Video games: The Addiction
Tom Bissell was an acclaimed young writer when he started playing Grand Theft Auto. For the last three years he has been sleep deprived, cocaine fueled, and barely able to write a word—and he has no regrets.
Tom Bissell was an acclaimed young writer when he started playing Grand Theft Auto. For the last three years he has been sleep deprived, cocaine fueled, and barely able to write a word—and he has no regrets.
Tom Bissell The Guardian Mar 2010 20min Permalink
A trip to Scotland and an investigation of enduring belief.
“I remember reading about the deathbed confession, and how strangely sad it made me, even though I had not, at that point, believed in the monster for years. How much sadder, I wondered, would it make those who still believed in the existence of a monster in Loch Ness?”
Tom Bissell VQR Aug 2006 35min Permalink
A bus tour through Israel with a conservative radio host and 450 of his biggest fans.
Tom Bissell Harper's Jul 2016 40min Permalink
A profile of author William T. Vollmann.
Tom Bissell The New Republic Jul 2014 30min Permalink
Finding peace and quiet in the high Canadian Arctic.
Previously: The Longform Guide to Silence.
Tom Bissell VQR Jun 2005 40min Permalink
An open letter on Grand Theft Auto 5 and aging out of the Rockstar Games franchise.
Tom Bissell Grantland Sep 2013 10min Permalink
The life and films of Werner Herzog.
Tom Bissell Harper's Dec 2006 Permalink
Why people play violent video games.
Tom Bissell Grantland Jul 2012 15min Permalink
How the game gets made.
Tom Bissell Grantland Jan 2012 30min Permalink
A visit with the novelist Jim Harrison.
Tom Bissell Outside Sep 2011 20min Permalink
On the shift from the “triple-A video-game production cycle — the expensive development process, in other words, by which games like Halo, Grand Theft Auto, Uncharted, and BioShock are unleashed upon the world” towards the simpler pleasures of gaming on the iPad.
Tom Bissell Grantland Aug 2011 20min Permalink
An investigation into The End.
Tom Bissell Harper's Feb 2003 45min Permalink
On LA Noire and the gaming paradoxes presented by pairing nuanced storytelling with a player’s free will.
Tom Bissell Grantland Jun 2011 25min Permalink
On Chuck Lorre, creator of the #1 (Two and a Half Men) and #2 comedy on American television, former cruise ship guitarist, composer of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theme song, and recently antagonist of Charlie Sheen.
Tom Bissell New Yorker Dec 2010 25min Permalink
A trip to interview former South Vietnamese premiere Ky on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the reunification of Vietnam ends with government surveillance, partying, and confusion.