Friday, May 25, 2007

Crash course: recommended video game tutors

I'm no videogame expert. Besides a computer I have never owned any video game system beyond the Atari 2600 that I picked up at a Santa Cruz flea market for $3 in 1989, the year that Nintendo changed home gaming.

Now that I'm no longer 9, my interest in video games has morphed a bit (I'm still a vintage game lover and mostly play Pacman and Tetris online)...enough about me. Video games are a growing part of the media now. Like the way that newspapers have moved online and become more interactive, video games have become more dynamic and educational possibilities abound.

ISIS-Inc is interested in the ways that gaming can be used to communicate sexual health messages or teach STD and HIV prevention. Like Deb said yesterday, "Sex is fun. Sex ed is boring." To stay on top of what's out there in the gaming/sex-and-games-world who do I depend on?

In no particular order, this is who helps me:

Sexy Videogameland blogger and The Aberrant Gamer columnist Leigh Alexander. Her analyses of the sly sex threads of Hentai games is a must read.

Bonnie's Heroine Sheik and Joystiq author of the column Playing Dirty Bonnie Ruberg. Bonnie has her fingers everywhere and it's always interesting.

Watercoolergames, Persuasive Games, Ian Bogost and crew. Fabulous, wonderful, necessary.

Sex & Games. A super news source for all things game/sex related.

2 comments:

SVGL said...

Aw, lookit you plug me!! Thank you so much. I'm glad you like the new column.

Anonymous said...

There's also that great new book about the history of sex in video games by Brenda Brathwaite. It's a heavy hard covered text, but it's chock full of good stuff from the woman who helped program one of the most popular sex video games: Playboy The Mansion, among others.

I think the IDGA forum is facilitated by Brenda.