This is a letter I wrote to video game journalist Ben Kuchera, who has recently started a site devoted to long-form video game journalism, which makes it really the first of its kind.
Dear Mr. Kuchera,
I know you’re busy running the
Report as a one man show, so I completely understand if you can’t respond to or
even read this. But you recommended contacting people who are smarter than you,
so I thought I’d give it a shot. Maybe you’ll appreciate reading an email that
isn’t a Kickstarter pitch.
PAX
East—which I think was an experience worth five to six times price of
admission, for the record—really made me think. Among other various panels,
booths, and concerts, I went to a panel of online community leaders, I talked
with several professional gamers, and I listened to your presentation on
long-form journalism. All provided an interesting snapshot of life in different
parts of the gaming industry, but as brown-nosing as it sounds, yours was the
one that stuck with me most positively. This isn’t only because your talk was
well done, but also because I realized that I have zero interest in being a
professional gamer or an online community manager.
It’s not that I expect that it will
take less time or work to do these (as you and many others have said, initial
failure should be expected in journalism), and it’s not just that there’s zero
certainty that such a high level of participation will ever produce a paying
job. It’s mainly that I’m not all that enamored with the ultimate goal.
Do I want to devote my life to an
online gaming community when I could theoretically be writing about current
events? Do I want to devote my life to video games at all?
These are questions I’ve been
thinking about a good amount recently. I’ve just finished my first year of
college as an English major, but I’m still not sure how video games are going
to fit into my adult life. Maybe I’ve been surrounded by people who have
thoroughly disrespected gaming for so many years that it’s starting to get to
me. I recognize, though, that gaming as a media is in its infancy; it’s not on
the same level as literature or film. I don’t believe we have a gaming
equivalent of Great Gatsby. And I’m sure I sound naïve; I realize that even if
I do choose to write novels, it’s extremely unlikely they would make any
lasting impact on humanity. What I enjoy about the Report it’s about people and
culture as much as it is about video games. I can get behind that.
You’re someone who has been working
in the industry for a while, so I have been wondering what this process might
have been like for you. What made you choose to write about video games? Was
there a moment when you decided that you wanted to work with video games as a career,
or did it naturally progress from a love of them? Similarly, as far a writing
goes, did you want to be a writer and then choose your topic or want to do
something with video games and choose to write?
I really appreciate your time, and
though I’ve tried to avoid sounding like a complete fanboy up to this point,
I’ll say that I think the Report is fantastic. The story of the Daigo/Wong
fight in particular (which you can peruse here if interested) was fascinating. Have a great weekend.
Sincerely,
-Will Martin
I haven't received a response yet, but maybe that's just because I need a more intriguing subject line than "On Video Games"...
