How Reviewing Games Broadened My Horizons

<p>Four years ago when I began my journey into video game journalism I was one of the most closed minded gamers you could ever meet&period; Ninety percent of what I played consisted of survival horror and Bioware RPG&&num;8217&semi;s and I rarely ever ventured outside of my comfort zone&period; My gamer buddies of course prodded me to try new things when I got my Xbox 360 a decade ago and I would go on to warily purchase <em>Elder Scrolls IV&colon; Oblivion<&sol;em> with it&period; Little did I know that <em>Oblivion<&sol;em> would not only introduce me to vast open world RPG&&num;8217&semi;s&comma; but also get me used to first-person controls as well&period; My closed mind opened up slowly into trying new types of gaming experiences&comma; but I still mostly stuck to survival horror and third-person games&period; It really wasn&&num;8217&semi;t until Trevor Kincaid&comma; Editor in Chief of BagoGames&comma; really opened my world up to games by hiring me as a features and review writer&period; I had no idea what the next four years would have in store for me&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>My first review for BagoGames was a game that had me completely out of my element&period; It was a little title called <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;witch-hundred-knight-review&sol;"><em>The Witch And The Hundred Knight<&sol;em><&sol;a>&period; I had rarely played any hugely Japanese influenced games and man&comma; did this title open my eyes up to what I&&num;8217&semi;d been missing&period; Sure I still loved my survival horror games and was always anticipating the next <em>Dead Space<&sol;em> or <em>Resident Evil <&sol;em>release&comma; but now goofy and offbeat games were on my radar&period; Thankfully BagoGames kept giving me these weird super Japanese-y games&comma; which not only dragged me into Suda 51 and Swery&&num;8217&semi;s world&comma; but made me more interested about the culture itself&period; <em>Shenmue<&sol;em> and <em>Yakuza<&sol;em> soon became must play games for me since a trip to Japan would be quite a few years away&period; My reviews editor also bombarded me with turn-based JRPG&&num;8217&semi;s which I had yet to truly master&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s honestly sad though because <em>Final Fantasy VII<&sol;em> is on my gaming bucket list&period; I&&num;8217&semi;ve been getting better and better with JRPG&&num;8217&semi;s and now that I found something that gives me more time&comma; I see myself getting better with this genre very soon&period; Square Enix will soon have a new master&excl;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;114239" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-114239" style&equals;"width&colon; 960px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-114239" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2016&sol;10&sol;13234851&sol;Final-Fantasy-7-PC-12&period;jpg" alt&equals;"I'm a little late in beating this game&period; &lpar;FINAL FANTASY VII - SQUARE ENIX&rpar;" width&equals;"960" height&equals;"540" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-114239" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">I&&num;8217&semi;m a little late in beating this game&period; &lpar;<em>FINAL FANTASY VII<&sol;em> &comma; SQUARE ENIX&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>As I wrote more and more&comma; I also began to read more and more about the industry&comma; which piqued my interest in competitive gaming&comma; lord knows I don&&num;8217&semi;t want to be a restaurant manager the rest of my life&period; After watching <em>EVO<&sol;em> and seeing the <em>Street Fighter V<&sol;em> competition&comma; I finally purchased a copy thinking that I would never get to it&period; When I received the game I hadn&&num;8217&semi;t yet found an easy way to read my comic books&comma; but now that I know that easy way I can sink some serious hours into <em>Street Fighter<&sol;em>&period; To stay well rounded I&&num;8217&semi;ll just keep different types of games in my other consoles so I still get the variety I like as I <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;gamer-choices-get-gud-variety&sol;">Git Gud<&sol;a> at <em>Street Fighter<&sol;em>&period; Will I ever get a sponsorship to EVO&quest; Will I ever get good enough to even compete&quest; I don&&num;8217&semi;t know&period; All I know right now is that I&&num;8217&semi;m enjoying my time with this game and that I&&num;8217&semi;m undefeated online after only one match&period; That&&num;8217&semi;s a good start&comma; right&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The biggest eye opener for me was playing <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;wheres-bruce-banner-saga-review&sol;"><em>The Banner Saga<&sol;em><&sol;a>&period; I remember when I read about its PC release I was interested in the title&comma; but then I read that it was turn-based strategy&semi; that quickly caused me to lose interest&period; Flash forward a few months and our review list comes out&comma; I remember seeing <em>The Banner Saga<&sol;em> on the request sheet and decided to go for it because I liked the art style and had completely forgotten about the battle system&period; After I remembered what type of battle system the game had I was immediately concerned that I would fail at reviewing this title&period; Thankfully I&&num;8217&semi;m a better gamer than I had previously thought and I succeeded where I thought I&&num;8217&semi;d fail- on the battlefield&excl; Gamers like to talk and of course usually about their favorite titles and I have a buddy who absolutely adores <em>Fire Emblem&period; <&sol;em>I&&num;8217&semi;ve stayed away from this series for quite some time seeing as I&&num;8217&semi;m bad at turn-based strategy and JRPG&&num;8217&semi;s&period; <em>The Banner Saga<&sol;em> opened my mind to turn-based strategy and with some nudging from my buddy I caved and purchased all the <em>Fire Emblem <&sol;em>games for my 3DS&period; <em>Awakening<&sol;em> is taking up the majority of my time right now and I&&num;8217&semi;m thoroughly enjoying myself&semi; I can&&num;8217&semi;t wait to see this game through to the end&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;114249" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-114249" style&equals;"width&colon; 960px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-114249" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2016&sol;10&sol;14003221&sol;Fire-Emblem-Gameplay1&period;jpg" alt&equals;"&lpar;FIRE EMBLEM&colon; AWAKENING - NINTENDO&rpar;" width&equals;"960" height&equals;"578" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-114249" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;<em>FIRE EMBLEM&colon; AWAKENING&comma; <&sol;em>NINTENDO&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Writing about video games is my dream job&period; It has transformed as I&&num;8217&semi;ve grown up&comma; but right now I&&num;8217&semi;m fully working towards this job&period; It isn&&num;8217&semi;t as easy as everyone thinks it is either&period; You have to play games that you may not know how to play properly&comma; but I can tell you that you will be exposed to a completely new world that you had no idea existed in our hobby&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s because of these past four years that I know so much more about Suda 51&comma; Swery&comma; Shinji Mikami and so on&semi; developers that honestly all need more attention&period; Had I not joined BagoGames I think that I would still be stuck in my little survival horror bubble&comma; which isn&&num;8217&semi;t a bad place&comma; but I like having a huge bubble that I can play around in&period; What has broadened your horizons in this industry&quest;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&nbsp&semi;<&sol;p>&NewLine;