Best video game blogs?
December 1, 2009 11:59 AM   Subscribe

What are the best video game blogs out there today?

We've had a Wii for a while, so I'd been reading Joystiq's Nintendo subfeed. We just got a 360, so I'm switching to their whole feed, and also thinking about Kotaku. Outside of those two, what are the best news/review type gaming feeds to read?
posted by kmz to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (23 answers total) 32 users marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: I really like RockPaperShotgun.
posted by Jinkeez at 12:04 PM on December 1, 2009


Best answer: http://www.gamasutra.com/

http://www.gamerswithjobs.com/

And probably neogaf if you want to read the news before Kotaku and Joystiq repost it.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=2
posted by longdaysjourney at 12:04 PM on December 1, 2009


Best answer: Hey, I'm a dev for Joystiq/Engadget and I made you a special feed that combines Joystiq's Nintendo and Xbox coverage into one superfeed. Here you go. Merry Christmas!
posted by nitsuj at 12:11 PM on December 1, 2009 [12 favorites]


Response by poster: Hey, I'm a dev for Joystiq/Engadget and I made you a special feed that combines Joystiq's Nintendo and Xbox coverage into one superfeed. Here you go. Merry Christmas!

Ho. Ly. Shit. That is awesome. Thanks so much!

And great recs from everybody else too!
posted by kmz at 12:29 PM on December 1, 2009


Response by poster: Next week I'll have to ask about everybody's favorite lotteries to win.
posted by kmz at 12:38 PM on December 1, 2009 [1 favorite]


Up until recently, I would have said Offworld, conceived by the former news editor for GamaSutra. Boingboing sorta unceremoniously offed it, however. Now it appears to lie whimpering and wheezing.

The author, though, also maintains his own personal blog (www.brandonnn.com) and, as I understand it, has plans to resurrect the excellent Offworld in a non-boingboing affiliated incarnation.
posted by kaseijin at 12:40 PM on December 1, 2009


Best answer: I lament the death of Offworld too, kaseijin.

Here's the list of general purpose blogs that's in my gaming folder in my feed reader:

Game|Life - from Wired, tends to be fairly in-depth.
GameSetWatch - niche topics, well written.
Giant Bomb - former Gamespot guys, all really know their stuff, have a great sense of humor, and LOTS of video updates. The site is also essentially a giant wiki, so there's lots of detailed per-game information. Probably my #1 go-to site right now.
Insult Swordfighting - essays, treatments on games, the like.
Jay Is Games - largely about casual gaming, which means 95% of the time it's Flash stuff, but there's an occasional Wii/XBLA/iPhone review and recommendation.
Opposable Thumbs - from Ars Technica; general purpose, industry-wide.
Plastic Axe - music game specific. Very useful if you're frequently playing Rock Band.
Rock Paper Shotgun - I know Jinkeez mentioned them already, and they're very PC-focused, but when they're on point, they're on point.
Siliconera - tends to catch stuff from Japan sooner than most of the bigger blogs.

I do read Joystiq, and recommend them, but I gave up on Kotaku many moons ago because of the tone, the lack of fact-checking, and the community being not quite what I needed.

NeoGAF can be terribly obnoxious as a community - I say this as someone who sinks a lot of time there - but if you want to live on the bleeding edge of news, that's a good place to be.
posted by Remy at 1:02 PM on December 1, 2009 [3 favorites]


Best answer: I really like Fidgit.
posted by sinfony at 1:07 PM on December 1, 2009


NeoGAF can be terribly obnoxious as a community

Understatement of the year. Particularly the wretched modding. (Makes me appreciate MeFi modding though!)

Still, it's the easiest place to find the latest news. Most things you see there will be disseminated to Joystiq/Kotaku, etc., but if you want it before they get it, it's basically NeoGaf or read a hundred blogs/forums.
posted by longdaysjourney at 1:12 PM on December 1, 2009


I'll add ayes to Fidgit and RockPaperShogun.

