Games tell stories - but do they work as well as films and novels? How should narrative work in a game? And exactly how awful was Phantasmagoria? Valve's Chet Faliszek, Mirror's Edge's Rhianna Pratchett, Braid's Jonathon Blow and others offer their thoughts.

This morning, Metro, the UK's third largest newspaper ran a front page story with a headline clearly blaming gaming for a rise in a serious disease. We take a look at this wild claim, and what it has to say about the ways in which research and gaming are reported by the mainstream media.

Pull up a chair in front of the fire because it's storytime here at bit-tech as we look back on our personal favourite moments of 2009. From Mark's discovery of Samorost to Antony's pilgrimage back to Battlefield 2, check out our tales and tell us yours in the forums.

It's that time of year when we take a look back on 2009 and decide what the best games of were. And by 'we' we actually mean 'you', since the results were entirely user-voted this year. What did bit-tech and Custom PC readers think was the best game this year?

We love to obsess over whether PC gaming is dying, but now it's time to look at the other side and examine if console gaming is really as secure as publishers would have us believe. With casual gaming and the credit crunch on the rise, what does the future hold?

Games licensed from films get a bad rap and it's mostly well deserved, but there are some games which actually do a lot to expand on a movie without spoiling a franchise. No, we're not just talking about GoldenEye 64 either - check out all these other ones we've thought of!