Videogame Journalism (Brief About Life: Why I Would Never Call Myself a Journalist)

This summer we have alot of games being previewed for the annual game convention E3. I hear different things about E3 such as "No Fans Allowed" (press badge required) and "We now allow fans". Although I won't be in LA this year for E3 or even ComiCon (due to school), those are still conventions that I would want to put on my wishlist for next year. I do plan on going PAX, but it depends, again, on school (I can't wait to graduate from college. I hope to make it ASAP).

Although I review games and talk about them extensively on this blog, I, however, AM NOT A GAMING JOURNALIST! I see it as a possible career someday, but it's pretty male-oriented and male-dominated. The videogame industry can be difficult to break into and be taken seriously if you are a young woman. It's the same way with the art world, the comicbook industry, the music industry, or any industry that does not require women to either sit and look pretty, or take care of others. I don't want to scare my male readers, but there is some truth to what I'm saying.

My English instructor when I first came to the university that I attend currently told me that instead of protesting, picketting, boycotting, complaining or even criticizing the videogame industry, be a catalyst of change by being a part of it. It's really difficult to bring about change when there are so few other women who share your hobbies.

I find that when I lived on campus there were other who did game, but they were male. This is off tangent but if I thought of it before, I would have blogged about living in my hall for 2009-2010 school year. It was the most turbulent school year I've ever been through. I don't recommend living on campus for some people. It can stunt social growth.

I found some of the gamers on campus to be arrogant bastards. If someone from a major company showed them a good game, they wouldn't know what to think of it. I'd say the same for the online community of gamers that I once belonged to. Fanboyism kills everything at best.

When I first went to my current school, I entered as a pre-journalism major, and I wanted to minor in computer science. I had to take a reporting class because it was required before going into public relations or magazine writing, which were fields I wanted a career in. My instructor was and still is an editor of the city paper. She insisted that I go into newspaper and write for the school paper. I would have done that if I wanted to go into a field that is dimishing as I'm speaking, due to online news sources (Why pay for the cow if you can get the milk for free/) and if there were still dignity and integrity in the field of journalism. The school paper lacked those things, and so did the school magazine. If I could change anything about the world of art or the field of journalism or even the entertainment industry in all media, I would make it where it is required to have passion and honesty in what works get exposed.

At the end of my journalism class, I told my teacher that I'm switching to art, earlier in that semester I told my TA in my computer science class that I wanted to go into art instead of journalism, and he told me to add computer science to major so I can be a shader for the gaming industry. I told him that's a pretty good idea. Computer science overall requires alot of dedication and precision. By those damned guy gamers, I was told that I need to be a computer engineer to be in the gaming field. I'm like "Not everyone in the videogame industry are programmers!" I know that I berrated my mom about age not meaning anything, but she does have a point. People have told her things that kept her from her dream, and I do not want to be like that. I plan on asking an instructor who teaches the gaming classes about game design and what degrees I need.

I don't necessarily think that game design will be my passion. I was told by a friend (don't speak to him any more, because he wasn't a good friend in the first place) that I needed to be in a more social field. I don't consider myself to be a social person. I try to be, which failed last semester (fall09/spring10), I just want a career or a niche that I can call my own. Hence the reason why I don't call myself a journalist in videogames.

Why not a Journalist?

First of all, I do not call myself a journalist, because unlike being an artist (that I am), journalism is a professional career, even though current journalists do not treat it as such. If I learned anything from my journalism classes here and at home, I learned that inorder to be a reputable journalist, you must register as one. I forgot what it is called, but it's similar to getting a license to practice real estate, or law or even medicine. It's so they can distinguish a real journalist from a not-so-real one and hold you accountable for your work. It's basically a press badge. I don't have a journalism degree, so I don't get one. My friend was a journalism major here, and she said that it's hard as hell, because I have to know every single thing about the field along with some classes aside. One of the requirements of a magazine journalist or newspaper journalist is interviewing. I hate to talk to people about their work. I hated that in my Digital Media class, I had to write questions to the artist about their work. What I love about art and writing is the broadness of these passions. I can do whatever I want in art, whether or not it sells, I'm sure someone would buy it. In writing, I can write whatever I want, there will be disagreements, but people will read it. Not so much in a group oriented career. There is less freedom and lesss room for journalism than in creating art, reviewing books, music, movies and videogames and so forth.

What Will I be Writing, Then?

I have a subscription on Youtube who talks in his videos about politics in videogames. I came up with the idea of writing about the poltical, social and cultural relevence of the games that we play today and the games that we've played yesterday. I will use literature to talk about these, along with reviewing the games that I play and discuss other forms of entertainment such as music, movies and books (scifi). I will also write about random sites I find interesting, or stupid. I am not sure if my idea is new, but if it's never been done before, I found a niche in writing. I don't know too many people who are willing to sit and watch interviews with dead people, and read their work and write about whether or not the gamer designers got it right. I hope for whoever reads my blogs that I make them as creative, entertaining and insightful as possible. I do not think that any magazine or any website will cover what I'm about to...