Dubious Quality touches on video games pretty frequently along with more personal bloggy items about such things as unicycling with his kid and whatnot.
posted by Drastic at 1:23 PM on December 1, 2009


I use Kotaku and Joystiq. (although I don't care for the later very much. But part is that is gender related and the other part is that I really don't like the tone most of the articles take).
posted by royalsong at 1:34 PM on December 1, 2009


2nding Kotaku
posted by gnutron at 1:42 PM on December 1, 2009


The trick is to find one where the comments aren't overrun by rabid fanboys. Even worse if the blog itself is done by biased fanboys. Hint: Joystiq used to be called "PS3 fanboy", "Wii fanboy" etc...
posted by GleepGlop at 2:02 PM on December 1, 2009


This gives me a chance to pimp the podcast my friend planet4 does for Prima Games. The tone is light but very informative, and does an excellent job of covering what's topical, both in terms of what games are coming out as well as what's happening in the video game industry at large.

http://www.primagames.com/blog/author/planet4/
posted by ga$money at 2:05 PM on December 1, 2009


I get most of my fill of gaming news from podcasts (RIP Idle Thumbs *sniff*) rather than sites, but I'll 2nd gamesetwatch, giant bomb, & rockpapershotgun.
posted by juv3nal at 2:54 PM on December 1, 2009


Hint: Joystiq used to be called "PS3 fanboy", "Wii fanboy" etc...

Joystiq did, for a while, decide to have platform-specific blogs, which were mostly just recycling content from the main Joystiq site. They then collapsed them all back into the main site about six months later. Standard Weblogs Inc nonsense, same as Gawker Media's regular expansion and contraction.

I don't think it's easy to find a gaming blog that has both a vibrant community *and* not full of asshats. RPS is pretty good in this respect, but the limited scope is probably helping that.
posted by Remy at 3:03 PM on December 1, 2009


Joystick Division (Full Disclosure: I used to edit it, although I'm not with that company any more).

Chris Ward and Gary Hodges have moved on from the blog, but the other guys who have written for it are also fully hilarious. You can check out Chris Ward's new work here, which isn't focused solely on video games, but is consistently hysterical.
posted by jeffmshaw at 10:09 PM on December 1, 2009


Major Nelson's blog is great for finding out when new Xbox Live Arcade games and DLC are released.
posted by Sibrax at 10:51 PM on December 1, 2009


Best answer: Kotaku is the Ain't It Cool News of gaming. A hyperbolic and reactionary low-brow boyzone with a comments section that represents everything that is wrong with the consumers of videogames. Yet I still go there every day because it gets a lot of scoops and updates frequently. I gave up on Destructoid due to its constant belittling, sarcastic editorial tone but looking at the front page today makes me think whoever was responsible for that has left or at least their contributions have reduced significantly.

Eurogamer is worth a read for the occasional articles and interviews. I know people who like the reviewing style, but it caters for a very specific taste.

Gamasutra, Rock Paper Shotgun (which, I should point out, is a PC exclusive blog) and Giant Bomb all get a big thumbs up from me. Giant Bomb's quick look videos where they play up to 30 minutes of a game is a fantastic way to get a feel for a game that might not come through in a review.

Though it is a radio show and not a blog, I cannot in good conscience leave out A Life Well Wasted which is consistently fantastic.
posted by slimepuppy at 3:16 AM on December 2, 2009


If you have an iPhone, GameFly has an application that lets you browse game info and a news feed (and manage your GF account if you have one, which I don't). The news is much the same as you'll find on the other gaming sites, but the app is pretty solid and a great way of browsing news on the go.
posted by Gortuk at 12:13 PM on December 2, 2009


Magical Wasteland is an excellent blog for those interested in game development. Shame that it's updated so rarely--the posts are gold.

Let me also direct you to insomnia.ac, another VG theory community.
posted by achompas at 12:58 PM on December 2, 2009


Whoops: Magical Wasteland
posted by achompas at 12:59 PM on December 2, 2009


Let me also direct you to insomnia.ac, another VG theory community.

That link is borked, but more to the point, the guy that runs that site starts off seeming sane and then descends into total internet rage jerkiness.
posted by juv3nal at 5:48 PM on December 2, 2009


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