Games media is dead, long live games media [bonus newsletter]
Death by a thousand cuts.
Hey folks, hope you’re doing well.
Bit of a different bonus newsletter from me this week, as I wanted to take some time to express my profound sadness at what’s been happening in games media recently. Perhaps this will be navel gaze-y, but as someone who has spent about 15 years in the field (and much longer than that admiring and following the people who made it so great!), I felt the need to write about how I’ve seen and experienced games media change over the last decade, commiserate about the loss of its talent, and perhaps end on some hope for what could happen next.
In case you’re unaware of what brought this particular topic on, IGN laid off some incredibly talented members of their team on Monday, including my friends Max Scoville, Brian Altano, and Seth Macy. This also coincided with GameDeveloper.com EIC Danielle Riendeau announcing her departure from the site, freelance budgets also seemingly being cut, and the anniversary of Fanbyte shutting down. While I’m writing this from the point of view of games media, it’s of course worth noting that we never seem to be more than a day or two away from some awful news in the industry: whether that’s layoffs, studio closures, or project cancellations. Sometimes all on the same day!
Perhaps I’m writing this out of a need for catharsis after seeing my peers be tossed aside over and over and over again.
Or perhaps it’s survivor’s guilt, because I dodged the axe so many times while others didn’t.