Christopher Spina

unwinnable.comOn Faith, Eternity, and Impossibility in Hollow Knight: Silksong’s Pharloom: A Symptomatic Reading - UnwinnableFor those residing in the Underworks, faith only serves to ensure obedience to the system of oppression.

My first published essay, from one year ago today:

I want to express my appreciation for @unwinnable.com & @rubeck.bsky.social giving me the opportunity to write about games and film for the past year. I'm incredibly grateful to share digital space with some of the most incisive and compelling critics working at the margins of games and culture.

Also, a gentle reminder to subscribe so that Unwinnable Monthly, Exploits, and Unwinnable Web can continue to support their regular contributors and take more chances on new voices — insightful critique is needed now more than ever and there are fewer and fewer avenues to nurture it.

critical-distance.comSeptember 20thWelcome back readers. I’m going to keep opening our issues with mini Patreon updates for the next little bit, because as I’ve been talking about recently, we need a bit more wiggle room…

20 Sept

Feeling both appreciative and sheepish about my inclusion in this week's Critical Distance round-up. Hard to believe my excursion into non-poetry about a textless puzzle-adventure can live alongside such great company.

Critical Distance | Where’s all the good writing about games?@critdistance.bsky.social

This week: Trails, Control, aesthetic experiences, and the International Phonetic Alphabet: critical-distance.com/2026/09/20/s...

buff.lyInside Out, Outside In – Alterity, Identity, and Helix: Descent N Ascent - UnwinnableTo switch; seeing at both ends.

18 Sept

Helix is one of those peculiar games that feels both generous and withholding, inviting wildly different readings — equally as enjoyable to play as it is to interpret. Analysis aside, the breadth of its puzzles/secrets are beyond enough to fuel a player’s curiosity well after credits.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"Playing within this realm of binary division, Helix: Descent N Ascent traces the loop between identity and difference." @quiltedpoints.net muses on what Helix: Descent N Ascent teaches about identity and disunity: buff.ly/bLq9IPf

18 Sept

With a score by @jimguthrie.bsky.social, it also sounds as otherworldly as it looks.

unwinnable.comTraumatic Encounters, Enduring Realities: Masaaki Yuasa & Restless, Subversive Love - UnwinnableWe all rationalize the trauma of love in different ways.

11 Aug

Four of the five films in the Yuasa collection are fantastic, but The Night is Short, Walk on Girl and Ride Your Wave are my favourites. I hope my essay communicates, at least in part, how they succeed in rendering the complexity of love.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"We all rationalize the trauma of love in different ways." @quiltedpoints.net looks at the anxiety and violent rupture that comes with love: buff.ly/IgcsLKH

unwinnable.comFreedom and Progress: A Loop Around The Subsurface Circular - UnwinnableTo see oneself as part of a larger struggle requires some degree of transformation.

27 June

From @danlesac.bandcamp.com's soundtrack to @mikebithell.bsky.social's dialogue and everything in between, Subsurface Circular is packed with style, clarity, and wit. Don't let my essay or the game's age scare you away, it's still one of the most thoughtful and engaging things I've ever played.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"Progress and struggling to try is not so cut and dry in this world of androids, nor in ours." @quiltedpoints.net examines freedom and progress in Subsurface Circular:

unwinnable.comWho Owns Brigsby Bear? - UnwinnableAn inevitable part of growing from audience and spectator to chorus and narrator.

29 Apr

I love much more about Brigsby Bear than I could’ve fit into this essay. But I wanted to explore how James’ quirky and tender story might resonate with people who know what it’s like to feel alone and still find the courage to express their passion and creativity. Also, “it’s dope as shit”.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"To find one’s own voice, even if speaking through a language exclusive to you, means to be true to yourself." @quiltedpoints.net muses on making meaning and connections in Brigsby Bear:

Christopher Spina reposted

Naseer Alkhouri

@naseer.eu

17 Feb

I do believe The Longest Road on Earth is the most underappreciated game in the Raw Fury library. Here's a wonderful essay about it at Unwinnable unwinnable.com/2026/02/16/s...

