“We hear of games becoming ever more realistic, but maybe they’re just becoming more intricate fantasies. There’s a place in gaming for both documentary and drama, fact and fiction.”

Featured in Issue 3

Personal Computing: Desktop PCs have evolved from family tools to gaming behemoths, they’ve alienated some lifelong players in the process. Where did it go wrong and how can we fix it?
Second Hand Memories: Surfing the wave of technology is expensive, and for some players, the only option is to follow in its wake. Yet a ‘second hand’ relationship with games can be more enlightening than a first-hand one.
Patricia Tannis, Asperger, and Me: writer with Asperger’s disorder examines a character in Borderlands 2 with the same condition and sees a warped mirror of herself. Is Patricia Tannis merely a caricature, or a way to help us understand this condition?
Audio, Video, Disco: By emphasising visual effects at the expense of sounds, game developers have lost sight – or should that be lost hearing? – of the power of sound to affect and excite us. Music can be a game itself, and even broaden our musical tastes.
All the Mistakes I’ve Made: A player who has explored games through infographics and illustrations explores the diminishing appeal of these features through infographics and illustrations.

Reflecting Reality

Blood, Births and Backsides: If games are meant to provide escapist fantasy, what draws us to real-world simulations like The Sims?
Yokosuka, 1986: The 1999 role-playing game Shenmue has a pedantic fixation on realism, but instead of leading us into an uncanny valley, it helps us engage with its fiction.
The Documents of War: How do videogames contribute to the documentation of war and its culture, and are the effects desirable?
Kill the Pig: Why do we hesistate to kill animals in games, but not humans? A traumatic experience in Minecraft leads to a crisis of vegetarian faith.
The Stage of History: Videogames play loose with the historical record. What’s more important: accuracy, or authenticity?

Featuring articles by Cameron Kunzelman, Robbie Pickles, Jordan Erica Webber, Craig Wilson and Alan Williamson.

Whenever you purchase the magazine, you’ll receive a link to download a PDF, ePUB, MOBI, and AZW3 (for Kindle). Please don’t forget to create an account so you can access your purchases in the future.

Retweet this link to have a chance of winning our third issue when it’s released! Read here for details: is.gd/footshareandwin

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That’s it! We’ll choose a winner next week. Good luck! Our Players Guide launch competition is still open until the end of March and you’re welcome to enter both.

If you haven’t got your copy yet, here’s some more information on the amazing second issue of Five out of Ten:

Players Guide

“As gaming becomes a more inclusive and popular pastime, it’s important to remember that while many of us have grown up with videogames our whole lives, some players are just getting started.”

Featuring Denis Farr exploring gender in XCOM: Enemy Unknown and The Sims , Rick Lane on the birth of videogame tragedy in Halo Reach and The Walking Dead, Marc Price on the instinct that drives us to play, Katie Williams on Sleep is Death, a game where the player makes the rules, and Alan Williamson’s travels to an abandoned virtual town.

Plus five articles on current issues in videogame culture: violence, misogyny and sexism, online multiplayer games, the rise of downloadable titles, and how games are already enriching the world around us.

Download a preview and check out the magazine before you buy it!

Whenever you purchase the magazine, you’ll receive a link to download a PDF, ePUB, MOBI, and AZW3 (for Kindle). Please don’t forget to create an account so you can access your purchases in the future.

The Prize

The winner will receive a free download of Five out of Ten #3 and #4 (to be released at the end of April and July, respectively). You’ll also win a mystery game bundle that may or may not include the classic European Bus Simulator. The game bundle can be shipped internationally.

How to Enter

You need to match every location to the game it came from. To give you a clue, each of the lines correspond to a major strand of gaming. The placement of the stations isn’t random! We’ll accept any game that matches both location and line.

In the event of a tie break, answer this question: which other location should we have included on the map?

You also need to tweet a link to this blog post. Save the URL and include it in your entry. We’ll check!

