Merry Chirstmas to everyone, i hope you all have a safe and awesome holiday!
Check out two new MW2 videos in My Videos' section:
http://www.gamespot.com/users/Masterchief1307/video?tag=all-about;header;more
They do contain spoliers obviously, but I know some people will enjoy them. 
Today I got a new Emblem
This emblem shows that youve submitted a bracket for GameSpots Greatest Game Hero competition. Lets get in there and fight!
Just like everyone else on the tubes, I have a twitter account! Check it out here.
Hiztoria.com is a new website that lets people share and discover anything and everything about websites. Rate, review, share, and talk about websites big and small. Hiztoria even has Gamespot in it's databse.
This is the year where the PS3 takes the lead and will hold that lead for years to come. The PS3 is getting the best exclusives this year not only in games but also DLC! Hello PS3, Goodbye 360!
Dashing through my front door, excitedly tripping over boxes with anxiety of playing the game of the year. upon opening it and
putting it in the 360 was probably the second most greatest time of my life. Up to now this was a happy moment for me and this
blog may sound somewhat over exaggerated but this game is that good, all the hype that has been building up to now exploded!
dam sleeping tonight might be hard
...to you, until we meet again (and I'm sure we will). Just a quick note to say this Friday will be my last day at GameSpot.
I hate long goodbyes, so this will be quick. Believe it or not, GameSpot has been paying my bills for well over eight years now, first as a freelancer, then an intern, then a freelancer again, then finally an editor, at which point I packed my bags and headed from North Carolina out to the left coast to work in the office fulltime. I'm learning that leaving a job after so many years feels more like a breakup than a simple professional transition, but it's time for a break all the same.
The hardest part will be leaving all my coworkers behind, whom I admire and will miss each in their own way. You wouldn't believe the number of talented and inspiring people I've been lucky enough to cross paths with--and in some cases, truly befriend--in my years here. Pretty humbling, really. Keep on keepin' on, y'all.
As has become the fashion, I've set up a blog if you want to keep up with my exploits:
http://verbocracy.blogspot.com/
I've had a blast busting out content for you guys and gals all these years. Catch you on the flipside.
Sorry to all.
Update your files accordingly.
...goodbye.
Boy, that would have been awfully obtuse, wouldn't it?
I'm going to do my best to avoid turning this into a massive weep session. I've already started and scrapped writing this message more times than I can count, so instead of putting endless thought into this, I'm just going to say what I feel and leave it at that.
The five years I've spent at GameSpot are arguably the most important years I've spent in my life. Prior to this gig, I'd never had much of a real job. When Jeff and Greg and the rest of the crew back in 03 gave me--some skinny, 21 year old punkass who'd never done anything but freelance for a few scattered sites--a legitimate chance, I'd never envisioned that this would turn to be the job that defined me, that gave me a place and a career. I had no idea that I'd actually make some semblance of a name for myself here. That anyone would actually give a crap about what I did or what I wrote. I still find the notion kind of unbelievable, actually. Reading all the messages people have been sending me since the word got out has been utterly mind-blowing. It's one thing to enjoy what you do, but it's quite another to know that others enjoy what you do. It's gratifying, and I'm thankful for it.
I could probably spend the next several hours giving individual thanks to everyone who has helped me along the way, but most of them know who they are and have been thanked in more personal fashion, so I'll skip the acceptance speech from hell. Instead, a general thank you to the staff (both former and present) for letting me be a part of the dream that is/was GameSpot. Also, thanks to you, the reader. I'd be nothing if you folks didn't come back time and time again to read the junk I put out, and I can't tell you how thankful I am that you did.
Leaving completely sucks, and believe me when I say I'm in no way joyful about my departure. Well, OK, that's not entirely true. There is a certain sense of...freedom that I'm feeling now as I envision an endless string of pantsless weekdays. Still, if I'd had my druthers, I'd have probably rather stayed precisely where I was, doing what I was doing. But circumstances don't always work out the way you'd prefer, and things change, often not for the better. My time here was finished. I was conflicted about that notion going into the holiday break, and that notion turned into fact with startling clarity as soon as I came back from break. It was a frightening and painful experience to let it go, but I had to. If you love something, set it free, and all that junk. I don't think this one's ever coming back, though.
