Melissa and Zora sat down to discuss the representations of sexuality and gender in the Dragon Age series, with some (maybe) surprising praise and some (less) surprising criticisms.
Check it out: sidequest.zone/2025/03/23/p...
20.09.2025 10:35 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
"Sometimes [challenging convention is] throwing convention and practicality out the window and just reveling in making us screw up our faces and demand that our friends take a look at what we’re playing."
sidequest.zone/2017/01/19/d...
17.09.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Seven Intriguing Video Game Sewers - Sidequest
Delve into the mysteries, horrors, and eerie beauty of sewers in seven video games with intriguing subterranean tunnel systems.
"Sewers combine the allure of secret underground tunnels with the chance to study old artifacts that have been thrown away and forgotten." — Kathryn Hemmann
Read more in Seven Intriguing Video Game Sewers: sidequest.zone/2025/03/03/v...
13.09.2025 10:35 — 👍 4 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
"And as I watched the playthrough again, I recognized an issue that I didn’t think I would have when I played it back then. You spend the vast majority of this game playing for and even lionising the bad guys. Genesis may be a dick, but he’s right." — Cress
Read more: sidequest.zone/2023/06/12/w...
10.09.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
In Pyre, Every Game Is a God Game - Sidequest
Andrei Filote writes about the world of Supergiant Games' Pyre, and what liberation means for those who are exiled.
"It is just and beautiful for friends to part when life... presents a fork in the road. When that moment comes... we will feel something precious when we say goodbye, for the joy of having known each other will be proven in the bittersweetness of our parting."
sidequest.zone/2025/08/19/i...
05.09.2025 10:35 — 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
How to Beat Nightmare King Grimm and Ignore Your Grief in Ten Easy Steps - Sidequest
Writer Rory Hoeschen walks gamers through defeating Hollow Knight's Nightmare King Grimm and working—or not—through grief.
"To truly understand this fight, to become one with it, we are chasing the hitless run. Radiant Difficulty. Perfection.
Nothing else will force the state of mind we need."
Read more in How to Beat Nightmare King Grimm and Ignore Your Grief in Ten Easy Steps: sidequest.zone/2024/11/04/h...
04.09.2025 10:35 — 👍 2 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
In Pyre, Every Game Is a God Game - Sidequest
Andrei Filote writes about the world of Supergiant Games' Pyre, and what liberation means for those who are exiled.
"Pyre is an unusually reactive game; there are many variations of its ending. In one ... you are not separated from your friends at all, and that is when you fail. It is possible in Pyre to meet your enemies with gratuitous mercy, by losing on purpose."
sidequest.zone/2025/08/19/i...
27.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
"Mystic Messenger... removes all of the layers between game and player.... The characters speak directly to you, the individual. You are your own player character. You are the one experiencing these emotions alongside the others."
Read more: sidequest.zone/2018/05/01/m...
22.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 2 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
In Pyre, Every Game Is a God Game - Sidequest
Andrei Filote writes about the world of Supergiant Games' Pyre, and what liberation means for those who are exiled.
Andrei Filote writes about the world of Supergiant Games' Pyre, and what liberation means for those who are exiled.
Read more in In Pyre, Every Game Is a God Game: sidequest.zone/2025/08/19/i...
20.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 1
REVIEW: Welcome to the Urban Jungle - Sidequest
Cress reviews Urban Jungle by Kylyk Games, a cozy game that allows players to organize, decorate, and build a flourishing plant store.
"We’re introduced to Ayta at her computer listening to a routine business meeting in which the company bosses are praising the quarter’s profits while only giving their employees a pat on the back (already relatable)." — Cress
Read more at sidequest.zone/2025/05/12/r...
12.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
"Deus Ex... imagines the Illuminati as a cabal of tech billionaires—scary, powerful, but also gifted in a way that makes them seem like philosopher-kings... And that machine god... would wave its hand and alter our destiny, whether we like it or not."
sidequest.zone/2025/05/19/t...
10.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 3 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Join us on patreon at patreon.com/sidequestzone!
08.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 2 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
The Softer Side of Dark Souls Fandom - Sidequest
Dark Souls fandom was once infamously unwelcoming, but it has grown to include female gamers and the LGBTQ+ community.
"In a strange twist of fate, the games weaponized to mock diversity have become a sanctuary for many of the people who were once excluded. I’d like to share my story of how this happened." — Kathryn Hemmann
Read more in The Softer Side of Dark Souls Fandom: sidequest.zone/2025/07/14/d...
06.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Review: Wanderstop Is Pretty, but Fails to Capture the Challenges of Healing - Sidequest
Wanderstop is a beautiful game, but its lack of engaging mechanics and unchallenging story failed to hook me the way I hoped they would.
"I’ve stopped playing games billed as “cozy” without a personal recommendation... [Would] humor be enough to offset the rose-colored disconnect I tend to associate with anything branded cozy?"
