A must-read for the serious gamer. Dr. Strunk provides thoughtful analysis and interesting connections between video games and cultural history shifts. This book was pretty academic in nature, but still accessible to most people. Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and publisher for an advanced reader copy of this book for an honest review.

Very dull and tedious. The author will stop his pace to ask five hypotheticals in a row without exploring the topics and without answer any of them, then ask yes/no questions to himself. I should have seen the red flags when he stated that "...the genre of the battle royale shooter, [is] our youngest and most diverse group of games by far..."

It is also simultaneously too difficult to read and far too dumb, with overly long sentences about nothing, but a paragraph explanation of what a "series" of games are. Skip this one.

As a lover of both video games and academic-style critiques, I found this book very enjoyable. I don't know if I felt like all of the goals for each chapter were met (such as exploring the end of capitalism through the way we imagine apocalypses in post apocalyptic games). Regardless, I would recommend this book to many of my friends who are interested in the role seminal games had in developing future games, as well as how games intersect with society and culture, particularly capitalism.

Trevor Strunk is a fine writer, but his book sits in an odd location and with this doesn't do either of his intended audiences complete justice. Story Mode is neither academic nor for a hobbyist audience, instead it tries to straddle the line between the two. As a result, it feels more academic than other books in the field by Simon Parkin and Tom Bissell, but also assumes a hobbyist knowledge. The book is trying too hard for general interest rather than going far out enough with its own conviction about how to cover these topics. The topics themselves are worthwhile and important, but the book could've used better editorial guidance so as to lead Strunk into either a fully casual, writerly tone or a fully academic one. As a result, the book moves forward more ploddingly than it should, with Strunk spending a lot of space on topics his audience is likely familiar with. Not a bad book by any means, but unfortunately not the crossover success it tries to attain.

This book was a very interesting read for me. I definitely enjoyed reading this, because of my own experiences growing up as a gamer and my fascination with the evolution of video games. However, I do think the author could’ve expanded on some of his theories. Also, I didn’t always agree with his opinions on various genres. But honestly, a lot of my enjoyment and fun came from that disagreement and the very passionate arguments I made in the general direction of my very understanding and loving family.

I think this book can be a good introduction into discussing video game history and their impact on culture. I also hope to see more books like this in the future.

An academic evaluation of several genres of video games, their history, and their touchpoints in the cultural and psychological landcasape of today. Not a text for casual gamers, but a good entry in the "video games as art" debate for those who insist that art must have higher forms of criticism.

I originally thought this book might be something that my son and the gamers in the our homeschool coop might enjoy, but it was more of a historical and critical commentary on video games and how they have impacted culture. Overall a tremendously interesting book and would definitely recommend it to those in the gaming community.