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This will seem like a weird flex, but probably one of the weirdest ways my hobby has affected my life is that I don& #39;t really feel comfortable writing about videogames or reviewing them, despite loving the media form and enjoying writing
The trouble is that, currently, gaming journalism -- particularly written games journalism -- has a really bad rep. So bad, in fact, that sometimes, just having an analytical mind and being able to articulate where a game is failing or could do better is enough to pass muster
I& #39;m a writer, so I have a certain level of articulation, and I generally love games, so I do think deeply about them, so I run into that weird pseudo-journalist mark a lot. Problem is, I am not a journalist
I& #39;m not trained as one. My skillset is creating *fiction*, which should not be a skill that journalists look to acquire. (There& #39;s an old joke about how many journalist are very poor novelists -- "Inside every journalist is a novel, and that& #39;s exactly where it should stay")
So in a sense, it& #39;s unethical for me to represent myself like that. But people do that for me. Several times, when I& #39;ve bothered to write legitimate reviews, people take them too seriously when I& #39;m mostly trying to get an opinion out there and leave feedback to help a game grow
I also occasionally get developer responses, which, I mean, I get it, the devs are cool and taking notice, but still kinda freaks me out lmao, I don& #39;t necessarily want to court that kind of attention
As a result, I& #39;ve kinda stopped giving out my opinions on games as much, or at least trying to severely hold back the urge to articulate it properly, because I don& #39;t feel comfortable with the extra baggage surrounding it. I almost actively avoid leaving reviews nowadays
Idk, it& #39;s probably another one of those issues where it& #39;s all in my own head, but I still feel like I& #39;m on this weird cusp where I have just enough skill to fake being a real reviewer and don& #39;t want to put myself in a position where I run into moral uncertainty because of that
(A fun note is that for a while after release I was the top steam reviewer for One Step from Eden, entirely because I managed to sum up several frustrations people were having about the game. The whole situation super freaked me out)
Eventually the dev asked me if I& #39;d alter my review after an update, which I did -- mercifully, it completely scrubbed the ratings the review had gotten. I felt really bad about the whole situation, and have avoided giving reviews since
(This thread is kinda out of nowhere, but I& #39;ve been thinking about it lately, and wanted to articulate why I very rarely speak about videogames on my public accounts despite it being one of the other consuming hobbies of my life)
