Willa Harlow Ross
@willaharlowross.bsky.social
Filmmaker. A Sheik main called Worst.
For those following me who remember me from Twitter, I promise you, my posting is even better than you remembered.
November 13, 2025 at 6:12 AM
For those following me who remember me from Twitter, I promise you, my posting is even better than you remembered.
Am absolutely shocked to report that after ten years of being loudly disappointed by del Toro’s visual decline in spite of working with Dan Laustsen, I am totally in the bag for FRANKENSTEIN ‘25
November 10, 2025 at 1:43 AM
Am absolutely shocked to report that after ten years of being loudly disappointed by del Toro’s visual decline in spite of working with Dan Laustsen, I am totally in the bag for FRANKENSTEIN ‘25
Single-player video games should generally have far fewer mechanics. Having a lot of mechanics should be considered a super risky thing for a game to do, or a sign that the game is effectively offloading design work to players, but it's the widely assumed correct approach by both players and devs.
November 3, 2025 at 10:55 PM
Single-player video games should generally have far fewer mechanics. Having a lot of mechanics should be considered a super risky thing for a game to do, or a sign that the game is effectively offloading design work to players, but it's the widely assumed correct approach by both players and devs.
Playing HOLLOW KNIGHT, getting pretty much all the items and beating all the bosses outside the endgame, all DLC EXCEPT the final, ultra-extended pantheon, and deciding whether to go ahead and attempt that pantheon (would take weeks of practice) is really making me contemplate this game’ merits are.
October 12, 2025 at 10:21 PM
Playing HOLLOW KNIGHT, getting pretty much all the items and beating all the bosses outside the endgame, all DLC EXCEPT the final, ultra-extended pantheon, and deciding whether to go ahead and attempt that pantheon (would take weeks of practice) is really making me contemplate this game’ merits are.
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
Folks, we're receiving new updates on this story as it breaks. Apparently, and I can't believe I'm hearing this, the new TRON movie has underperformed at the box office.
*touches ear piece* The news desk is receiving shocking reports that the new TRON movie is visually slick and has a cool score but is narratively unsatisfying. Our entire team is on the scene to analyze this breaking news.
October 12, 2025 at 5:40 PM
Folks, we're receiving new updates on this story as it breaks. Apparently, and I can't believe I'm hearing this, the new TRON movie has underperformed at the box office.
checked into my hotel tonight and um
September 19, 2025 at 2:26 AM
checked into my hotel tonight and um
Thinking about the common response media criticism that "art's effect on the audience is subjective and down to individual preference".
It tends to be a means of arguing that we shouldn't make declaratives saying people who like something or wrong or that less work like it should be made. thread 🧵
It tends to be a means of arguing that we shouldn't make declaratives saying people who like something or wrong or that less work like it should be made. thread 🧵
September 1, 2025 at 1:24 AM
Thinking about the common response media criticism that "art's effect on the audience is subjective and down to individual preference".
It tends to be a means of arguing that we shouldn't make declaratives saying people who like something or wrong or that less work like it should be made. thread 🧵
It tends to be a means of arguing that we shouldn't make declaratives saying people who like something or wrong or that less work like it should be made. thread 🧵
After years of consideration I feel confident saying that I think SUPER MARIO BROS is a substantially better game than SUPER MARIO BROS 3
August 31, 2025 at 11:27 PM
After years of consideration I feel confident saying that I think SUPER MARIO BROS is a substantially better game than SUPER MARIO BROS 3
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
A lot of people take performance eval in games too seriously. When it's being judgemental or insulting/mocking they feel like it's judging them as a person because the games don't convey that it's a type of play, or roleplay. Silly example but it's easy to see if you reframe the judgement as kink
August 11, 2025 at 11:38 PM
A lot of people take performance eval in games too seriously. When it's being judgemental or insulting/mocking they feel like it's judging them as a person because the games don't convey that it's a type of play, or roleplay. Silly example but it's easy to see if you reframe the judgement as kink
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
circa-1990s reviews asking why Panzer Dragoon can't fly in 360-degrees always stick in my mind as the most heinous example of this
I rly wish players were less intolerant of mechanical limitations but with that being the case I think the goal for devs is to make sure that the answer to the question "why can't [character] do [thing]?" is "are you stupid? Look at them."
August 19, 2025 at 3:39 AM
circa-1990s reviews asking why Panzer Dragoon can't fly in 360-degrees always stick in my mind as the most heinous example of this
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
The background on this waterfall, from the game's director Takatsuna Senba
(the whole interview is pretty great stuff:
web.archive.org/web/20191230...)
(the whole interview is pretty great stuff:
web.archive.org/web/20191230...)
August 23, 2025 at 8:11 PM
The background on this waterfall, from the game's director Takatsuna Senba
(the whole interview is pretty great stuff:
web.archive.org/web/20191230...)
(the whole interview is pretty great stuff:
web.archive.org/web/20191230...)
It's rare that I feel like such an outlier as I do when discussing remakes, and truthfully that goes double for gaming remakes and the general "remake culture" framing of discussion.
There is no "remake culture", It's all just part of the same mainstream AAA design impulses.
There is no "remake culture", It's all just part of the same mainstream AAA design impulses.
August 23, 2025 at 9:07 PM
It's rare that I feel like such an outlier as I do when discussing remakes, and truthfully that goes double for gaming remakes and the general "remake culture" framing of discussion.
There is no "remake culture", It's all just part of the same mainstream AAA design impulses.
There is no "remake culture", It's all just part of the same mainstream AAA design impulses.
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
Well this is the 'expose to oxygen' part, to try and find the biggest outliers in the actual proc-gen department. "Tends toward low contrast" is probably fairer, but I'm obviously not even 100% sure if that's true.
