I started writing in the professional blogosphere about cinema, but immediately I felt tired doing it. The cinema is an established art with more than a century behind and at this point I had the feeling that I had nothing left but to underline the words and thoughts spoken by others. Soon I found a practically virgin territory in which to grow and develop my ideas, video games.
I had not seen the birth of the cinema; so, by the time I joined and consciously faced everything it offered, thousands of pages in the form of biographies, critics, essays and encyclopedias were exposed before my eyes to be devoured. In the same way it happened to me with other arts such as music or comics. I didn’t see them born, and a huge bibliography was waiting for me to be discovered
In the case of video games it was different. I watched his cries of newborn in the form of two sticks like rackets and a square that acted as a ball, witnessed his first edged steps of primary colors, his wild and bright adolescence full of pixels and multiple scroll planes, the discovery that I was facing more than entertainment when I first tried a masterpiece like ‘Mario 64’ …
I feel privileged to be able to witness the origin and development of a new artistic manifestation, it is an exciting moment in which everything is about to be said and much still to be discovered.
I claim from these lines the writing about video games as a literary genre at the same level as film or music criticism. I also claim the narration and evocation, the first person and the palpable presence of the writer, the absolute subjectivity and the heartless heart. I refrain from the aseptic analysis of planes whose soul is as empty as a cold framed number. We must get involved and pour into what we write whether biased, light, dense or fun. You can write well about video games.
I want to read texts that take my guts out, twist them and put them back inside me in a different way. I want to read texts that I always want to read again. I want musicality, skill, rhythm. I want meticulously chosen words and placed in the most beautifully possible way. I want naturalness, artificiality, freshness, tear, insolence, shamelessness and respect.
I demand that video game criticism mature and is placed at the height of those who read it. I demand my right to demand more, to get excited and to get excited again. I demand passion in each syllable and in each intonation. I demand that a text about videogames has the ability to change my perception of the environment and everything that surrounds me.
Yes, I am lucky to live in an exciting time where everything is yet to be said, and I am lucky to have the means to do so. As my admired Raheel Akbar said: Write what you love and love what you write.
More information: The Witcher’s Showrunner Responds To Criticism Over The Netflix Series’ Adaptation
Rene Bennett is a graduate of New Jersey, where he played volleyball and annoyed a lot of professors. Now as Zobuz’s Editor, he enjoys writing about delicious BBQ, outrageous style trends and all things Buzz worthy.
