Why We Write – And the place of established games journalism styles

Best enjoyed with a chirpy yet slightly sarcastic Midlands English accent.
I’ll admit that the thought of niche writings’ place in the world had never really struck me as a minor force until a couple of days ago, when my ideas and thoughts in this area of games journalism were critiqued by who I’m starting to believe was the editor of a high profile gaming magazine. Now I’m a gamer, however my passions extend beyond just playing games, and into the area of game development, and thus I have a lot of ideas and concepts floating around in my head that often need to vocalise themselves, so I started a blog as that outlet. So every week up feel obliged to share with the world, some of the subtle game design intricacy, usually involving Stalker, or the philosophical grounding of volumetric lighting. Yet apparently I’m an oddity.

From what I established from this chap’s thoughts, professional games journalism should really be kept to a maximum of high profile consumer oriented reviews, and I can hardly blame him, it’s his business and I very much respect his opinion. But when he began saying that examining aspects of games beyond the games delivery itself is hackneyed and cliché, it really made me wonder just what he was expecting from his readers, and from the general gaming population. Once again, this is business, he has to make educated decisions every day in order to maintain a high level of consumer oriented journalism; people buy game magazines to read about games, and read reviews of games, but what seemed like a bit of a discredit to the journalists who explore a wider range of game, and game development related subjects beyond the classic review led me to ask the question; are people really interested in reading this stuff?

Some (and quite some) time back a little online magazine called Gamers Quarter released a quad-annual pdf/paper based magazine for the sole purpose of sharing their passion with the world, and to gather a fan base of like-minded people who would understand their plights and enjoy their material, and it was a great magazine. It worked in a similar way to a lot of game magazines, in the sense that it had articles related to all sorts of game-y stuff, but the thing that I found particularly captivating about it was its style.

The first ever gamers quarter column I read was a (not a) review of Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater in which the author, Amandeep Jutla wrote of his emotional experience with the game, and his intentions to not strictly review it because it was “above subjectivity”. There is no way this piece of writing could possibly condensed into a paragraph that would it justice, but to put it short, it was a genuine paradigm shift in my approach to games journalism; One that I have yet to do justice. In this article, he approaches the game from an interesting and intellectually grounded standpoint by making observations of the game’s subtleties, its intentions and its motives, and ties it all together into one coherent, and thoroughly enjoyable read. The reason why I found this particular piece, and many to come so captivating was because the writer was able, and willing to demonstrate that they had a meaningful connection with the subject matter, and were given the free will to express this.

The motive to deviate from established writing methodologies fascinated me as I’d never really read material that delved so deeply into the emotional experiences attached to the true, unyielding passion of the writers who poured their deepest ideas into these articles; creating works that escaped established conventions by adding the personal touches to reviews and critical examinations that made them special, that made them enjoyable.

I’m not at all saying that basic, conclusive games journalism should disappear since there is a high demand for slick reviews, and at the end of the day, somebody needs to give a score to the people. I’m merely commenting on how, I would almost go as far as to say foolish, it would be to completely discredit the integrity, and potential reader base of a more involved, personal style of journalism that goes beyond merely discuss the game; and I think this kind of writing is becoming rapidly more popular.

Sites like The Escapist are dedicated to delivering a consistent stream of very interesting and entertaining articles, always with the intention of allowing the writer to give their personal flavour to an essay, enabling it to become a much more dynamic piece of writing. Through a more diverse writing style, and a heavy mix of the writer’s emotional involvement with the game, creating what I feel is a more honest exploration of an “experience” rather than just a review.

The internet is a diverse place often free from the constraints and obligations of the printed media, something that even tends to be acknowledged in a lot of online journalism allowing it to become a more colourful style. Sure there will always be the most basic opinion delivery services, but I don’t think we should allow our minds to become bogged down to the point where we’re creating our own criteria for what is acceptable since it will only squander the sea of talent that yearns to express itself.