Nearing the end of the year, here are some of the best videos I've seen related to video game criticism/development/culture/etc from 2020.

"Ratonhnaké:ton's story feels the most connected to the modern societal fabric, he's an embodiment of a culture." By @marker_quest

"This is a story about America, about war and bloody violence, this is a story about the forces we seek to conquer and control are the very things that will be our undoing, and most of all this is a story about how a misunderstood..."

"Life Is Strange 2 is constantly presenting us with the mechanics of everyday racism. Even some of those individuals you are meant to love and trust are complicit, and at times this is demonstrated through direct verbal parallels..." By @GameAssistYT

"And while the game is pretty clear about how Capitalism is ruining everyone's lives, there is another force at play here. Because, for all the collapsing spaces abandoned by this conquest for profit, there is something about them that isn't quite empty."

"Disco Elysium asks, 'What kind of cop are you?' And allows you to make lots of choices for Harry. However, the game never allows you to not be a cop at all." By @renegadecut

"Instead, when it comes to narratives that deal with mental health we have to ask what does the role of player agency tell the player they are responsible for?" By @TimHickson1

"Heather fought her way through hell and claimed back her body, identity, and safety. Things that should have never been taken in the first place." By @eurothug4000

"Scenes that unmoor a player instead and send them spinning into a sort of limbo where everything is equally untrustworthy and reality is a promise that can't be kept." By @yacobg42

"Who we are and what we intend to say isn't limited to just these things but certain subcultures rely heavily on these forms to solidify a presence in such groups. It's these subcultures which have found their way into gaming..." By @eurothug4000

"We go from an empty world to a gleaming one, with trains and skyscrapers and cars and it's all so much that I almost forgot that there are any costs at all. And then that reactor goes off and reminds me all over again." By @yacobg42

"Anything else is either cheating or not following instructions, And it's because of this repeated conditioning that an open-ended puzzle or an open-ended assignment can be so intimidating..." By @DarylTalksGames

"going back, and back, and back, until the crowd, the music, everything else has just fallen away. What you're left with is just those great hills and drops and turns, far outstripping everything around them, reaching towards an isometric sky" By @yacobg42

"Hanging a painting of a bowl of fruit in the same space as this is a demand to treat our least dynamic, most everyday scenes with the same level of contemplation." By @yacobg42

"This was a landmark title that not only established the fantasy genre as a mainstay of video games, but its soundtrack, with its heavy classical inspiration and unmatched orchestration, showcased the value of having a dedicated composer." By @mittopotahis

"Today, we'll be dissecting the compositions made for the series, how the various composers were able to capture the essence of each game or inject uniqueness into it, and what makes this series' music so legendary." By @LiamTriforce

“Doom Eternal is, essentially, the childhood fantasy of Doom 2 that I conjured up given a week to stare at it longingly without actually playing it.” By @MrGervaisWrites

"have produced greatly provocative works of science fiction in the past but when putting together this list I'm a little worried at how the big budgets of big video games seem to show them opting out of that step over the past 20 years." By @superbunnyhop

"Welcome back to the ethics of video games, this time we're looking at what was called The PlayStation War, surrounding conflict minerals such as Coltan in the DRC." By @heavyxeyed

"not written,designed,nor programmed in a vacuum. It will not be played in one. To restrict yourself to the game's text and the text alone, to refuse to interact with the world that it was molded, formed, and consumed in, that is what limits us." @yacobg42

"This video isn't for anyone. This video is an effort to reprogram my brain to understand what got me to enjoy writing about games in the first place, what got us loving games in the first place." By @davidoztv

"These outstretched ideas of explaining the what of today helps people connect. It's easy to say something is technically good or bad, but that never paints the full picture." By @heavyxeyed

"Bobby Kotick is economic disparity. He is unchecked capitalist avarice. He is power and wealth and political influence. He is one of the ruling class, and by extension he is bigotry." By @JimSterling

"These songs transcend genre, because people aren't genres and what these tracks make me feel is just, connection, and empathy, and that's not a horror thing or a video game thing or even a story thing, that's just art." By @yacobg42

"On September the 4th I was a husband, a full time dad, a boss whose opinion on everything mattered and at the center of something good and creative and whatever. And on September the 5th I was none of those things." By @noclipvideo

"Paratopic comes along in such an innocuous, tiny frame, yet is spun more intricately than the world's largest ball of yarn." By @RagnarRoxShow

"It was insane to release an alpha version 10 months before launch. After the alpha, feedback saying that the game hadn't changed really took its toll on me. I feel the sequel really started at this point." By @SailToArchipel

"And second, Matt Turk's skill level was way way beyond any other player in the world. And there was pretty much no hope in anyone else beating some of them. At least, that's what he thought." By @summoningsalt

"The game materialized into an actual game that was somewhat fun very late. Yes, Kickstarter was huge 'cause we felt like, "oh people want this," but internally we knew we were selling the sizzle." By @gameumentary

"The destructors of society as we know it - whether it be a natural disaster, a resilient plague, or mankind's hubris - bring about not only a profound change to people's lives, but ignite a metamorphosis in terms of the environment." By @eurothug4000