My keynote at Edge Online

This morning I found out that the piece I’d written about writing The Rough Guide to Videogames had been posted at Edge Online. Bizarre as it may sound, this was almost as much of a thrill for me as seeing the first printed copy of the book itself – and not only because it’s the first publicity we’ve had so far. For years I’ve been a fan of the print magazine, though I gave up my subscription during a brief period when I went off games (more on that another time).



Edge was to my knowledge the first magazine to treat games as cool*; it wasn’t trying to snare schoolboys with pictures of Lara Croft’s bottom (oh, wait, that shot’s in my book). It boasted cutting-edge design, it was literate and witty, with contributions from industry insiders and writers of the calibre of Steven Poole (author of Trigger Happy) producing thought-provoking articles. What’s more, it offered challenging, uncompromising reviews where you knew what the score meant and trusted it implicitly. Today, it still has that unique voice and you know that if Edge doesn’t rate a game, it’s not worth playing. So, to be a tiny part of Edge’s newly revamped website is a huge privilege for me.

You can read the article here.

edit: * As Theo commented at Edge Online, this isn't actually the case. All gaming magazines treated games as cool; what Edge did was write about them as a serious medium. What I should have said was that Edge made games feel cool to me; other magazines were mostly written in a more juvenile style and didn't treat the subject in a way that interested me. So back when magazines were the only place to read about games, I often felt sidelined and "uncool" about my gaming. Until I discovered Edge, that is.