Happy Anniversary

We won’t really be getting lanyards will we? – Its recently come to my attention that the As the Gaming World Turns blog just turned two years old, last month. Of course somebody else had to tell me because I don’t really remember these things but I’m pretty proud anyway. Two years isn't bad in this business and the way things have been going, I don’t see why I can’t last at least two, maybe even three more years until I get really tired of writing this blog for free.
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After spending some time looking over the posts from the past two years I started getting nostalgic. As a writer, I like to consider myself my toughest critic. While reading through the posts some of them were already pretty dated while others still made me laugh. Some of the predictions were spot on, others were horribly off. Not only has the blog changed in 25 months but the gaming industry has as well, a lot of which was reflected in what was on the blog. Below are my ten favorite posts (click the title to go to the original post, misspellings and all) along with some comments.
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Terry's Top Ten Favorite Posts from the Past Two Years in No Particular Order
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1. Top 5 Games You Should Keep Until You Croak - I like this post because even after the release of the Wii, PS3 and Xbox 360 I wouldn't substitue one game from the original list. At least not until GTA IV comes out. Notice all the comments are spam. Ah the good old days when I didn't filter the comments.
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2. Best. Top 5. Ever. - This was the list of Top 5 Simpsons quotes I hoped to see in the next Simpsons game. Sadly I don't remember hearing any of them while getting a migraine through the last tiring Simpsons title.
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3. Why the Wii Will Fall by the Wayside - Here's a good example where I made a calculated guess and ended up looking like an ass. Not the first time that happened and certainly not the last. I was so indignant I even had a guy curse at me on the comments. Yes! Now I know what Stephen A. Smith feels like! I completely underestimated the Wii at the time. Oops.
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4. Interview with OXM's Fran Reyes - This was my first of two interviews with Fran and the first of many with people who cover the industry. Besides being a pretty good read I knew I impressed her with my questions and the positive way the discussion went (anytime you can make somebody laugh a lot during an interview, you know they'll remember you). This ended up helping me in the future as I interviewed Fran again and would later meet up with her at E3. This interview was my foot in the door to freelancing for gaming mags so it carries a lot of importance for me...or maybe it was because I emailed Fran about 100 times and she wanted to shut me up. I love doing interviews by the way, not only are they easy to write but its a lot of fun talking to other people about games.
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5. Top 5 Most Memorable Video Game Music - Another top 5 list I'm pretty pleased with but a horribly titled post. I must have been drunk when I wrote this one. After reading through it today I thought long and hard (that's what she said) about what I'd switch out and the only thing I could think of would be trading Vice City for Portal but I just couldn't do it based on one song (Still Alive).
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6. Are Video Games Art? - This post is a little over a year old and sometime this year I want to write it again. I was prompted by Roger Ebert's dig on gaming at the time but in light of the stupidity of all the talking heads who blame gaming for everything but the rise in gas prices, this should be something that needs to be addressed every year because there are still a lot of morons out there who just don't get gaming.
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7. Grading the PS3 - My digs on the PS3 in December of 2006 remain the same as they do right now - no killer app (sorry, Uncharted is fun but not great), lame online service and a wimpy gaming linup. Things have been looking up for the PS3 lately though. Its online downloadable game library has gotten better (I love PixelJunk Monsters), Home should be up and running this spring, the lineup for this year looks great, and Blu-ray finally knocking out HD DVD is big. Still, its a system built on potential, not achievement.
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8. Old Spiced - Another tale of my long held addiction of inflating my Gamerscore. Achievement Point binges are like rum and cokes binges, so good going down but you regret it in the morning. On this post I particularly like the line "I don't plan to make a habit of buying games like "Pocket Bike Racer" just for the points". What a load of crap! Just this weekend I rented Avatar so I could get over the 40K threshold. I have no shame.
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9. E3: Cooking with Gas - When I feel shitty about where my game writing career is going, I go to this post and remind myself how lucky I've been so far. Pretty much everything I wanted to see and do at E3 I got to do in this one day. Got to play a ton of great new games, met Adam Sessler, Morgan Webb and drank beer with Peter Moore? It was an incredible day.
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10. Games You Wish You Could Download - The king of this list, Cyberball, ended up being available soon after this post and was a dud because it lacked an online versus mode but the rest of these titles still needed to be made available yesterday (especially Sunset Riders and Pa Rappa the Rappa).
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Honorable Mention - I just couldn't leave this off the list.
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