Geek Culture Reviews

It has been over a decade since Five Nights at Freddy’s first flickered onto our screens, quietly released on August 8, 2014, by a relatively unknown indie developer named Scott Cawthon. At the time, it seemed like just another quirky horror game in the ever-growing pile of let’s play bait on Steam. A game where you sit still in a security office and monitor malfunctioning animatronics through grainy security feeds? Sounds niche, right? Yet here we are, several games, books, and a big-screen adaptation later, and FNaF (as it’s now colloquially known) is no longer just a one-hit wonder. It is a full-blown pop culture phenomenon, having influenced the indie horror space more than perhaps any other series in recent memory. Looking back now, it is easy to forget just how strange and refreshing the original game was when it first released — and how much of its DNA can still be felt in the genre today. The Horror of Helplessness What made the original Five Nights at Freddy’s so different fro...

In the golden age of PlayStation horror when fixed camera angles and clunky controls were just part of the charm, Parasite Eve II stood out as something… stranger. It wasn’t just horror. It wasn’t just an RPG. It wasn’t even a clean sequel, it was a pivot - an evolution in more ways than one. Released in 1999 in Japan and 2000 elsewhere, Parasite Eve II followed up Square’s first attempt at fusing a horror-RPG hybrid. While the original blended cinematic storytelling with turn-based combat inspired by JRPGs, the sequel leaned heavily into real-time action and survival horror. Think Resident Evil, but with psychic powers, genetic horror, and a protagonist who could light enemies on fire with her mind. The World After Manhattan If you never played the first Parasite Eve, here’s the short version: mitochondria - energy-producing organelles in your cells are sentient, mutating, and really mad at humans. Aya Brea, a young New York cop with her own mysterious cellular gifts, ends up at the...

In the long shadow of comic book adaptations, Dredd stands as a lean, gritty, and faithful tribute to one of the most iconic antiheroes in comic history: Judge Dredd. Far removed from the neon kitsch and narrative misfires of the 1995 Judge Dredd film starring Sylvester Stallone, Dredd is a stripped-down, brutal, and grounded take on the lawman of Mega-City One. But more than just a hard-edged action flick, Dredd is deeply embedded in the lore and philosophy of the original 2000 AD comic series. Dredd is a film that doesn’t just adapt the character it’s portraying —it understands him. The being that would become synonymous with the faceless reality of justice first appeared within 2000 AD issue #2 back in 1977, and was the brainchild of writer John Wagner and artist Carlos Ezquerra . Conceived during a time of political unrest and growing authoritarianism, Judge Joseph Dredd was a dark satire of fascism wrapped in the skin of a futuristic law enforcer. Set within Mega-City One, ...

Over the last couple of months I’ve been playing through Death Stranding as it’s finally made its long awaited release on the Xbox Series X. I’ve been a fan of Hideo Kojima’s work for quite a while and it all started back in middle school when I got my hands on Metal Gear Solid. While I could have experienced Death Stranding on the PlayStation 5, those who know me will already know that my Xbox is my go to console. So while the epic journey of Sam Bridges has been seen by numerous people in the years since its initial release, much like Sam - I was treading new ground within a very unique world. When Death Stranding was released in November 2019, it was heralded as one of the most ambitious and divisive games in recent memory. Directed by Hideo Kojima, the legendary creator of the Metal Gear series, it was the first project from his independent studio, Kojima Productions, following his high-profile split from Konami. Promising to redefine the boundaries of what games could achieve, Dea...