It probably doesn’t bear repeating that 2023 was a roller coaster of a year. The highs were very high, the lows were very low, and we spent a lot of time rapidly oscillating between the two points. Was 2023 the “best year” for videogames? Only if you look at the number of hot releases that came out this year. But as always, if you broaden the scope of your view, deeper, more complex narratives emerge. For instance, several certified bangers came out in 2023, but those tentpole releases were punctuated by mass layoffs across the industry, with the total number of people fired inching closer and closer to 10,000 even as December was coming to a close. Not even games media was spared from this sudden industrial contraction, as at least two major outlets – The Washington Post’s Launcher and Vice’s Waypoint verticals – shut down, and independent site Uppercut Crit dramatically scaled its output back this fall.
This year also saw numerous examples of games and the world intermingling in messy and complicated ways. Multiple film and television adaptations of popular games hit screens, from The Super Mario Bros. Movie to The Last of Us, giving critics cause to question the presence of these works in relation to their ludic predecessors. Prominent game developers spoke out on issues ranging from established genres and their knock-on effects to development sustainability and investor reluctance to greenlight new projects. We watched the last of the major mergers-and-acquisitions from 2021 and 2022, Microsoft’s absorption of Activision-Blizzard, finalize despite government pushback. Game developers around the world continued the years-long push to unionize the industry, with some successes and some setbacks.
The industry also once again found itself having to contend with social issues around colonialism, racism, sexism, homophobia and transphobia, and most notably, a rapidly-unfolding genocide in Gaza. If the silence on any of these issues, especially at prominent fall and winter industry events like the Golden Joysticks and the Game Awards, is any indication, that response has been sorely lacking, to say the least.
All of this is to say: there are many, many justifiable reasons to not want to celebrate this year. It would be extremely easy for us to say, “let’s take a raincheck, maybe come back next year if the vibes improve at all.” But something we discovered while writing this caused us to push back against that impulse.
Where is all the good writing about games? It’s everywhere.
In 2023, 589 articles by 292 writers at 140 different websites were included in Critical Distance’s weekly and monthly roundups. Yes, the big sites like IGN and GameSpot all made appearances, but overwhelmingly we heard from small and midsize independent outlets, researchers specializing in particular areas of game studies and videogame history, and dozens upon dozens of individual bloggers whose desire to engage critically with games on their own terms shone through extremely brightly. Even as things seem like they’re at their darkest, hundreds of flowers have bloomed in that twilight.
Since 2009, Critical Distance’s mission has been to “facilitate dialogue,” “build a foundation for ongoing conversations between developers, critics, educators and enthusiasts about critical issues in games culture,” and create “a compendium of the most incisive, thought-provoking, and remarkable discussion in and around games.” With the way social media has fragmented over the past year, it can sometimes be hard to see these ongoing conversations. But reading the works our Senior Curator Chris Lawrence collects each week with the help of attentive Critical Distance readers and community members, seeing the unexpected and interesting ways they connect with each other, and then being able to zoom out to see hundreds of writers in spirited dialogue with each other… this is worth celebrating.
Without further ado, here is a list of some of the best, funniest, most tear-jerking, claim-staking, and rabble-rousing pieces of videogame blogging from 2023.