I've been on GiantBomb since the beginning, and have posted a user review for pretty much every “new” game I’ve played since. That’s a whopping 118 reviews (don’t trust the number the site lists, it lies!) in about three and a half years, which, in retrospect, is kind of nuts. In that time I came up with a style that worked well for me, that focused on giving concise, fluff-free reactions on why I thought a game was worth playing or not. There have been plenty of ups, such as my review for Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness: Episode One being a featured user review back during a time when GiantBomb did that sort of thing. Even better are the (very) rare occasions when someone would leave a comment on a review saying that it helped them make up their mind about whether to purchase said game. That kind of stuff genuinely feels good.

Of course, there have been some downs too, such as a few reviews getting “downvoted” into oblivion for unknown reasons. Worst of all, and the real crux of the matter, is when the review format feels restrictive. I’ve had multiple instances, mainly recently, where the only meaningful things I have to say about a game don’t really have a place in an actual “review”. In the traditional sense, reviews are supposed to evaluate the relative quality of a video game and offer purchasing advice; that’s my understanding at least. Recently, however, that measure feels limiting. So many technically “good” games come out all the time now, and the only way anyone can parse through them is to get into the nitty gritty about what they personally do or don’t want in a video game, then try to find what’s out there that satisfies their needs. If the Great Gaming Avalanche of Fall 2011 has confirmed anything, it’s that anyone can like or dislike any game, to any degree, for any reason, regardless of what any review says about its quality. Personal preference rules the day in the gaming community, which, in all honestly, is probably for the better. But it sure makes writing reviews weird.

I love writing about games, and for a long time (much longer than the three and a half years GiantBomb has been active) writing reviews felt like the best, most satisfying way to express my thoughts on the games I play. That’s not the case anymore. As time goes on I find myself wanting to be more and more subjective and personal with my writing. I have a lot of ideas I’d like to express that don’t belong in a review, which simply means it’s time to switch formats. I think the general trend of video game journalism is slowly moving in that direction anyway, but that’s a story for another day. For now, I just want to give anyone who actually follows me on GiantBomb a heads up: I will not be writing any more user reviews, at least for the foreseeable future. Instead I will post any writings in this blog space, the format of which I’ll figure out as I go (it will probably be pretty freeform). The one thing I do know, however, is that I won’t stop writing about the games I play anytime soon.