokatu\",\"The Novelist\",\"video games\",\"writing\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Arts &amp; 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