Finding a Voice: Part 2

Moments after posting the previous entry, I went over to Michael Abbott's Brainy Gamer to listen to the latest podcast, where he interviews fellow blogger Leigh Alexander of Sexy Videogameland. It's a great interview so go check it out. What's interesting is that she too found herself in the same predicament as I am in, unable to find a voice. She eventually found a niche topic, that of hentai games, that gave her her distinctive sound.

This was a completely different solution than my proposal, which was to expand to a different form of communication altogether. She was concerned about her content, I was concerned about my medium. I guess I am too much into the Marshall McLuhan's "the medium is the message" school of thought that I never taken my content into consideration. Hmm... trying to find a niche topic to talk about? That's going to happen with time. I'll just continue whacking away at all these thoughts in my head until I find it.

Finding a Voice

It's amazing how only a couple of months ago, we were complaining about the lack of video game criticism. Now, many have stepped up to the challenge of providing intellectual discourses or more subjective, and often crass, reviews. With so many entering the gaming blogosphere and many prominent figures already existing, I admit I find it hard for myself to forge a distinctive voice. So far, my medium of communication has been text, but I find myself getting lost among wordsmiths like N'Gai Croal, Stephen Totilo, Leigh Alexander, Mitch Krpata, Michael Abbott, and Jerry Holkins (all of whom are in my blogroll, by the way).

I think a good path for me to take is to expand to a new medium. After all, unlike most of the above mentioned names, I'm not a professional writer and thusly, text is not my greatest strength. Currently, I'm trying to set up a podcast with three other gaming personalities, which I think would compliment this blog nicely. Having four people with differing opinions brings an interesting dynamic to gaming discourse that you won't find in the blog, which is basically one man's soliloquy. Besides that, I'll continue to find new ways to make Theory Fighter more interesting.

While we're on the subject of game criticism using alternative media, why don't I point out other successes? Here are four that I really love and that you've probably already heard of. Nevertheless, they discuss games using non-textual media and all of them are very humorous.

1) 1UP Yours (Podcast) - I subscribe to Electronic Gaming Monthly magazine and visit the 1UP website every so often, but I don't particularly find anything special about them that I can't find with other enthusiast presses. The exception, however, is the 1UP Yours podcast. There must be over a hundred gaming podcasts on the internet and I've tried out a quarter of them, but 1UP Yours is definitely the best one. It's updated weekly, the cast is funny and informed, and they get game developers for guest spots every once in a while. Given their nature as a gaming magazine, they have the opportunity to cover a large range of games and to preview upcoming games. If you look past the immature jokes, you'll find that the cast has a lot of intelligent things to say about the games they play.

2) Penny Arcade (Webcomic) - There are a dozen or so gaming webcomics, but Penny Arcade is the first and still the best. Other webcomics put video game characters in funny situations and although it may bring out a chuckle or two, I find that they don't have much to say. Whereas Penny Arcade strips take a more critical approach, summing up everything they like or don't like about a game and presenting it in three panels. There is often a better game review in those three panels than many reviews you'll find in the enthusiast press.

3) Zero Punctuation (Video Reviews) - Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw's reviews are hilarious and overly critical. His rapid-fire speech and his minimalistic cartoon style are so distinctive, he obviously had no problem distinguishing himself from the myriad of mediocre video reviews you'll find on Youtube.

4) Mushroom Singdom (Music Videos) - I'm not really sure what this is, but it's absolutely genius! GameJew summarizes and reviews new Virtual Console releases in the form of music. The music is great and the lyrics are hilarious. Go watch the reviews for Kirby and the Crystal Shards and Super Turrican if you don't believe me.

The Product Review

Every time I watch a great movie, or even a terrible one, the experience sticks with me upon finishing it. I always feel the urge to talk about the movie with whomever I watched it with and when I get home, I immediately bring up online reviews to see what other people thought of it. Yeah, I use reviews the wrong way. I don't read them to make an informed decision on what movie to watch. I make my movie decisions based off previews and word of mouth. Rather, I read reviews after watching the movie because it's fun to find others who share my opinions and it's interesting to understand the opinions of those who don't agree with me.

Unfortunately, I can't say the same for game reviews. They're incredibly boring to read. There's already a lot of criticism written about game reviews -- whether or not they're influenced by advertisement pressure, how they differ and are inferior to game critiques, and how broken the number rating system is. Nevertheless, I'll share my personal gripes about game reviews.

1) The long descriptions of fact and features

Q: "Wait, reviews are just opinions. Right?"
A: Actually, we don't think so. We make no excuses for our verdicts about games and believe our reviews stand for themselves. While our reviews, of course, do contain an element of subjectivity to them, we see the process of reviewing games as one that primarily involves the reporting of facts. -- Gamespot, in the FAQ section of their review philosophy.

What facts are there to report? The game runs at 60 fps, it has 16 player online matches, it includes 20 different game types, and it takes 20 hours to complete. These aren't very interesting to read at all, especially for someone like me who reads reviews the "wrong" way. At the top of every review, they should include a bullet list of all the features and get it out of the way early, or just post links to previews that already covered the different modes and characters. I frankly don't want to read three paragraphs of facts before I get to a sentence telling me the story is good.

2) The pullback comment

The pullback comment happens when the reviewer makes a negative criticism, then immediately relents it with a positive note that is of a different category. Below are three examples of the pullback comment selected at complete random.

"If you're a Ninja Gaiden fan, it's a bit disappointing to realize that on standard difficulty level, you'll be able to take the majority down in one try. Even some of the attack patterns are practically the same among bosses, which is disappointing. That doesn't mean, however, that Dragon Sword isn't a lot of fun, regardless of how you feel about its level of challenge." -- Gamespot's review of Ninja Gaiden Dragon Sword

"While there's a huge selection, very few [maps] stood out as iconic in actual layout – the bigger maps were a little bland, while the smaller maps were incredibly pretty, but without much personality beyond looks. Don't get me wrong, UT's gameplay is more than strong enough to carry maps that aren't wildly interesting" -- IGN's review of Unreal Tournament III

"That’s right, the framerate is a major problem in this game and it does get bad during multiplayer and sometimes in the single-player game when you’re in a massive battle. The game does feature online functions using the Wi-FI connection but it is reserved to trading Moogles with others. It’s hardly a worthy substitute for going on quests with other gamers. Still, with a game with solid controls and good use of the touch screen, you can’t complain too much." -- GameZone's review of Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates

3) The cliché fan recommendation

"It's a blast to play with friends, but not alone. It's certainly worth a look if you're a fan of this series." -- PCMag's review of Mario Party 8

"Check it out if you're a fan of the series or want to go questing with local friends." -- Game Daily's review of Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates

"If you're a fan of the genre, you pretty much owe it to yourself to pick this game up." -- IGN's review of Virtual Fighter 4 Evolution

It's a given that fans of the series or genre will check it out. Instead, inform fans when they should stay away. Not surprisingly, most of these boring reviews are from the big enthusiast press outlets. Thank goodness for the Tom Chicks and Mitch Krpatas, or else I'd think game journalism is doomed.