Steven Nguyen Scaife

Steven Nguyen Scaife

Steven Nguyen Scaife has written about pop culture for Slant Magazine, Polygon, Buzzfeed, Rock Paper Shotgun, and more.

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The Best Games You Aren't Playing: Orbital Bullet and More

Previously:

'The Black Phone' Review: Toll-Free Terror

After a middling sequel and a detour into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the collaborators behind 2012’s Sinister reunite to test out what more or less worked last time. Like that film, The...

'Inu-Oh' Review: You're My Best Friend

Some of Inu-Oh‘s most gorgeous visuals don’t even involve its centerpiece, a series of musical performances flagrantly anachronistic to its setting in 14th-century feudal Japan. Instead, they...

'Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers' Review: The Loneliest Number

Does it really matter if I dislike Chip ‘n Dale: Rescue Rangers? I found it empty and pandering, an instance of some typically reliable comedians on autopilot, but is it even for me? I...

'Men' Review: Trash Indeed

Still recovering from the death of her husband James (Paapa Essiedu), Harper Marlowe (Jessie Buckley) has rented a country cottage, retreating to the sort of stone-and-brick village that makes her blu...

'Kimi' Review: The Conversation (with Alexa)

If you’re even remotely online, countless facets of your life are observed and cataloged all the time. It happens via the technology we use every day, the resulting data sold or otherwise disseminated...

In 'Highfleet,' the Imposing Interface is the Point

Getting into Highfleet takes some doing. It starts with a tutorial for moving its hulking airships across the desert world, sort of, but there’s a reason the game labels that segment a “prolo...

Subnautica: Below Zero is Another Landmark in Video Game Horror

There are people who, I am told, feel relaxed when they play Subnautica. They find it pleasant to swim through an underwater alien world where distinct and colorful biomes seamlessly melt toget...

The Best Indie Games You Didn't Play in 2020

There were a lot of great indie games in 2020, and many have already been covered at Fanbyte: Umurangi Generation, Signs of the Sojourner, Noita, and Paradise Killer, to na...

Receiver 2 is the Year's Scariest, Most Subversive Shooter

Each level of Receiver 2 starts you out with the most omnipresent of video game tools: a gun. Normally, we wield virtual firearms with a near-unthinking ease, their controls largely standardize...

Nicolas Cage in a Post-Ironic Universe: On a Decade of Cagesploitation

Nicolas Cage is an actor forever associated in the popular imagination with his most outrageous scenes. In 2016’s Dog Eat Dog, for example, Cage sprays ketchup and mustard bottles on a shirtles...

I Played Disco Elysium as an Absolutely Gigantic Fascist

Kim Kitsuragi is not the protagonist of Disco Elysium, and for that he is more or less a living saint. A middle-aged, no-nonsense cop in Coke bottle glasses and a sweet orange bomber jacket, he...

The Physicality of Consciousness: A Conversation With Larry Fessenden

As a character actor, Larry Fessenden has appeared in films like You’re Next and The Dead Don’t Die, plus numerous cameos in productions by his company Glass Eye Pix, which has been cran...