I idolize certain people, well…I idolize pretty much everyone who get's to do what I've always wanted to do for a living. Getting paid to write and talk about games has always seemed an impossible dream to me. Full disclosure here, I barely graduated high school, flunked out of college and at 25 have a baby thats about two months away from being born. The odds of me going back to school and getting some kind of formal training in writing is zero percent. Ever since I can remember I've had gaming magazines, subscribed to about five or six different ones, reading them cover to cover dreaming about a day where I could be one of these people. When I got old enough to actually start paying attention to the writers I would imagine interviewing them or sitting down to talk with them. For some reason I keyed Jeff Green as the guy to be, so smart, such a good writer and a truly insightful man. There are too many great gaming journalists to count these days but current heroes would be the guys over at Weekend Confirmed and the always amazing Giant Bombcast. I've spent my whole life wanting to do this, to just write, to be more than just a random message board commenter. To talk about games and gaming culture. Its always changing, this industry is a hyperactive five year old that has infinite supply of ecto-cooler Hi-C thats why I've always been drawn to it.
I knew reviewing was out of the question, asking me to put a number value to a game would just be impossible. My friends know full well that I rate movies on a Bad Boys 2 scale, either a movie is or isn't Bad Boys 2, doesn't really make them good or bad, they just aren't Bad Boys 2. I knew reporting stories was also out of the question, what could I do that anyone else wasn't already doing a great job of? All I had left was opinion and commentary, heres the problem though. I'm not Jeff Green, I'm not Dan Hsu and I'm not Leigh Alexander. Who cares if I think Big Bang Theory has been setting gaming culture back since its inception? Who cares if I think that Bioware games are going to have a long term affect on us? Well, hopefully some of you out there do. Because, this is the lesson I've learned, sending out e-mails to game journalists with your work is a quick way to become annoying, submitting to n4g works, but if the headline ain't catchy your writing isn't going anywhere. Message boards are a great place to get feedback but you better be ready for a shit storm of hate. Bitmob.com is a great place to put up your work, but as of right now not a single person has commented on my writing, maybe that speaks to the quality of the writing and not the community, but I really wouldn't know because nobody will tell me if they think its shit or not. I realize that this will be the hardest thing I've ever done, to come in as a new voice and try to write about the thing I love. My advice to anyone in a similar boat, just keep writing, maybe something will hit and you can be the next games journalist youngsters idolize, or maybe you won't. Bottom line is that the industry needs you, fresh ideas and fresh point of views will always have a place.