Buzz and Ollie find many rhythms and beats as they go on a visit to their grandparent's house.

Ugly Lady Briar, beautiful Princess Rose, and Jack plot the downfall of the evil giant who plagues their kingdom while the girls face a curse that only true love can break.

Build games with techniques and insights from a pro.

A wacky tall tale about how musicians first learned to play together. All the musicians in the kingdom are so awful that the king sends his men-at-arms to round up musicians and feed them to the royal crocodiles. Pipe and drum player Piffaro heads for the border, collecting other refugee musicians on the way.

For fans of Jessica Day George and E. D. Baker comes a charming young fantasy about a girl, her grandmother, and an animal hospital devoted to fantastical creatures. Ivy’s grandmother is a healer—to mostly four-legged patients of the forest. Although the woodland creatures love her, the residents of Broomsweep grumble about Grandmother’s unkempt garden. When a kingdom-wide contest is announced to proclaim the tidiest town in the land, the people of Broomsweep are determined to win. That is, if they can get Ivy’s grandmother to clean up her ways. Ivy is determined to lend a hand, but the task proves more challenging when a series of unexpected refugees descends on Grandmother’s cottage. Before the week is over, an injured griffin, a dragon with a cold, and a tiny flock of temperamental pixies will cause a most untidy uproar in Broomsweep . . . and brighten Ivy’s days in ways she never could have dreamed. Praise for The Cottage in the Woods: “Charming and engaging. . . . Beautifully written.” —School Library Journal, starred review “As rich with characters from folklore as it is full of heart.” —The Wall Street Journal

An exploration of how we see, use, and make sense of modern video game worlds. The move to 3D graphics represents a dramatic artistic and technical development in the history of video games that suggests an overall transformation of games as media. The experience of space has become a key element of how we understand games and how we play them. In Video Game Spaces, Michael Nitsche investigates what this shift means for video game design and analysis. Navigable 3D spaces allow us to crawl, jump, fly, or even teleport through fictional worlds that come to life in our imagination. We encounter these spaces through a combination of perception and interaction. Drawing on concepts from literary studies, architecture, and cinema, Nitsche argues that game spaces can evoke narratives because the player is interpreting them in order to engage with them. Consequently, Nitsche approaches game spaces not as pure visual spectacles but as meaningful virtual locations. His argument investigates what structures are at work in these locations, proceeds to an in-depth analysis of the audiovisual presentation of gameworlds, and ultimately explores how we use and comprehend their functionality. Nitsche introduces five analytical layers—rule-based space, mediated space, fictional space, play space, and social space—and uses them in the analyses of games that range from early classics to recent titles. He revisits current topics in game research, including narrative, rules, and play, from this new perspective. Video Game Spaces provides a range of necessary arguments and tools for media scholars, designers, and game researchers with an interest in 3D game worlds and the new challenges they pose.

Super Mario Bros. Doom. Minecraft. It’s hard to imagine what life would be like today without video games, a creative industry that now towers over Hollywood in terms of both financial and cultural impact. The video game industry caters to everyone, with games in every genre for every conceivable electronic device--from dedicated PC gaming rigs and consoles to handhelds, mobile phones, and tablets. Successful games are produced by mega-corporations, independent studios, and even lone developers working with nothing but free tools. Some may still believe that video games are mere diversions for children, but today’s games offer sophisticated and wondrously immersive experiences that no other media can hope to match. Vintage Games 2.0 tells the story of the ultimate storytelling medium, from early examples such as Spacewar! and Pong to the mind blowing console and PC titles of today. Written in a smart and engaging style, this updated 2nd edition is far more than just a survey of the classics. Informed by hundreds of in-depth personal interviews with designers, publishers, marketers, and artists--not to mention the author’s own lifelong experience as a gamer--Vintage Games 2.0 uncovers the remarkable feats of intellectual genius, but also the inspiring personal struggles of the world’s most brilliant and celebrated game designers--figures like Shigeru Miyamoto, Will Wright, and Roberta Williams. Ideal for both beginners and professionals, Vintage Games 2.0 offers an entertaining and inspiring account of video game’s history and meteoric rise from niche market to global phenomenon. Credit for the cover belongs to Thor Thorvaldson.