Thread by @SethAbramson

(🔐) NEW SERIES ANNOUNCEMENT: Tonight is the debut of "Top 100 Android Video Games," a PROOF series I've been working on for weeks now.

This *isn't* a typical review series, so I'll discuss it more in this thread. I hope you'll subscribe, read, and share. sethabramson.substack.com/p/the-top-100-…

1/ Most of you reading this know that I teach video games at a university; used to review video games at Indiewire; have been an avid gamer since the Intellivision dropped in 1979; and study digital culture as an academic. But one thing I was never interested in was mobile games.

2/ Up until the pandemic, I thought of mobile gaming as *most* people still do: full of low-quality time-wasters and money-suckers whose most popular exemplars show up in annoying TV/Instagram ads that suggest the only audience being sought for them is kids. I hear this critique.

3/ But as a regular Twitter user, I'm on my phone a lot. And as a human living through a pandemic and a domestic insurgency, like many of you I've found myself down quite a bit over the past year. And so once or twice I tried playing a game on my phone to take my mind off things.

4/ I didn't think much of those games—but I felt like there was something there. I'd lost the attention span for console games around the time of Trump's election—I suspect a connection—but playing games for 10 or 20 minutes every once in a while felt doable. And maybe enjoyable?

5/ So I started doing research. What were the best mobile games out there? What I found was... odd. Some lists seemed thoughtful, but honestly a great many of them were so focused on co-op games and so little concerned about microtransactions that their suggestions were... awful.

6/ And I started noticing that all the ads I saw on TV or Instagram for mobile games were for—well—pretty *awful* mobile games. I wondered: was it really so hard to find an amazing piece of digital entertainment to play on a device most of us have with us at all times every day?

7/ Once I found a few great mobile games—and by that I mean, *great* pieces of digital art that would be "great" on any hardware—I looked to see whether there was a review series (like the sort I'd once done for digital art generally at Indiewire) focused on art in mobile gaming.

8/ I just couldn't find any review series where a reviewer said (a) here, transparently, is my perspective and biases; (b) I'm going to work over time to hone a list of recommended games; (c) I'm going to specifically celebrate art and innovation and imagination in mobile gaming.

9/ So, what is "Top 100 Android Video Games"? It's an ongoing project intended to serve anyone who has ever wanted to experience beauty and joy and a sense of focus and wonder via their phone. It will be filled with videos that amaze you and a guide for finding games you'll love.

10/ Genres considered by the series:

🔴 Action
🟠 Adventure
🟡 Board Game
🟢 Card Game
🔵 Fighting
🟣 Platformer
🟤 Puzzle
🔴 Racing
🟠 Rhythm
🟡 RPG
🟢 Shooter
🔵 Simulation
🟣 Sports
🟤 Strategy

Also:

⚫️ Hybrids (e.g. Action RPG)
⚪️ Subgenres (e.g. Endless Runner, Roguelike)

11/ But I also put my biases at the bottom of each entry in the series—so you understand my philosophy of what mobile gaming can add to one's life that's *healthy* and *important*. Many things you might think a mobile gamer would be OK with, I'm not OK with, and I say so clearly.

12/ I suspect 95% of readers of this feed will say one of five things in response to this thread: (1) I don't play video games anymore; (2) video games are for kids; (3) video games aren't healthy; (4) I don't play games on my cell; or (5) I don't need help finding games to play.

13/ It's not my place to talk anyone out of anything. I'll just say that if you think you can imagine the scope of the art this new PROOF series recommends, I assure you, you can't. There are games here whose sole purpose is to make you pay attention to light. To color. To sound.

14/ There are games here to make you laugh. To immerse you in stories told only through words. To make your brain hurt—in the good way—by testing your intelligence. There are games here of shocking beauty. Games with music that moves you.

Games that will, in sum total, move you.

15/ What you won't find here are games intended to take your money, waste your time, or become unhealthy obsessions. Most can be played in short spurts that are meditative and increase your focus and simply make your day *brighter*. I'm not interested in pushing unhealthy habits.

SAMPLE GAMES/ The Procession to Calvary (#52)

SAMPLE GAMES/ Sine the Game (#48)

SAMPLE GAMES/ Iris and the Giant (#34)

SAMPLE GAMES/ Tender: Creature Comforts (#60)

SAMPLE GAMES/ Lyxo (#49)

SAMPLE GAMES/ Unruly Heroes (#24)

SAMPLE GAMES/ Huntdown (#19)*

*Yes, all of the 80s kitsch is intentional.

16/ That's just a quick taste of just this first entry in the series—which will be honing itself entry by entry, with new games being added and new games being dropped, in an ongoing attempt to create the best imaginable guide for people who want to expand their phone's utility.

17/ Some games I won't even tweet the trailer for, as it wouldn't be fair to the game. Blind Drive (#51) is played with headphones—you don't need to look at the screen as you play, because the screen is irrelevant—and it's one of the most intense gaming experiences I've ever had.

18/ Other games are ill-served by their trailers because they're so immersive that while you play them in bursts—which is what I've come to love about mobile gaming, as I have a ton to do, and only have brief windows of time to game—you really need to experience them first-hand.

19/ The sad thing about this series is that I started it as it looked like the pandemic was easing up. Now I fear we'll all be socially distancing and even staying indoors more this fall. That means more folks will need mobile games, but it's tragic that it's worked out this way.

20/ What folks often now call "distraction" is just as frequently "focus." When I play a meditative mobile game, yes, I'm "distracting" myself from my swirling thoughts—but that "distraction" is actually a moment of quiet, focus, attention, beauty, and calm. Does that make sense?

21/ I really believe that, whether it's an ingeniously simple card game like Threes (#23) or an ornate narrative like FAR: Lone Sails (#78), as things continue to be tough for all of us gaming in *short spurts* can be profoundly therapeutic—but only if the game is worth the time.

22/ So I hope that—whether you're an admirer of digital art but not a gamer, a casual gamer, or a hardcore gamer—you'll check out this series via your PROOF subscription. I'm certain that you'll see what I'm doing with the series over time—and what I hope it can add to the world.

23/ And I hope it goes without saying that I accept recommendations! Subscribers can always check in to recommend I try a certain game—or, if you like, to quibble with an entry or exclusion—and I promise to take those views and suggestions seriously. (PROOF readers are the best!)

24/ Remember that the purpose of PROOF is to be an archive as well as a new-content-producing publication. If you love a series—say "Lost Classics of the 1960s" or "Insurrection Update"—you can plum the depths of all prior entries. The same goes for this new mobile-gaming series!

25/ Because each entry will have various features—new trailers, new rankings, new reviews, new summaries of games that dropped or missed the cut, and so on—I'm hopeful fans of the series will find many reasons to return to earlier entries. So—*enjoy*! /end sethabramson.substack.com/p/the-top-100-…