Wanderstop Is Pretty, but Fails to Capture the Challenges of Healing: sidequest.zone/2025/05/05/r...
04.08.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
July Roundtable: Summer Fashion - Sidequest
In July's roundtable, two Sidequest editors come together to discuss summer fashion in games. Can Astarion pull off that hat? You decide.
In July’s roundtable, two Sidequest editors come together to discuss summer fashion in games. Can Astarion pull off that hat? You decide.
Read more in July Roundtable: Summer Fashion: sidequest.zone/2025/07/21/j...
31.07.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
The Softer Side of Dark Souls Fandom - Sidequest
Dark Souls fandom was once infamously unwelcoming, but it has grown to include female gamers and the LGBTQ+ community.
"These new Bloodborne fangirls were welcomed into the FromSoft fandom by a cohort of Dark Souls fans who, having been exposed to portrayals of gender queerness in the world of the games, had begun to explore and renegotiate their own identities in real life."
sidequest.zone/2025/07/14/d...
17.07.2025 10:35 — 👍 3 🔁 1 💬 0 📌 0
GYGO Cosy: New Magical Cosy Games to Fend Off the Despair - Sidequest
In this month's cosy gaming news: upcoming magical cosy games announcements, plus Paralives gets an early access release date.
"[F]inding ways to connect with your real-world surroundings and respect the life that lives alongside you is one way to help push back on the bleak feelings many of us are experiencing right now."
Read more in GYGO Cosy: New Magical Cosy Games to Fend Off the Despair sidequest.zone/2025/07/09/g...
15.07.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
This month, Maddi and Melissa, the two least qualified people for this topic, discuss escapism in games. What is it? Can we do it successfully? What is a Nut Sort-like?
sidequest.zone/2025/07/08/p...
12.07.2025 10:36 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Level Up Your Poetry, Part 7: An Editor's Point of View - Sidequest
Katherine Quevedo discusses video game poetry with poet and editor CB Droege, who has edited both of the Dangerous to Go Alone! anthologies.
"The greatest poets of this generation... will have some stories to tell about pixels and survival modes, and they won’t even separate them from all the poems about love and family and beauty and pain, because they never weren’t swimming in the world of games.'"
sidequest.zone/2025/04/28/l...
09.07.2025 10:35 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
"Could we have made a different decision if we knew how quickly and severely we’d be affected? Even if we knew, would we have done anything differently?" — Kathryn Hemmann
Read more in Crow Country Is a Game About Climate Change: sidequest.zone/2025/04/22/c...
07.07.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Mystic Messenger Trash: Storytelling Choices in Seven's Route - Sidequest
In the latest installment of Mystic Messenger Trash, Naseem looks at Seven's route and the storytelling methods used that set it apart from the others.
"Fully learning Seven’s backstory—hinted at in other routes—puts his story in a tragic but also hopeful light, also enriching the larger world in Mystic Messenger." — Naseem Jamnia
Read more in Mystic Messenger Trash: Storytelling Choices in Seven’s Route: sidequest.zone/2019/03/25/m...
05.07.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
GYGO Mobile Games: A Fortnight's Worth of Fortnite News - Sidequest
This month in mobile games news: a Fortnite/Apple roller-coaster, that may—MAY—bring the conflict to an end. Plus, Roblox is still weird.
"Though cussing and homophobic slurs are, unfortunately, part and parcel of the online gaming space (which is not to say they should be, only that they are), hearing a dead actor’s voice speak them without his express consent is… ghoulish? Gross? Disgusting?"
sidequest.zone/2025/06/11/g...
03.07.2025 10:35 — 👍 1 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
Level Up Your Poetry, Part 6: Advice from Other Poets - Sidequest
In this Level Up Your Poetry, Katherine Quevedo collects words of advice from other poets who draw inspiration from video games.
“[W]rite towards the feeling... you have (or had) while playing the game, the heartbeats of the characters, the air and light of the world, the strange hinges of the narrative structure, the joy and frustration and nostalgia and curiosity: all of it.”
Read more: sidequest.zone/2025/04/14/l...
28.06.2025 10:35 — 👍 0 🔁 0 💬 0 📌 0
The Optimistic Fungal Horror of Ender Lilies - Sidequest
As the world changes around us, Ender Lilies asks, is it really so horrific to develop radical new relationships with the environment?
"How do we make our peace with 'monsters' in a way that doesn’t involve violently disposing of outliers?" — Kathryn Hemmann
Read more in The Optimistic Fungal Horror of Ender Lilies at sidequest.zone/2024/09/05/e...
26.06.2025 10:35 — 👍 4 🔁 2 💬 0 📌 0
We want you! Sidequest is always looking for new contributors for a variety of games-related writing: news, criticism, interviews, opinion, reviews, you name it. We're also looking for somebody to help us manage our social media—could it be you? Reach out to our email at editors@sidequest.zone!
17.06.2025 10:35 — 👍 11 🔁 5 💬 0 📌 0
