Good PC gaming websites?

December 8, 2005 5:02 AM

Recommend me good PC gaming websites.

I am looking for sites with a good mix of news and reviews for PC games. For my taste, the usual suspects (Gamespot, Gamespy, IGN) have in the past become too mainstream oriented, and what's more, steered away from PC gaming and into the console realm.

Google is not really helpful with this, as every site out there claims to have "game reviews".

My main interest lies in the RTS, RPG, and FPS areas.

Extra points for sites with working RSS feeds, as I have not yet found a single one that puts out a valid feed.

posted by uncle harold to computers & internet (14 comments total)

Gaming News:
Joystiq
Kotaku
Evil Avatar

Industry News:
Next Gen

Commentary:
Escapist

All of the above have RSS feeds. None of the above are super-PC focused, though... that's hard to find these days.

As for reviews... eh. Haven't found any sites with consistently great ones. I rely on demos and word of mouth.
posted by selfnoise at 5:16 AM on December 8, 2005

selfnoise's links are pretty spot on.

Maybe this one is a usual suspect for you, but I still think Blue's News is pretty good. There aren't really reviews there, but excellent news, and they link to pretty much every review that comes out for games that are likely of interest to you. For reviews, I usually check Game Rankings.
posted by pazazygeek at 5:23 AM on December 8, 2005

Penny-Arcade

Many people focus on the comic-which is excellent and often NSFW-but they have quite a bit of game review and commentary. I found this excellent little jolt of fun through them.
posted by oddman at 6:34 AM on December 8, 2005

I'm a bit partial to Kotaku myself, for reasons present in my profile.

Penny Arcade is absolutely hilarious, with really well written commentary and some of the best web comic you'll find. Although it's not as news or PC-oriented.

As for other links, aside from the main players, selfnoise hit it pretty nicely on the head.
posted by disillusioned at 6:41 AM on December 8, 2005

Metacritic has a pretty decent PC games section. No news, though, just reviews.
posted by cog_nate at 6:42 AM on December 8, 2005

Bluesnews.com was the site I always checked when I played computer games. Mainly a news site, but has lists of links of all the latest PC game reviews.
posted by pollystark at 6:45 AM on December 8, 2005

I would warn that you should only visit Joystiq if you are prepared to be amused by laughably amateur journalism/rumor-mongering and the utter silliness provided within each post's comment section. Probably the most entertaining gaming website I know of.
posted by flavor at 6:47 AM on December 8, 2005

Eurogamer is pretty good - covers everything but is fairly even.
posted by jontyjago at 6:52 AM on December 8, 2005

IGN is pretty comprehensive, and their reviews are posted pretty quickly.
posted by surferboy at 6:53 AM on December 8, 2005

Thanks everyone!

Escapist and Metacritic look very interesting. Also, I was a regular reader of Bluesnews in the Quake days, but I had completely forgotten about it until you guys reminded me.
posted by uncle harold at 7:33 AM on December 8, 2005

I'm surprised no one has mentioned GameTab. It's a gaming news compilation site, and it has an RSS feed of the most popular stories overall. If it's too much information, by scanning the headlines you should be able to find a few sites that match what you're looking for.
posted by Sibrax at 10:21 AM on December 8, 2005

Another vote for bluesnews. It's been my homepage for years.
posted by ludwig_van at 10:57 AM on December 8, 2005

But, I may as well add, don't bother with the comments at bluesnews. They tend not to be so erudite.
posted by ludwig_van at 10:58 AM on December 8, 2005

GameTrailers.com is a semi-regular visit on list of daily link visits.. they have video of loads of things for both PC and console, especially cutting edge stuff. Even has direct links to the actual non-streaming, non-advert-smothered MOV/WMV options without having to go C&P the embed tags, and no pre-movie adverts either. Has its own "GTtv" video reviews of games.. pretty snappy if you ask me :-D
posted by vanoakenfold at 2:09 PM on December 8, 2005