Forums > Contributor Zone > RotW 2010-06-06 to 2010-06-12: newly fortified with sitestaffiness(c/r/tm)!

Hi everyone. It was good to see interesting reviews from staff and users alike. I saw a lot of variety, too, and while some reviews stood out from the rest, none felt like a waste of time. More importantly, none really felt like falling into a rut and if some reviews didn't quite work for me, they tried some enterprising new stuff, and it made my every-fourth-weekly RotW a fun one. It's good to people who've been writing reviews for a while mix it up, and if they aren't fully successful, you get the feeling they can tweak things for next time. And if some of my critique topic advice helps them get there, whether they have the confidence to reject it utterly or see something to incorporate, so much the better. Their risk taking helps me with my own, in my writing, and that's a Good Thing.

But this is an award/placement topic and not a participation ribbon topic. THERE CAN BE ONLY THREE.

THIRD PLACE: HonestGamer's Blur review. Good discussion here about the game trying to be too self consciously gritty (did I mention firejoemorgan.com makes me laugh at that word now? Have I mentioned that they're about more than just sports, or bad sports journalism? They've helped me wipe certain cliches and loaded words from my thoughts and writing, and they may do that for you, too. Not that this review overused grit. It just reminded me of how FJM made fun of sportswriters who overuse it) and leaving out fun. I really do like to see unapologetic mentions that cartoony stuff DOES have more to offer. This was in my opinion the better of HG's two reviews, maybe because it took on more interesting subject matter. Also the disappontment never felt overdone.

SECOND PLACE: Suskie's Prince of Persia review. This review goes beyond the game nicely and has a good controlled complaint about giving fans of the series what they want, as opposed to what people in general want.

FIRST PLACE: Ben's Super Street Fighter IV review. To anthropomorphize--this review knows what it's trying to be and never does anything too crazy. Yet it remembers to be...interesting. Perhaps I haven't played enough fighting games to see all the options and possibilities, but this left me interested, and more importantly, some questions I asked "but what about X?" were answered in short order. Some of this may be serendipity, but it happened too often to be chance.

Congrats to the winners. See you again in four weeks.

My principal said, 'Emo, Emo, Emo.'
I said 'I'm the one in the middle, you lousy drunk!'
-- Emo Phillips

Oh hey, thanks for this. Congrats to Ben for his deserved win.

You exist because we allow it. And you will end because we demand it.