Kill Screen Magazine is the natural extension of a maturing games industry. Founded by a former Wall Street Journal culture reporter and the outgrowth of a Kickstarter project in 2009, we’re approaching a beloved medium on its own terms as fans and as critics.

With an eye for quality design, Kill Screen Magazine is the voice of a generation of consumers who grew up on games and now wants to talk about them with the same wit and rancor that can be found in dialogues about film, television, etc. We are a professional, curated approach that respects the time constraints of the older game player and aims right for the brain.

Our ranks include those who have written for the Wall Street Journal, New Yorker, Atlantic, GQ, the Daily Show Popular Science, Fortune, Christian Science Monitor, LA Times, the Colbert Report, the Onion, and Paste.

Kill Screen Issue 5: Sound by Kill Screen Magazine

Issue 5 brings together our two most personal obsessions: the games we play, and the sounds that make them whole. While the bright lights and colors catch our eyes, the secret attraction in every game is its sound: the soundtracks that excite us, the atmospheres that haunt us, the hooks we remember from our childhood, and the interactive music that points to the future.

Plunge into a (real!) deep-sea diving mask to play the scariest horror game—with no visuals. Visit a student orchestra in Lima, Peru as it prepares a tribute to the music of Zelda, and watch the Toronto game and music scenes collide to make Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP. Ken Levine and Patrick Balthrop tell us about the art of building a world through sound in the aeriel epic BioShock Infinite, while Tetsuya Mizuguchi teases the mystery of Lumi, the virtual pop idol.

Plus! Interviews with ubiquitous voiceover star Nolan North, moody DJ and producer Mux Mool, and sultry chanteuse Lana Del Rey. The bastard love-children of metal and chiptunes. A song for Super Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto. And much much more!

Written By: Dan Bruno, Matthew S. Burns, Chris Dahlen, Sarah Elmaleh, J.P. Grant, Kirk Hamilton, Jon Irwin, Jason Johnson, Patrick Klepek, Jon Lynch, Jonathan Mann, Gus Mastrapa, Reid McCarter, Julian Murdoch, Lana Polansky, David Raposa, Danielle Riendeau, Luis Wong

Art By: Craig Adams, Steve Courtney, Keenan Cummings, Johnny Dombrowski, Nicola Felaco, Peter Jellitsch, David Lemm, Jonathan McGhee, Edward McGowan, Nicole Nodland, Richard Perez, Diego Rodriguez, Tim Saccent, Daniel Schludi, Jack Teagle, Chaunté Vaughn, Kyle White, Ping Zoo

CURATOR'S NOTE

Music has had a close tie to Kill Screen's heart. We partnered with Pitchfork for a year; Kill Screen was founded by two music journalists; and our editorial director was a music critic. So it made sense that we'd look at sound design and scoring, two of the must underappreciated elements in all of games. – Kill Screen Magazine

 
 

BOOK PREVIEW

From the article Say Hi to Lumi by Jason Johnson

Lumi, the singer and frontwoman of the Japanese pop band Genki Rockets, is the type of girl every teenager idolizes. In the video for the song "Curiosity," she is dressed like a fashion-conscious space cadet, standing arms akimbo in the center of a geodesic dome. As the music swells, she comes to life, waving her arms in expressive, hypnotic gestures. Her skin is milky white, and her straight, black hair, parted down the center, emphasizes the symmetry of her face, save for a slightly crooked right front tooth which can be spotted when she smiles. She has a vibrant, youthful demeanor. She smiles often.

Lumi's rise to stardom had a peculiar beginning. Her big break came when Genki Rockets recorded a song for Lumines II, a slick PSP puzzler similar to Tetris. That song, the catchy "Heavenly Star," became a hit single in 2007. A year later, their debut album, Genki Rockets I, Heavenly Star, reached the 15th spot on the Japanese pop charts. Lately, between launching a new album, filming music videos, and performing at dance clubs across Japan, Lumi found time to star in her own videogame, the futuristic, psychedelic Child of Eden.

Save one important detail, Lumi is a regular Japanese pop star. However, unlike the legions of divas who fill Asian radio waves and video sharing sites like Nico Nico Douga, Lumi isn't real. She is a virtual idol—a digital representation in the image of a celebrity. She looks and sounds like a teenage dream. But what she is made of reads like a recipe for cyborgs: recordings stored on a hard drive, and a voice that is carried by fiber optic cables.