Hi everyone, I’m Joe. I’m the new editor here at Kill Screen. I wanted to introduce myself, and to talk a little bit about some changes that you’ve probably noticed on the site.
Ok, the first thing you should know about me is that I am a lifelong gamer. My earliest memories involve the intrusion of an irate babysitter upon the ecstatic early-morning completion of Super Mario Brothers by my sister, as I crawled on the basement carpet. Little has changed, except now I rarely need a babysitter, and my sister doesn’t play games anymore except Just Dance, which let’s face it, is awesome as hell.
The second thing you should know about me is that I try to take the whole journalism shebang seriously. That’s my background – I came here from Popular Science and before that I interned at Harper’s and The New Yorker and before that I actually went to school for journalism, genius that I am – and my passion and what I read in my spare time, except sometimes I read novels, and by read novels I mean play Diablo 3.
The third thing you should know about me is that I have a Grim Fandango tattoo, and if you ask really nice you can see it. Ok fine, here it is anway:
Right then. We all know games journalism is broken, underperforming, overly credulous. This website, under the guidance of Ryan Kuo, has put out some of the best and most interesting writing on the subject over the past few years, and I want to continue that work.
But Kill Screen is going to evolve. In the coming weeks and months, you are going to see more and shorter pieces on the site. I’m not interested in words for words’ sake, and I am a firm believer that writing, on the internet especially, needs to justify itself, and fast. This is an acknowledgement that your time is finite, and that ultimately what we write is about informing you and not about flattering us. That said, we are still going to feature the longform deep dives that you are used to seeing from us, on our website, in our magazine, and in our forthcoming monthly ebook, the first of which will arrive in the coming weeks.
Ok! I’m excited to get to work, to get to know you, and to continue to make Kill Screen the first place you look for thoughtful, incisive, funny and lasting writing about games.