I see what yr saying but I think procgen is too big a term to make generalizations about, not just bc I can think of complex procgen level systems that really do feel striking and deliberate (Cogmind, Unexplored) but also because procgen could be as simple as moving the items around a static map
August 2, 2025 at 6:09 AM
Well this is the 'expose to oxygen' part, to try and find the biggest outliers in the actual proc-gen department. "Tends toward low contrast" is probably fairer, but I'm obviously not even 100% sure if that's true.
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
Which like the idea in the feely parts of my brain is like.. Low contrast isn't BAD, in art, or design or whatever. But you think about a minecraft world and it is very big, varied, but always weirdly samey. Non-procgen example, some puzzle games have very "low contrast" levels...
August 2, 2025 at 5:46 AM
Which like the idea in the feely parts of my brain is like.. Low contrast isn't BAD, in art, or design or whatever. But you think about a minecraft world and it is very big, varied, but always weirdly samey. Non-procgen example, some puzzle games have very "low contrast" levels...
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
Also to throw out another random thought I had during the podcast that I didn't manage to get out, but when we were talking about proc-gen content vs handcrafted, a phrase that popped into my head is "proc-gen is low contrast content" and now I need to expose that phrase to oxygen
August 2, 2025 at 5:42 AM
Also to throw out another random thought I had during the podcast that I didn't manage to get out, but when we were talking about proc-gen content vs handcrafted, a phrase that popped into my head is "proc-gen is low contrast content" and now I need to expose that phrase to oxygen
It’s incredible how it took me literally decades to realize that once you remove the whiff of financial exploitation from classically-designed arcade games (i.e. free credits, any costs paid up-front for all future play) they address virtually every major issue I have with most video game design.
August 20, 2025 at 1:46 AM
It’s incredible how it took me literally decades to realize that once you remove the whiff of financial exploitation from classically-designed arcade games (i.e. free credits, any costs paid up-front for all future play) they address virtually every major issue I have with most video game design.
One interesting thing about having FFS just two months away is that I have just a small amount of annoyance at every event that I go to or plan between now and then, because I wish I was going with the face I’m going to have.
August 20, 2025 at 1:34 AM
One interesting thing about having FFS just two months away is that I have just a small amount of annoyance at every event that I go to or plan between now and then, because I wish I was going with the face I’m going to have.
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
I tend to prefer games that aim to invoke a range of positive AND negative emotions over dopamine factories but a lot of people don't entertain the idea that not all games want to make you happy (or take all your money)
August 18, 2025 at 12:02 AM
I tend to prefer games that aim to invoke a range of positive AND negative emotions over dopamine factories but a lot of people don't entertain the idea that not all games want to make you happy (or take all your money)
Might have to finally rank Melee over Super Metroid on my favorite games list, albeit I’ve put many hundreds more hours into the former and its community
But i love my girlfriend even more and getting to experience a major with her is fulfilling in ways I don’t know how to describe.
But i love my girlfriend even more and getting to experience a major with her is fulfilling in ways I don’t know how to describe.
August 10, 2025 at 10:38 PM
Might have to finally rank Melee over Super Metroid on my favorite games list, albeit I’ve put many hundreds more hours into the former and its community
But i love my girlfriend even more and getting to experience a major with her is fulfilling in ways I don’t know how to describe.
But i love my girlfriend even more and getting to experience a major with her is fulfilling in ways I don’t know how to describe.
“They just don’t see what RapMonster sees”
August 10, 2025 at 4:42 PM
“They just don’t see what RapMonster sees”
Reposted by Willa Harlow Ross
Well, the end of HOW WOULD LUBITSCH DO IT arrives today with our episode on CLUNY BROWN (1946).
It's a bittersweet one only in the sense that there's nothing left to cover - this has been among the more rewarding adventures of my life thus far!
It's a bittersweet one only in the sense that there's nothing left to cover - this has been among the more rewarding adventures of my life thus far!
S5E10 - Cluny Brown [1946] and our Grand Finale with Tim Brayton — Moving Image Agency
How Would Lubitsch Do It comes to a close with a grand finale. Tim Brayton returns to discuss Cluny Brown and look back on both Ernst Lubitsch’s career and the past five seasons of this show. Fi...
www.movingimageagency.com
October 22, 2024 at 4:25 PM
Well, the end of HOW WOULD LUBITSCH DO IT arrives today with our episode on CLUNY BROWN (1946).
It's a bittersweet one only in the sense that there's nothing left to cover - this has been among the more rewarding adventures of my life thus far!
It's a bittersweet one only in the sense that there's nothing left to cover - this has been among the more rewarding adventures of my life thus far!
Obviously FURIOSA is going to call forward to FURY ROAD in numerous ways, but I noticed this and it makes me REALLY excited to explore their intertextual relationship.
March 22, 2024 at 5:24 AM
Obviously FURIOSA is going to call forward to FURY ROAD in numerous ways, but I noticed this and it makes me REALLY excited to explore their intertextual relationship.
George Miller and Nico Lathouris were writing FURIOSA before production ever began on FURY ROAD. Here are some images from the FURY ROAD script circa the 2000s and the first FURIOSA trailer that provide an indication of how tightly interwoven their development wound up being.
March 16, 2024 at 6:52 AM
George Miller and Nico Lathouris were writing FURIOSA before production ever began on FURY ROAD. Here are some images from the FURY ROAD script circa the 2000s and the first FURIOSA trailer that provide an indication of how tightly interwoven their development wound up being.
i spend a considerable amount of social energy not talking about furiosa, my labour is unseen
March 5, 2024 at 10:52 PM
i spend a considerable amount of social energy not talking about furiosa, my labour is unseen