An introduction to me!

Hello!

I'm the Cartridge Thief. I'm new to the games-writing scene but I've been playing games across Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo platforms since the early 2000s. I grew up cherishing my PS2 slim and haven't been able to stop talking about the games I play ever since!

I play all sorts of different games from AAA to indies, shooters to turn-based RPGs and Yakuza to Pokémon.

My aim is to celebrate all the fun that our favourite games have to offer whether they're already a part of beloved franchises or hidden gems that deserve the attention. I hope that you enjoy hearing what I have to say and that I might even shed some new light on our games libraries!

✌

(Image from Amazon.com)

The Witcher 3, Money and Immersion

Once again, emerging forth from my Hobbit-hole of inactivity, I feel compelled to talk about what experiences in video games have sparked my dormant soul to life recently. Well, this year, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt turns 10 years old and seeing as CD Projekt's other open world action RPG, Cyberpunk 2077, managed to grab me so firmly by the balls last year, it felt like an appropriate time for me to go back and play it. (Image property of CD Projekt) I should state, I had played The Witcher 3 before. I made it as far as the Skellige Isles before deciding to take a break and never coming back. My head-canon for that original Geralt is that he just never survived the shipwreck that landed him on Skellige and all hope for the future of the Northern Realms was just dumped on a beach with some driftwood. However, my infidelity with my digital hobbies wasn't what I came to talk about. Rather, I wanted to talk about the way that The Witcher 3 handles money an...

Why are so few games about something?

I've recently been making my way through Bioshock: The Collection in a similar manner to how a slug moves through a wedding cake. However, my slow progress isn’t down to lack of enjoyment. If anything, it’s the opposite. My feelings on Bioshock so far have been that the game contains such strong writing and so many interconnected themes in each area that I’m reluctant to rush through it all at once. Effectively, the wedding cake has so many layers that I want to stop and sample each at my own pace. (Image property of 2K and Irrational Games) This, however, has caused me to ask myself why more games don’t feel like this. After all, Bioshock released in 2007, you’d think more games would have been able to mimic its success if it was simply on a technical level. However, for me, what sets Bioshock apart isn’t technical. Instead, it is about the quality of writing and the way that the game presents themes and ideas in such an intellige...

5 gaming product placements that were too weird for this world.

There are few elements of modern media more pervasive and pecuniary than the much-maligned product placement. In return for some cash to help get your game finished and distributed, companies insert their references to their products so that audiences needn’t feel any respite from corporate advertising culture. (Images property of Atlus, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, Kojima Productions, Naughty Dog and Nintendo) However, not all product placements are as sinister as I make them sound. In fact, over the years, video games have included a wide variety of product placements that range from confusing to downright bizarre. Here, I have curated a list of some of the product placements in games that are so baffling that I’m not even sure they’re advertising anymore. Death Stranding - Monster Energy The grim, post-apocalyptic USA of Hideo Kojima’s Death Stranding is in equal parts dangerous and clearly based more on Iceland than America. Deadly, ghostlike spirits roam the land, forcing much of...

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