A Man Marrying Hatsune Miku Is a Small Part of a Big Story (Tanja Välisalo) (Patreon)

This week on Post Games:

Act 1: What Is Fictophilia?

Act 2: Fandom, Parasocial Relationships, and Big Tech

Patreon Bonus: Post Games Hits Two Milestones

Act 3: The News of the Week

Guests:

Tanja Välisalo: Teacher, researcher, and project coordinator at the Department of Music, Art and Culture Studies at the University of Jyväskylä in Finland

Nicole Carpenter: Reporter at publications like 404 Media, Vulture, Polygon, and more

Closing Song: "Character Selection Theme " by Vibe Avenue (Tears of Metal)

Act 1: What Is Fictophilia?

Fictosexuality, Fictoromance, and Fictophilia: A Qualitative Study of Love and Desire for Fictional Characters (Frontiers)

Imaginary social worlds : a cultural approach by John Caughey (Archive.org)

Jessica Rabbit (Fandom)

Akihiki Kondo (Wiki)

Fictosexuality.org (fictosexuality.org)

Japanese Man Who Married Hatsune Miku (TAKASHii)

What is being fictosexual (Reddit)

Act 2: Fandom, Parasocial Relationships, and Big Tech

This Man Married a Fictional Character. He’d Like You to Hear Him Out. (NYTimes)

Parasocial Interaction (Wiki)

I Tried Dating Elon Musk’s AI Anime Girl Companion But She's a Terrible Girlfriend (PCMag)

Has anyone tried an AI girlfriend app? What was your experience and which one was best? (Reddit)

Tanja Välisalo on Bluesky (bsky.app)

Patreon Bonus: Post Games Hits Two Milestones

1500 Water Balloons + Trampoline- SLO MO!! (YouTube)

Numberwang (YouTube)

The Score by C. Thi Nguyen (Penguin Random House)

The Entertainment Software Association (theesa.com)

Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley (daniellebrathwaiteshirley.com)

You Died: The Dark Souls Companion (Tune & Fairweather)

Act 3: The News of the Week

Roblox Head of Parental Advocacy Says We’re All Responsible for Kids’ Online Safety (Vulture)

We Asked Roblox’s C.E.O. About Child Safety. It Got Tense. (NYTimes)

Nicole Carpenter on Bluesky (Bsky.app)

This Week in Video Game Links

Video games need to do better than treating skin like skins (Mothership)

How a Dungeons & Dragons meetup turned into mutual aid during ICE operations (MPRNews)

ICE Arrests Beloved Fighting Game Community Member Ludovic (Aftermath)

The Dream Of Titanfall 2's Gauntlet Is Alive In VHOLUME (Aftermath)

The Story Behind the Failure of ‘Highguard’ (Bloomberg)

One More Catch is a new, indie Pokémon site (OneMoreCatch.site)

Not everything is Concord (ReaderGrev)

A full scan of "Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes Survival Guide In The Darkness of Shadow Moses", published in Japan in 2004. (Archive.org)

On Baby Steps (Arcadence)

Is It Appropriate for a Grown Man to Have a Big Fat Ass? (BPM)

A not-at-all-mandatory list of video games Black folks should play at least once (Mothership)

They Trained You For This (Peterspittech)

Free Game of the Week: today and every day, i become a chinese new year bonsai

Thank you to Warpdoor for spotlighting this delight. "move your mouse back and forth rapidly to prune your bonsai" (Warpdoor)

What Else I’m Enjoying

Even Tony Kushner Warned Steven Spielberg About Making Munich (GQ)

Scream 7's gnarliest casualty is the franchise's dignity (AVClub)

Daft Punk - Human After All (Official Music Video) (YouTube)