The 2010s: A Revolutionary Decade in Gaming

“Have you heard of Minecraft?” My little brother asked me as I peered over his shoulder. It was winter 2009, and I honestly had not heard of it before. I gathered from watching him play that it was a peculiar survival-based game, a sim, some sort of creative sandbox-style free-for-all, and I don’t even know what. Yeah, it seemed like a real strange game, but it was intriguing.

By the end of the last decade, most of the video game landscape was dominated by massive, action-packed, AAA titles from the Halo and Zelda franchises, to the massively multiplayer titan that is somehow still kicking, World of Warcraft. Interesting and engaging titles were being released all the time on every conceivable platform, from the fast-paced and visually breathtaking Mirror’s Edge to the quirky and off-kilter Portal, from the atmospheric and occasionally thought-provoking Bioshock to the fantastic and whimsical Super Mario Galaxy. But by and large, most of the PC gaming landscape could be boiled down to hack ‘n’ slash action RPGs like Torchlight, and apart from Nintendo which always did its own thing, console developers had become fixated on multiplayer military shooters like Call of Duty and the gang, and epic RPGs with dialogue trees.

So then along comes this simple sandbox survival game, a humble bit of freeware launched by then-nobody Notch. These two separate concepts were far from new, but together they had spawned a game defined by limitless creativity. Little did anybody know it would kick off an absolutely revolutionary decade in gaming, that saw the medium ascend from a gradually accepted form of mainstream entertainment to one capable of producing art. Minecraft in particular would end up becoming central to the trends in this decade. Most notably, it paved the way for sandbox survival games like Don’t Starve! and Rust, and more horror-oriented entries to the genre like The Forest.

Today, in recognition of the absolutely amazing decade in gaming we have had, I wanted to count through some of the most important games of each year. Maybe we’ll even learn something about the defining trends of the decade along the way.

Here’s how this is going to work: the games on this list didn’t have to be wildly successful or even financially successful at all, but they did have to be well-known. I mean, you can’t have a revolutionary game if it wasn’t influential to the gaming industry at large, right? Remakes and ports of games from the 2000s and 1990s are out – only games that are original to the past decade will do (sorry Halo fans). Also, I am not going to count expansions to World of Warcraft and other games that predated 2010. This is really just an attempt to tell the story of the trends and major releases of the decade.

Strap yourselves in, because this is gonna be a long one.

Stressed Out: The Millennial Generational Anthem

Not only a breakthrough hit for the band, twenty øne piløts’s 2015 hit single Stressed Out has the potential to become the Hey Jude of a generation.

Oh, those darn Millennials. They eat avocado toast, they destroy all our industries, and they won’t stop complaining about everything!

Good Times and Noodle Salad: Ten Great Movies About Writers and Writing

I want to do things a little differently today. As some of you may know, I have had a lifelong passion for writing, and spent much of my life trying to write novels – it’s part of why I chose this creative outlet, actually. It’s probably no coincidence then that I love movies that involve or revolve around the lives and work of writers. When someone truly understands what it’s like to love and struggle for (or with) writing, it translates really well onto the screen, so I thought I’d give a few recommendations of my own and then ask you all to share your own favorites. Click on to check them out.

Adventure Time Has Gone On Its Last Journey to Distant Lands in “Come Along With Me”

After eight years, ten seasons, and nearly three hundred episodes, the legendary animated children’s fantasy series, Adventure Time, has come to a close. Come on, grab your friends as we say goodbye to one of the most intriguing and successful cartoons of our time. But before we do that, let’s take a closer look at the cultural phenomenon that is Adventure Time.

WARNING: In case it wasn’t obvious, MAJOR spoilers ahoy. But really, if you haven’t watched the series up until this point, why are you even reading this?

A Culture of Our Own: On the Democratizing Nature of User-Created Art Platforms

Thanks to online platforms for creating, distributing, and promoting user-created content, and with the arrival of user-driven monetization, independent and amateur creators are in greater control of their work than ever before.

Hello all! None of you expressed any preferences or opinions in last week’s open forum, so I’m just gonna keep doing my own thing.

I want to tell you a story of my teen and pre-teen years. It started with Shakira and 50 Cent, and ended it with Fall Out Boy at their peak and Lady Gaga just beginning to explode.

Despite those groups getting tons of airplay and radio play, from Cry Me a River to Paparazzi, I didn’t know many people who were into that stuff. Mainstream music and radio was a thing that “other” people liked. Throughout middle school, my friends and I were digging Linkin Park, Good Charlotte, Story of the Year, Evanescence, lostprophets, and others.

Something Left Unsaid: The Story of Rare’s Dinosaur Planet

Simple nostalgic yearnings for what we didn’t get are not the only reasons gamers lament the loss of what may have been Rare’s coup de grace of gaming.

Welcome back to Nerd Revolt! I thought this would be kind of timely considering the recent release of Rare’s Sea of Thieves on March 20th.