Where I have been?

Hello everyone, if you are here from my gaming twitter account I want to go and thank you, if you are from my main twitter account that is awesome too, all in all I have been away and I think you guys waited long enough for an explanation.

Well for two months I went ahead and wrote for a good gaming site called Blistered Thumbs, the people there were very nice to talk to and a good spirited bunch.  I was brought on as a reviewer, which was my forte that I have been doing for numerous years, and was excited to add my input into this new venture.  However there was a catch, in addition to reviewing one game a week I had to write five news stories as stated in the policy set by the head of the site.

Now to be honest, I am not a news reporter, nor do I consider blogging a "profession" to report on news.  My review style is neutral and I interject opinions into them.  As a reporter I know that could not happen since your job is to go and report the news.  However I was up to the task to go out and try to do this and do the best that I can do.

At first it was a rough start, getting help from as many people as I can, hunting down stories that were not covered on the main gaming blogs and presenting them to the audience.  Several of these stories I try to have them relate to the average gamer as some where a complex subject, like Silverlight potential for a Zune/Xbox game, to things that are interesting, like an interview with someone defending video game from the naysayers.

Well it turns out I made many mistake, actually too many mistakes.  I had a long checklist of things to do and over the course of time I missed some of them and would get called out for them.  I also had to do my own graphic design, which I am no expert at either, and went ahead going through free programs making interesting images.  In total one news story across the wire would normally take me over 7 hours to finish from soup to nuts and on top of working full time job let's just say I do not have time to add a social life as well.

After about two months of work I was told I had to take a break until February, only to be told then that I was no longer needed for the site.  Although I investing much time and money into this venture as well as classes, tutors and additional resources to improve upon my weakness it was for naught.  Most people will go and rage at their former employer and curse them up and down saying it is unfair, because what is better for your track record on the Internet then raging about a past job right?

That was sarcasm kids.

So instead of giving up on the dream I am going to take a new approach.  Instead of working to the grind with a major site I will attempt to go and start over right here.  Will everything be perfect?  Most likely not, but I am going to focus on things that I do well in, and that is reviews.  Sure there may be a news story here and there I will add my thoughts on, but the key focus will be simply reviews.

Now the one thing I do have going for me is my reviews I tend to keep myself out of them as much as possible giving you an opinion that in essence I will not show in writing.  Yes folks, I review games like a critic would in a newspaper.  In the age of "reviewers" simply telling you their opinion on a game I consider various things like the intended audience, the genre of people in the audience, and then finally pointing out the things you may or may not like.

I don't like numbers, at all.  They defeat the purpose of actually reading a review, and as much as meta-critic tries to over expose this fact for gamers, the real meat of any review is the time the author takes in explaining each detail of the game and at the end letting the reader decide if they want the game or not.  People are too focused on numbers that everything else is moot.

So what can you expect from me here?  My honest thoughts about games, mainly on the PC, but also on other consoles as well.  I am what many people a "casual gamer" or what I like to call "a guy who likes to play games but doesn't have 40 hours of free time to spend to play a game."  I graduated college and work for a living in IT, picking the wrong avenue in computers, I spend so much time with making money that I want to do what I want to do and eventually attempt to go full time with this again.

So if you have manage to go and read all of this I want to go and thank you in advance, I hope to inform you, educate you, and share my thoughts with you to go and encourage a discussion with the masses.  You can read my semi-random thoughts on twitter at @therealcoldguy if you like otherwise subscribe to your favorite RSS reader and I hope I can add a smile to your day when I go and finish a review.

That is all for now, it is now time for me to go to work.