Stan Hogeweg

There's a special relationship that's in place between new generations of consoles and long-running game franchises. Sometimes, franchises make a point of having one huge installment per generation, while others release...

There's lots of pieces of media where the power of evil forces can be used to do good. For decades, anti-heroes like Ghost Rider have been using demonic powers to fight super villains. For example, in games...

The gaming industry and its fan communities are always in high energy when it's time for a new generation of consoles. The PS5 and the Xbox Series X are coming up over the horizon, and their releases will likely mark a...

What does it mean for a franchise when its next installment gets cancelled? How much does the cancelled installment inform the next game? Does anything from the original concept remain? These are all hard questions for...

The Legend of Zelda hasn't traditionally been a franchise about gathering materials, but Breath of the Wild had a robust material system. The more resources Link gathered from monsters and the wilderness, the...

One of the most important things about making a game franchise a success is figuring out the formula. Even if the franchise sees a lot of settings and unique storylines, the traditions and core structure of the games...

Breath of the Wild was a revolutionary game for The Legend of Zelda in a lot of ways. It broke away from the action-adventure formula by introducing Skyrim-esque elements. Link can explore the world at his own pace,...

Matter is a fairly big deal for a game that hasn't technically been announced yet. Even though the game is almost completely a mystery and nobody really knows what to expect, it's important just by virtue of being a...

Those new to The Legend of Zelda might find it funny or surprising that the main character of the games isn't actually Zelda herself. She's frequently one of the most important characters in the games, but it's always...

Phasmophobia is really the perfect game for the Halloween season. Anyone who's tuned into travel themed TV channels late at night has probably seen one of the many shows about ghost hunting that have cropped up over...

Even though LEGO products always come in sets aimed toward a certain build, half the fun is building something new out of the pieces. If a build falls apart or the owner wants to make it new, they're free to rearrange...

Nintendo is not regarded as a company that has games constantly struggle to get through development, as classic titles from franchises like Super Mario and The Legend of Zelda are often smooth successes. However,...

Some people might feel inclined to argue that superhero media has never been more mainstream than it is now. For decades ,there's been plenty of movies and shows that let superheroes escape the comic panel, but the...

No sequel can find success by treading all the same ground as whatever came before it. It has to offer something new. One of the best ways to introduce something new in a sequel is by taking familiar characters to a new...

Nobody expected Nintendo to have a quiet year after releasing Animal Crossing: New Horizons in its first quarter. That game was such a smash hit that everyone was ready to see Nintendo make big announcements and...

Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity is something of an oddball as far as Zelda games go. There's plenty of precedent for sequels and spiritual successors as far as Zelda games go, but there isn't as much precedent for...

It's not always easy to loan someone something that's important . Most people know what it's like to be uneasy about letting someone borrow something, even if it's something trivial and the other person is perfectly...

It's always important that a sequel to a game isn't just a rehash of the first one. Sequels have the power to look back on their predecessors, determine what worked and didn't work, and make improvements to the...

The difference in approach between the PS5 and Xbox Series X couldn't be more telling. The latter is seemingly playing the long game, with many big IPs and new games coming down the pipeline. After all, what good is a...

Sometimes, the best lore comes from games that hardly look like they should have any lore at all. Games like Minecraft hide elaborate fortresses and dungeons that hint at a greater world that the player will really...

Tons of starry eyed children fell in love with fantasy stories because of Harry Potter. The books and movies might only have been around for about twenty-five years, but they're already a key piece of media in...