We've just announced the author and subject of the 38th book in our series, Legend of the River King by Alexander B. Joy, in a new Kickstarter campaign funding right now. To celebrate, fellow forthcoming author Kaitlin Tremblay interviews Joy about the book's travelogue format, River King's legacy, games writing, and bald eagle-punching.

Kaitlin Tremblay: I’d love to chat more about the craft of writing these sorts of books. Since book-length games criticism is its own beast, I’m curious to hear more about your process and techniques. So to start, what made you want to write a book specifically about River King?

Alexander B. Joy: Legend of the River King occupies a strange space in stateside gaming history. There are two things that make it extremely interesting: its unusual subject matter, and its unfortunate timing. It was the world’s first portable fishing RPG – not that it faced much competition in that niche – but in this respect, it was a proto-creature-collector kind of game. Yet within months of its US release, Pokémon Red and Blue arrived on American shores, and completely bulldozed River King in terms of popularity and influence despite the two games’ similar aesthetics and subject matter. This is a minor tragedy, to my mind, because River King represents an extremely different – and much more beneficial – set of attitudes and values toward the world and our place in it than Pokémon does. I wanted to write a book that hoists River King out of the mud of the past to unpack all the ways its philosophy was unique in its day, and increasingly relevant in the age of human-driven climate disaster. 

Once you started writing your book, where did you start? Why did you pick that place to start from?

The form of the book largely decided my starting point for me. I wanted to approach Legend of the River King like a travelogue, documenting the journey through the game and the (in)sights along the way. This meant that, after a short introductory preamble, I started writing from River King’s beginning.

Can you talk a little bit more about the travelogue format? What does it lend to your writing of Legend of the River King? Why did you pick it?

I went with the travelogue format for a couple of reasons. First, I recognized from the outset that I could not count on readers having played the game before, as it’s almost 30 years old, and was not the most popular even in 1998. I therefore needed a format that could illustrate the happenings in the game without presupposing reader familiarity. The travelogue seemed ideal for that – after all, it has historically been deployed to acquaint readers with places they’ve never visited.

Second, the travelogue makes for a productive critical architecture, especially when you’re analyzing a rich and intertextual work. I owe this realization to Geoff Dyer. I cribbed my general approach from Dyer’s Zona, which amounts to a real-time talk-through of the Tarkovsky film Stalker, but with Sebald-style digressions into the threads and undercurrents in each moment. I swear Zona unlocked something in me – it perfectly matched how I usually think and feel about art, and finally gave me a language for putting that mindset into text.

What other techniques or traditions did you bring to writing a book-length piece of criticism on River King?

Throughout the book, I drew upon techniques typically used in nature writing and philosophy. They’re surprisingly similar genres, actually. Both rely on accurate yet evocative descriptions of reality, such that the reader comes away with a deeper understanding of whatever is being described. And they prove that the movement of clear thought furnishes an enticing dramatic arc if done correctly. Michel Foucault was exceptional at this, in my opinion; his essay on Las Meninas from The Order of Things is a prime example. Mary Austin’s The Land of Little Rain, on the nature writing side, is another choice selection.

Which games critics or other pieces of games criticism have inspired you?

I’ve encountered too many excellent, inspiring games critics to name them all! There are a few whom I will drop everything to read, though. Luis Aguasvivas, for one – his writing on Despelote is a great work of nonfiction, let alone games criticism. Artemis Octavio is another, who, in addition to being a top writer, has cultivated a wonderful platform with Stop Caring. Felipe Pepe is a master of gaming history, especially regarding markets and scenes with which American gamers are largely unacquainted. Steven Santana always has smart, piercing things to say. Anything the great Nathalie Lawhead writes is worth your attention, though they often discuss gaming more broadly than they do specific titles. (This is not a complaint; only an observation of their beat.) The stable of regular contributors to Gamers with Glasses make for good reads. Finally, the team at Critical Distance have made it their mission to uncover the best in current games writing, and I’ve enjoyed pretty much everything and everyone they’ve highlighted.

Now to talk a little bit more about Legend of River King specifically. In your opinion, what makes River King special, even now in 2025?

I note this in the introduction to the book, but the thing that sticks with me about River King is how its attitude toward the world beyond the player feels palpably different compared to RPGs of its era. Nature isn’t something to be slain and lorded over in River King; it’s a force to respect and coexist alongside. (Compare this to, say, the “kill everything to grind to the next level” approach of most RPGs, or the “capture every animal and make them fight” mindset of Pokémon.) When you think about how that attitude of conquest and domination has informed so many games in the intervening years, you can’t help but wonder how the culture might have changed for the better if River King had been the title that more games patterned themselves after. Playing River King nowadays is like asking what might have been.

What kind of legacy do you see River King having? Any games that were inspired by it?

Well, River King was one installment of the long-running Japanese series Kawa no Nushi Tsuri, so it did enjoy many direct and indirect sequels. That said, the series has probably run its course, since the last entry (River King: Mystic Valley on the Nintendo DS) appeared between 2007 and 2009, depending on your region. Truthfully, I don’t think River King has much of a legacy at the moment. And it deserves one, which is one of the reasons why I wanted to write a book about it.

And finally: what’s your favorite memory or anecdote of having played River King?

There’s a section of the game where you can punch out a bald eagle. Or as many bald eagles as you like, for that matter. The localization team must have failed to realize that you are categorically not allowed to do this in the United States. Fistfighting the national symbol was hilarious to me as a kid, and I find it even funnier now.