by NorseGamer, HSM Publisher

Here’s something interesting about the video games industry: so far, in my observation, the only people working in it are those who had (and continue to have) a burning desire to be involved with it.

It’s just not the sort of industry, as far as I’ve seen thus far, that somebody happens to fall into. And as a result, there’s a much higher level of engagement between the people creating the product and the product itself. I suppose it’s much the same in any creative art — movies, music, etc. — but the difference with games is that they are, to some degree, interactive experiences. You don’t so much watch or hear an adventure as you live the adventure.

Bringing these adventures to life, as you can imagine, is often an arduous, painstaking and time-consuming process. Making games ain’t all fun and games, ya know. But for those people involved in it, it can be a tremendously rewarding experience. So what better way to turn this on its head than by asking the obvious question: is there more to life than video games?

It can be argued that, to some extent, everything is a game. It’s just a question of what the rules and stakes are. Indeed, “gamification” is gaining considerable traction in the business world, education and beyond — because it seems to be nearly universal that we respond better when things are presented in the form of a game.

Anyway, that’s about as deep as we’re getting. The rest of this first LOOTcast of 2014 deals with the quest to come up with 70’s action hero names, what sort of ad hoc games can be built on the fly with Sony’s Trilithium tools, new features in Forsaken Planet, and more. But if you’re a fan of Top Gear‘s “Most Expensive Road Test” sketch, then I think you’ll like this LOOTcast. Because it took months of work and thousands of dollars (and miles) to produce — and the end result is unlike any dev diary you’ve ever seen before.

Share