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From many of the comic book lists on this site you can tell Toptenz.net is big supporter of comic books. In today’s comic books you don’t see the advertisements you used to – no ads with outrageous promises to be taller or more muscular. No advertisements to own a nuclear sub or army tank can [...]

Video games are a form of escapism, but they’re also your property.  When you buy a game, you should be able to do whatever the hell you want with it.  If you want to spend hours just punching women in Grand Theft Auto that’s totally your choice; it’s also a sign that you’re no fun [...]

2011 was a banner year for video games. It saw the release of Modern Warfare 3, Battlefield 3, and a dozen other indistinguishable shooters, all of them selling millions of copies. And then there were these games. Their sales ranged from “okay” to “embarrassing,” but each took creative risks that paid off. For that, they [...]

There’s more to the video game industry than the games themselves. Developers, always looking to get more money out of their hard work, routinely turn to merchandising to compliment sales. Usually they’ll just release a standard line-up of shirts and action figures, but now and then they’ll get creative. And by creative we mean insane, [...]

Video games aren’t usually associated with books—games have yet to reach literature’s level of sophistication in storytelling, and we all know books are for uncoordinated nerds who can’t get kill streaks in Halo. But the two mediums are sometimes combined, and not just into dozens of mediocre Lord of the Rings games. Some very fun [...]

When people talk about Japanese role-playing games, certain images pop into mind: scrawny and under-dressed teens saving the world, ridiculously complex story lines, and ground-breaking graphics.  While it’s true that these stereotypes are stereotypes for a reason, the world of JRPGs is one of the richest and most fascinatingly diverse in all of gaming.  They [...]

Older and wiser, the games industry is still no stranger to failure. Thankfully, due to a wider market and a new found ability to learn from the mistakes of the past, disasters come and go without toppling the biggest names in the industry (well, we assume they do). For those nostalgic for a time when [...]

The video game industry has pumped out countless accessories over the years. Most are functional but forgettable, the Ray Romanos of the video game world. Some, like the NES Zapper, are iconic. And then there are these ten, which make absolutely no sense. Maybe they were good ideas that went awry, or maybe they’re shameless [...]

We are all familiar with the phrase “your mind plays tricks on you.”  In many scientific cases, this statement has proven to be true.  The human brain is extremely complex and organized.  Professionals are skilled at making observations surrounding cognitive tendencies, but understanding the mechanisms behind human perception is challenging.  The cognitive map that develops [...]

Nowadays, nobody plays board games unless they’re out of alcohol and the Xbox is broken—those simple diversions of paper and plastic just can’t hold our attention in a modern world full of entertainment that’s flashy and action packed. Also, all board games are seemingly designed to produce nothing but anger, misery and broken relationships. Here [...]