Grimes Duels a Dark King With Chess Pieces, Lightsabers in ‘Player of Games’ Video

Grimes does battle with the nefarious Dark King  in the new music video for her recent single, “Player of Games.”

The video was directed by Anton Tammi and based on a story written by Grimes, who also served as the clip’s creative director. The sci-fi fantasy epic is centered around Grimes and the so-called Dark King — played by Andrei Pishchalnikov — who appear to have had some past relationship, but are now locked in constant battle, whether that be games of chess, lightsaber fights, or an old-school duel with swords.

Grimes released “Player of Games” at the beginning of December after teasing the song in typical Grimes fashion — by sharing lines of binary code that translated to the song’s title. Grimes produced the song with Illangelo, and the track appears in the new season of the video game Rocket League.

“Player of Games” marks Grimes’ first proper single since the release of her 2020 album, Miss Anthropocene. At the end of September, she posted a short track called “Love” on social media, which Grimes said was a response to “the privacy invasion, bad press, online hate, and harassment” she had been experiencing after her separation from Elon Musk.