my favorite video essays!

The Witness - A Great Game That You Shouldn't Play

(by Joseph Anderson - 41min, march 2016)

I played The Witness a few months ago, and I wasn't able to get it out of my head for a few weeks. Even to this day seeing a reference of the game fills my head with memories of my playthrough, so it didn't took long for me to click on this video when it was suggested to me. 

Super interesting analysis of the strenghs and flaws of this game, and sheds some light on stuff i wasn't aware of while playing, or couldn't quite put my finger on!

Rain World : A Guided Tour

(by Jimmy McGee - 1hour 20min, june 2020)

this video has been the thing I put on before sleeping for months now. I think I might know the first half an hour by heart. I discovered Rain World via SkurryPls, a streamer I watch mostly for their Hollow Knight videos. The first video I watched, I didn't understand anything of the game, so I looked up guides or reviews of the game, and that's where I found this one! 

Extensive, well paced, the voice is really soothing and the visuals are simple but great, please watch it unless you want to try the game blind (which, if you aren't scared of difficult games, go for it!)

How Yume Nikki Changed Everything... | A Retrospective

(by Sagan Hawkes - 1hour 4min, june 2022)

I love RPG horror games, and Yume Nikki is a game that holds a special place in my heart, and inspires me a lot creatively, but i do not have the patience to play it, or watch someone do it, so I really liked watching someone go through it in detail!

Sagan's channel is full of video restrospectives of many games - I haven't checked the other videos (except the Diminish one, it's really good but really heavy because of the nature of the game itself),  but since the ones I watched we're of good quality, i'm sure the others are as well!

The whole Jacob Geller channel

Okay, I haven't watched all of his channel, so I can't say all of them are my favorite. But I couldn't chose between the ones I watched, because they're all very good. Namely The Horror of Universal Paperclips and Space Engine, The Quiet Sadness of Mario Galaxy, Four Short Games About Pain, Outer Wilds: Death, Inevitability, and Ray Bradbury (although as good as this one is, I feel it's the weakest of the lot, but maybe it's because I'm a huge Outer Wilds fan and my expectations very high kdsfjhgkjdfs), A Thousand Ways of Seeing a Forest, Returnal is a Hell of Our Creation, The Game That Won't Let You See All Of It, and Every Zelda is the Darkest Zelda.

To use his own words, his channel is about "Talking about video games, history, politics, empathy, and more- typically at the same time, always unpredictably". I can't suggest enough that you check it out : It's captivating, and of very very good quality.

Art, Furries, God

(by Patricia Taxxon - 24min, july 2022)

You might think i'm biased because of my obsession for her music (and you wouldn't be wrong, please check it out, I might also write a whole separate post about it because I like it that much), but hear me out. I don't think i could accurately describe this video - I just know for sure that i wasn't the same after watching it (multiple times, of course). She analyses her relationship with furries, irony, authenticity, stupidity, art, and the sometimes inexistant line between all of that, with a bunch of exemples of different media that do it oh so well. "It's stupid, it's so incredibly stupid at its core. It definitely couldn't have worked any other way." 

Oh, and while you're at it, check out their Do you remember Marble Blast? A "Series" Retrospective. It's how I first discovered her, and it's pretty interesting.

a video about Homestuck

(by jan Misali - 32min, january 2022)

How can I talk about my favorite video essays without mentioning jan Misali. I love their channel a lot! (even though I don't know shit about linguistics kajsdhgfkdjfg). On top of that, how can I talk about my favorite essays without talking about one mentioning Homestuck. I read most of the comic (I stopped around page 6500), but it left an impact on me I couldn't really explain, one of both appreciation and hate. So when I saw jan Misali posted a video on it (and since I can't form an original thought alone /j) I knew I was going to love it. Sarah Z also made a very good video on the webcomic called A Brief History of Homestuck (brief here being used loosely, as the video itself is 2hours and 12min long), and both really helped me create and consolidate ideas of my vague feelings about this whole thing.

In the same style by jan Misali, I suggest the who wrote Caramelldansen? and how many Super Mario games are there? videos! They are really entertaining and packed with info!

The whole Summoning Salt channel

If you enjoy speedruns, chances are you probably heard of Summoning Salt's videos before. The channel is mainly composed of speedrun tech and world records retrospective videos. I mostly watch content on the different Mario games. The music is on point, and the recent ones feature cool graphics and visuals to make the video entertaining despite the overall calm rhythm of the voice. Summoning Salt manages to maintain tension and keep you involved in the subject - I always find myself being surprised and excited as the videos goes on and either new tech or world records are being revealed!