Preview: Cara Ellison and Simon Parkin

• Tina Koenig
• 17 August 2016

This article is from 2016

Serial gamers ask if our obsession with video games is killing us

Cara Ellison and Simon Parkin both like to play video games. They write about them and like to talk about them too.

In 2014 Ellison set herself a challenge: to live with and write about some of the most interesting game developers. The gaming commentator's voyage of discovery lasted more than a year, and taught her about how developers express the culture around them.

After documenting her journey in Embed with Games, she won the New York Games Journalism Award earlier this year.

In his first non-fiction book, Death by Video Game, journalist Parkin explores the impact that video games have on our lives. He has uncovered real-life tales of obsessed gamers who go beyond their limits and just don't know when to stop, those that have been all-consumed by the gaming world and die suddenly in dingy, dank internet cafes. Parkin, who is also known as 'gaming's Jon Ronson' asks: 'Why the hell do we all care about video games anyway?'

They're two of the most informed gaming critics around and in this book festival event, they'll be talking about all things virtual. They know when it's Game Over. No need to bring your controller.

Charlotte Square Gardens, 26 Aug, 8.30pm, £8 (£6).