PixelVixen707

Let’s pick at the carcass of the standardized game review. It was born in the dry, cash-corrupt dirt of the enthusiastic press. It grew into a bloated, overdetailed and understimulating monster via the web press, flirted with a patronizing respectability in the mainstream media, and lights up, here and there, in the blogosphere. If you had to make an anthology of great games writing - and I mean, an editor is holding a gun to your head, right now, and your grandmother’s too - you could find maybe ten or twenty pieces that will survive the ages. But your editor will run out of bullets before he gets anyone to read it.

Sound harsh? Well, there are good critics out there. They just happen to work in a stillborn format. I sense a consensus from some of gaming’s best writers that reviews aren’t cutting it. We hem and haw over their shortcomings - ethical, literary, and intellectual - and pick on little logistical problems, like how someone’s going to finish GTA IV on deadline and still have time to enjoy it. But nobody faces the problem head-on.

My personal edit-hero Simon Carless recently wrote that write-ups of experiences pose a strong alternative to the standard review. The gaming blogosphere prospers here - take Leigh Alexander’s write-up today about getting wrapped up in just the first section of Fallout 3. And if you scan my reviews for the past year, you’ll see me switch from straight-up reviews to, well, whatever I feel like. Without raising the dreaded “new games journalism,” people are looking for experiences and reactions rather than bullet-point assessments. They want us to treat games as architecture, restaurant, social space, fleeting spectacle. You don’t review a rave. You don’t review baseball.

Here’s my latest obsession: TwitterCrit.

Let’s assume you already know about Twitter, with its up-to-the-second speed and its 140-character limit. Most of my fave bloggers have landed on Twitter, and they’re tweeting day and night. Their crit is the exact opposite of a traditional game review, focusing entirely on spontaneous reactions.

You have Triphibian (Gus Mastrapa) sinking into Wrath of the Lich King … or getting high and wilding in a zoo?

Fun first session. I fought atop a mammoth, flew in a gnome spitfire, killed a rhino-riding poacher, loved a penguin and dove for wine.

On the flip, you get 10rdBen (Ben Abraham) waiting for a download:

Oh so taunting!!! Left 4 Dead demo at 98%!!!!

N’Gai Croal’s a dreamscribbler, but watch him cram a movie review into a single tweet:

Quantum of Solace: left-iest blockbuster in many a moon–and its politics serve the story well. Hectic pace needed more longeurs, though.

And don’t forget that the gamemakers themselves show up here. Like CliffyB.

CONTEST: Try to make me look more badass. I know you’ll think it’s almost impossible, but be creative, go nuts.

Or this:

@ncroal I’m a renaissance man. My goal in life is to make everything I do bigger, better and more badass. If that means opera, so be it.

Or this:

If you’re coming to see me in Universal CityWalk tonight, mention my twitter and I won’t Cliffy-Punch™ you.

Errr I’ll admit, I just sat and read every tweet he’s ever written. Absorbing. (BTW, and here’s the contest winner and I dare you to look at it.)

I won’t tell you TwitterCrit is the future of game writing. But everyone who’s ever penned a formal review or even an essay-length blog post should give it a spin. Don’t pretend that one piece of writing can sum up your thoughts on a game. Don’t wait ’til the end to start writing. Don’t sweat it if you’re wrong. Don’t come to a conclusion. Just talk, and relate, and converse. And along the way, critique.

… And yes, maybe I’ll do it too. I registered the other day, mainly so some smartass (like Zach’s brother) didn’t grab the handle first. But let’s see. I could always use more practice.

UPDATE: Turns out that cliff_b on Twitter was a fake. I admit it, I was duped. Is there ever egg on my face. Still, it almost makes the case for me - it’s a mesmerizing critique of CliffyB. Or as I’ll always know him, Dude Huge.