Mouse Smash

JC Lau's blog about geekery, gender and other rants

Monthly Archives: December 2016


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A Season’s End: Looking Forward, Looking Back at 2016

A version of this piece was originally published at GeekGirlCon’s blog. In the time (11 days!) between it was published and now, there have been at least two terror attacks internationally (plus one averted), even more influential figures have passed away, and the Electoral College confirmed Trump as President. There are still four days left in the year, which I’m cautiously optimistic will just pass away quickly and uneventfully.

My original plan for this blog post was to write a review of the events of the past 12 months. But, for a lot of us, 2016 was not the greatest year, for a variety of reasons. A lot of scary political things happened, or are still happening, both at home and abroad. Many figures who were influential when we were growing up passed away. Zika, Brexit, having giraffes added to the endangered species list…

It’s no wonder that some people have described this year as a giant dumpster fire. Continue reading →


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I’m going to GDC!

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I’m still new to games per se. I’ve grown up as a consumer, a writer, and a critic, but not a creator. This year, I got my first job in the industry, and it’s been a fantastic journey so far.

In games, the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco is one of the biggest industry events on the game dev calendar. It’s HUGE, with a lot of industry-facing talks, workshops, and networking opportunities. Unlike things like PAX or E3, the focus is on game makers and the industry as a whole, rather than end users. For someone starting out in games, it’s seriously a wonderfully immersive way to get connected, and get a more in-depth idea of what the industry as a whole is like. Continue reading →