unwinnable.comSeeing Distance, Hearing Warmth in The Longest Road on Earth - UnwinnableHow can we measure a moment when our experiences of repetition shape our perceptions of time?

youtube.comThe Longest Road on Earth DocumentaryYouTube video by Raw Fury

17 Feb

I've been listening to this soundtrack regularly since playing the game in 2022. If my essay got you curious, @brainwashgang.bsky.social & @rawfury.bsky.social put out this lovely mini-doc about the development process.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"The possibility of sharing our lives with each other, seeing ourselves in the struggles and joys of another, depends on the methods and means of our movements." @quiltedpoints.net explores the connections we make through movement in The Longest Road on Earth:

unwinnable.comSeeing Distance, Hearing Warmth in The Longest Road on Earth - UnwinnableHow can we measure a moment when our experiences of repetition shape our perceptions of time?

unwinnable.comZarvot, Intimacy, & The Limits of Politeness - UnwinnableZarvot draws the player in with its sheen.

15 Jan

Mid-November, in the lead up to Skate Story, my partner suggested I replay Zarvot to quell my insatiable anticipation. The result was my most personal essay, which explores the aesthetic and thematic reasons why @bysameng.com's first project has been one of my favourites since 2018.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"There is a messy balance to be found between expressing openness and engendering the conditions which allow people to seek help." Christopher Spina toes the line between politeness and intimacy in Zarvot:

unwinnable.comSubjectivity and Exploitation: On the "Right Degree" of Alienation in Henry Halfhead - UnwinnableHenry does not succumb to this vicious cycle forever.

12 Jan

My partner and I had been anticipating Henry Halfhead since Day of the Devs SGF 2023. We loved Henry's story so much that I decided to write about it - here's my essay from last Fall. Thank you @lululu.games and @popagenda.co for such a playfully inventive and subversive game.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"Henry’s experiences exhibited in the game make clear the delineation between the alterity inseparable from personhood and the exploitation that structures capitalist reproduction." Christopher Spina examines alienation under capitalism in Henry Halfhead:

A few months ago, I was published for the first time - thanks @unwinnable.com! I'm still very proud of this piece that touches on the portrayal of faith, deification, technological "progress", solidarity, and music found in this charming masterpiece of a game.

Unwinnable@unwinnable.com

"For Pharloom’s past, present, and future, faith functions as an omnipresent mediator, embodied and exploited in varied ways depending on the social position of its interlocutors." Christopher Spina examines the various facets of faith in Hollow Knight: Silksong:

After the Nintendo Switch's release, my partner and I began creating game recommendation lists for everyone we knew who was fresh into the ecosystem.

After a year of working within those constraints - and probably taking it a little too seriously, as I often do - I thought it was worth trying to take the next step in pursuing my passion for writing.

I'm still committed to updating the lists we spent so long crafting and if you are curious to check them and those shorter reviews out, you can find them through the link in my bio.

After the Nintendo Switch's release, my partner and I began creating game recommendation lists for everyone we knew who was fresh into the ecosystem.

What was an occasional hobby became an expanding project of tracking and cataloguing releases through various playlists, and eventually evolved into trying my hand at writing user reviews for some of my favourite games.

2000 characters is a pretty austere limit, but Sarah's surgical and frequently-painful edits helped me create what I think is some decent short-form writing, even if sharing my thoughts often left me feeling vulnerable.

After the Nintendo Switch's release, my partner and I began creating game recommendation lists for everyone we knew who was fresh into the ecosystem.

We tried our best to find a balance between being informative and enticing in hopes of sharing our passion with the people around us. Having repeated this gesture so many times we thought, hey, maybe there's a tool we could use to keep track of the things we recommend.

So, in 2023, we created an IGN Playlist account, intending to maintain an updated list of indie game recommendations that our friends (and anybody else) could check in on whenever they were looking for something new.

After the Nintendo Switch's release, my partner and I began creating game recommendation lists for everyone we knew who was fresh into the ecosystem.