What are the best XBox sites?

December 19, 2016 8:14 AM

Does anyone have any recommendations for grown-up, well written sites about XBox gaming? I've read RPS for years to keep up with the PC scene, but am just about to get an XBox One and would like a go-to place to learn about both big-ticket new titles and smaller indie titles.
posted by srednivashtar to Computers & Internet (7 answers total)

You can start with Larry "MajorNelson" Hryb's blog: https://majornelson.com/
posted by jozxyqk at 8:50 AM on December 19, 2016 [1 favorite]

In my experience, sites and reviewers are not willing/capable of doing well at both flagship $80 hype machines and $1 games made in mom's basement. I'm not entirely sure why, but imagine it has something to do with different aesthetics, different markets, different demographics, different barriers to entry, different numbers of releases per year etc. etc. So you'll have to skim different sources if you want to be well informed, just like with sports news or political news or whatever topic.

For the indy side:

Indy Gamer Chick has some nice indy reviews, with a whole tab for XB, and

theXBLIG has good content 100% dedicated to XB indy games.

If you have any interest in co-op gaming: Co-Optimus is a great resource.
posted by SaltySalticid at 9:11 AM on December 19, 2016

I really like what Waypoint is doing for videogames, although they don't focus on the newest new stuff. Other than that... Writing is kind of on the downslope at least in terms of traditional journalism. There's no money in it.

In terms of indie titles, the games available on XB1 are generally a subset of the ones on PC. Plus, all future MS first party games will have PC versions, so you may want to continue reading RPS.
posted by selfnoise at 10:00 AM on December 19, 2016

I check the IGN site daily, including their Xbox site. And their "Podcast Unlocked" podcast only covers Xbox and is pretty entertaining.
posted by tacodave at 3:30 PM on December 19, 2016

I have the same question only for PS4. Game Informer is the closest I've come, but half their articles are industry shill crap. Some are good though.
posted by Nelson at 3:36 PM on December 19, 2016

Kotaku is not XBox exclusive but, if you can stomach a Gawker media sight, you'll find decent coverage.
posted by firemouth at 4:32 PM on December 19, 2016 [2 favorites]

Giantbomb covers all the major releases as well as many of the indies on consoles and pc. It is run by several industry veterans who bring a historical perspective most sites lack. Most of their coverage comes on their two podcasts, the Giantbombcast and the Giantbeastcast (bombcast is based in California, beastcast is based in New York). They also post quick looks of most of the games they talk about.
posted by haqspan at 4:22 PM on December 22, 2016