Please send your entries to editor at fiveoutoftenmagazine.com. Entry is open until midnight GMT on 1st April 2013. This competition is not open to Five out of Ten contributors. Good luck!

If you haven’t got your copy yet, here’s some more information on the amazing second issue of Five out of Ten:

Players Guide

“As gaming becomes a more inclusive and popular pastime, it’s important to remember that while many of us have grown up with videogames our whole lives, some players are just getting started.”

Featuring Denis Farr exploring gender in XCOM: Enemy Unknown and The Sims , Rick Lane on the birth of videogame tragedy in Halo Reach and The Walking Dead, Marc Price on the instinct that drives us to play, Katie Williams on Sleep is Death, a game where the player makes the rules, and Alan Williamson’s travels to an abandoned virtual town.

Plus five articles on current issues in videogame culture: violence, misogyny and sexism, online multiplayer games, the rise of downloadable titles, and how games are already enriching the world around us.

Download a preview and check out the magazine before you buy it!

Whenever you purchase the magazine, you’ll receive a link to download a PDF, ePUB, MOBI, and AZW3 (for Kindle). Please don’t forget to create an account so you can access your purchases in the future.

Featuring Denis Farr exploring gender in XCOM: Enemy Unknown and The Sims , Rick Lane on the birth of videogame tragedy in Halo Reach and The Walking Dead, Marc Price on the instinct that drives us to play, Katie Williams on Sleep is Death, a game where the player makes the rules, and Alan Williamson’s travels to an abandoned virtual town.

Plus five articles on current issues in videogame culture: violence, misogyny and sexism, online multiplayer games, the rise of downloadable titles, and how games are already enriching the world around us.

Download a preview and check out the magazine before you buy it!

Whenever you purchase the magazine, you’ll receive a link to download a PDF, ePUB, MOBI, and AZW3 (for Kindle). Please don’t forget to create an account so you can access your purchases in the future.

What we need now are more contributors: enthusiastic writers with amazing feature ideas. Maybe you’re already a freelance writer with some pitches begging to be turned into articles, or you’re a new writer looking for a way to kickstart your career. Either way, we want to hear your ideas. We want to hire you and make you some money!

Don’t think that this isn’t worth your time: we pay more than most games websites (Five out of Ten contributors share the profits of each issue). Don’t be daunted by the length of features we publish, or your lack of experience: we’re here to help and we’ll give any writer a chance to develop ideas into essays. Don’t tell yourself you’re not good enough: you’re awesome! Get in touch with us.

Please visit our contribution page for further information and our contact form.

If you use the discount code JOYTOTHEWORDS at the checkout, you can get 20% off the cost of your order. This discount is valid until the 24th of December, so hurry!

Five out of Ten is now available in PDF, ePUB, MOBI, and AZW3 (for Kindle). You’ll get access to all file types with your purchase. If you’ve already got the magazine and would like a different format, just log into your account and the new formats will be available.

We need your help to spread the word about Five out of Ten. Tell your friends, send us a letter or a responding blog to one of the pieces! Why not buy a copy of Five out of Ten as a Christmas present for that special person in your life?

“In this issue, we look at new horizons of gaming: where can videogames take us that cinema, music and art cannot? What are the limits of the medium?”

Featuring Bill Coberly on how Guitar Hero killed his passion for practising music, Kris Ligman on The Unfinished Swan and life’s unfinished business, Brendan Keogh on when the characters of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas revealed an unsettling truth, Lana Polansky on Katamari Damacy and the fickle demands of kings, and Alan Williamson on Ecco the Dolphin, childhood fears and escape into fiction. Plus, five great features from our contributors on the new horizons of gaming

Download a preview and check out the magazine before you buy it!

Whenever you purchase the magazine, you’ll receive a link to download a PDF. ePUB and MOBI (for Kindle) versions will be released at a later date for all readers. Please don’t forget to create an account so you can access your purchases in the future.