Here are a number of articles that will surely be very interesting to read, should I ever manage to find the time to read them.

the Experience Points blog is doing a series of articles on Mass Effect 2.  specifically the politics therein.  So far, they’ve written up pieces on Salarian and Quarian politics.  Having just finished my first playthrough of the game last night, I’m currently in the ‘eager to devour every last scrap of information and prose available’ stage of my wait for Mass Effect 3.

Ars Technica just debuted a new series of articles called ‘Masterpiece’, with the goal of ‘celebrating games that are nearly perfect, or mark a major turning point in the industry’.  the first one is on one of my favourite games of somewhat recent days: Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.  It’s certainly worthy of either of those commendations. 

Ars also has a handy guide with rules for creating mainstream media controversies over video games.  I really wish everyone who reported on video games was required to read this.  But then, I wish I had Half-Life 2: Episode Three right now, so there you go.

Oh, speaking of things Valve makes, did you know that they have links to a lot of the powerpoint presentations that they’ve used for their panels in places like GDC?  they do!  and there are some really interesting insights to concerning their design process hidden within!