Four Hundred Entries, Ten Years, And One New Mission Statement

Hey there folks. How are you all doing? It's been a little while, hasn't it? Some of you may be wondering where I've been recently, to which the answer is definitely "around", albeit in a much more passive sense these days. Fellow inhabitants of the blogosphere might even have noticed that my previous entry (promoting my contribution to last month's Giant Bomb Community Endurance Run) put me at a total of 399 blog entries since this site launched almost ten years ago. With my next written piece heralding a mighty milestone of four hundred published blog entries, you might think I've been taking a break to come up with some grand, exciting plan to mark the occasion. The truth is, I haven't put anything up in this space for a while because I've been trying to work out what I want this space to be going forward. Call it an identity crisis of sorts, if you like.

Part of the struggle is trying to work out what it is I want to say on this blog. My entries here have always been scattered across a wide spectrum of content types, with reviews, critical think-pieces, let's plays and top tens coexist in this weird miasma of video game writing without any clear mission or goal. Which, on some level, is absolutely fine. It's an approach that has worked for me in the past, as evidenced by the fact my total blogging output on this website probably rivals Tolstoy's War and Peace for word count at this point. But as "real life" (for lack of a better phrase) has placed serious limits on my free time in recent years, I've found I just don't have the time to sit down and ponderously slap a couple of thousand words down into this window whenever I feel like it. I want to continue this endeavour, not let it wither and die, and in order for that to happen I need to build a writing schedule. And if I'm going to apply some rigidity to when I write, then I need to apply it to what I write too. I need a goal in mind for what I want this blog to achieve, and it's been quite a challenge to work out what that goal should be.

Another part of the struggle has been working out whether or not a blog is even a viable way for me to say things any more. As someone who consumes a lot of video game-related content in my spare time, I've definitely recognised the pronounced shift away from the written word and towards audio-visual presentation. You only have to look at the News tab here on Giant Bomb and compare it with the Videos tab to witness the shift first-hand. There's a clear argument to be made in favour of this approach - games are a visual medium, and consequently they lend themselves very well to being demonstrated and critiqued in a video format. I've even attempted to dip my toes in those waters by producing some video content myself, ranging from a bit of casual Saturday evening live-streaming to episodic series chronicling various attempted Pokémon Nuzlocke challenges.

The conclusion I've ultimately reached is that yes, I do still feel like I have things I want to say about the games that I play and the industry at large, and I do still want to share those things by writing them down. First and foremost, I should acknowledge that the written word is where my strengths have always been. As much as I admire the YouTube personalities and the folks here at Giant Bomb who consistently produce fantastic video content on a weekly basis, I am always going to be more at home with a pen in hand or a word processor open than I am when fumbling with cameras and video software. Not only that, but written content lends itself better to opening and promoting discussion - video content, by comparison, feels very passive to consume and doesn't inspire me to engage with it like the written word does. I also think it's important to recognise that although video games lend themselves well to audio-visual presentation due to their graphical aspect, their most recognisable feature is their interactivity. A video presentation will never fully convey the experience of actually playing a game, just as even the most descriptive paragraph of text will never fully convey its graphical fidelity. For that reason, I believe written editorial still has a role to play in video game discussion and criticism, and unless we reach the idealistic summit of being able to transpose our own thoughts into the game itself, developer commentary style, for others to experience as they play, then I believe it always will.

That brings us back to the first point I raised, which is what should I be writing about? It's a question that took me right back to why I ever started writing in the first place, and some advice that I was given when I was writing more prolifically (albeit with a lot less finesse) while a teenager in school - to write for myself first and foremost, and to consider anyone else's enjoyment of the finished product a bonus. That got me thinking about the kinds of game-related content I consume, which has in itself shifted over time. A few years ago I was very heavily into Let's Play content, something that I've gradually drifted away from. Most of the game-focused YouTube personalities whose channels I subscribe to these days are focused on critique and analysis, crafting fifteen- to thirty-minute videos exploring the mechanics and stories of games and how successful or unsuccessful they consider them to be. Since that's the kind of content I enjoy most from a consumer's perspective, it stands to reason that's also likely the kind of content I'm going to enjoy creating most from a writer's perspective.

So here's my vision for this blog going forward. From June 1st, I'm going to commit to writing two critical think-piece blogs per month, taking the games I am playing or have recently played for inspiration and diving deep on some of their mechanics, gameplay systems, and the stories they're trying to tell, and trying to draw on my (admittedly now rather distant) background as a student of English literature to inform my critiques. This is going to become the primary focus of this blog, with entries most likely to be published on Mondays, given it's currently my most free day. However, I'm also keen not to abandon some of my roots. I'm aware that a significant portion of the people who have chosen follow my updates over the years did so because of my long-form serial blogging endeavours - things like Enduring Final Fantasy VII and A Month in Skyrim, which are effectively the written equivalent of video Let's Plays. So, to that end, I'd also like to run long-form serial content in that style, at a rate of perhaps one series per year. I'm yet to work out specifically how that will run alongside the bi-monthly critiques, but given I'm also yet to work out what game I'd like to focus on for my next serial, there's no imminent pressure to find the answer.

I think that's all I have to say on the matter, besides the fact that I'm hoping this new approach has you all as excited as I am for what's coming over the horizon. I'll be back in early June with my first blog under this new schedule and format, and perhaps even some news as to what my next serial project will be by that point. Until then, thanks very much for reading folks. Take care, and I'll see you around.

Daniel

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Currently playing - Dragon Quest IV: Chapters of the Chosen (ANDR)