Of course, I'm not going to disappear into obscurity--at least, not without a fight. You'll probably start seeing my name start appearing on bylines relatively soon. I'm not doing anything full time just yet, but we'll see where the wind takes me. In the meantime, if you need to get in contact with me for any reason, my new e-mail address is alexiconofscars@hotmail.com, and if you want to read my assorted ramblings about whatever, I am keeping a personal blog at The Head Of Alfredo Garcia. Stop by sometime if you want to read about what I think of practically everything except games. I'll give you a hint: I hate all of it.
And lastly, let me just make one thing as crystal clear as possible. I hold no ill will, issue no blame, take no umbrage with any of my former co-workers on the edit team. These guys are some of the hardest working, upstanding, straight up cool mother****ers I've ever met in my life, and as long as they're around doing their thing, GS will continue to live and breathe--there will still be a soul there, underneath whatever ridiculousness might be on the surface these days. There is no GS without those guys. The GS content crew is a family, and no one can change that.
Before I duck out, a few stats to chew on from my time here:
Number of reviews written: 733
Number of video reviews produced: Somewhere around 100
Number of video features appeared in: Dozens
Controllers broken: 7
Debug consoles broken: At least two that I can remember (sorry Ricardo!)
Number of console launches experienced: 5 (not including N-Gage and Gizmondo, which absolutely, positively don't count)
Number of weekend birthdays spent at the office: 2 (thanks PlayStation 3, Wii and Rock Band launches!)
Number of E3s covered: 5
Number of hours of sleep lost while covering said E3s: 280
Number of delicious sandwiches consumed during work hours: Too many to count
Pounds gained over the last five years: 45
Favorite review ever written: It's sort of like choosing your children, but I'd have to say that Super Mario Galaxy was probably the piece of writing I was most proud of just for clarity and overall quality. For pure comedy, while Big Rigs is obviously the fan favorite, I think my Land of the Dead: Road to Fiddler's Green review was my favorite, mostly for the opening paragraph, but there are some good chuckles elsewhere, too. My only regret with that one was that it was published before I'd learned the skill of brevity.
Favorite video piece: Regarding Robocop. Tim Tracy took my hours of ridiculous footage and turned that thing into something magical.
Worst review ever written: Read any of the first five to ten reviews I did for the site. They're as boring as they are barely informative. I was still learning the craft at that point. I think I've gotten a touch better.
Review that caught me the most flack: Probably Advent Rising. I will still never understand what anyone saw in that game. It was like retarded Star Wars with a broken frame rate. Now there's a box quote for ya!
Biggest editorial regret: Never giving Burning Questions proper closure. What can I say? I snapped.
Biggest non-editorial regret: Lack of travelling, specifically to Japan. Would have loved to have gotten one TGS trip in.
Thing I'll miss least about GS: Apart from the current unpleasantness, I'll say the commute. Nothing sucks more than driving an hour through traffic to work every day, especially when you're accustomed to carpooling and then suddenly end up having to do it all by your lonesome. *cough*
Thing I'll miss most about GS: The dozens and dozens of awesome people who have come and fled over the years that helped make GS a terrific place to work during their time. You know who you are.
And with that, I bid you all a fond adieu. It's been real.
--A
It's been crazy around here for the past week. The whole Jeff issue really got out of hand. I've had time to cool down myself. I've not yet fully forgiven Cnet but I didn't stick to my plans to boycott either. Acutally, I still don't plan to visit cnet.com until I hear more about this. 
The recent Hotspot at least allowed me to relate to the staff again, but I'm still pissed because they can't tell us the full details that is if they even know. I'm sure they do. If he really did something that warranted an honest firing, then I'm sure most people wouldn't even want to here that. We want to hear about the injustice that has been taking place.
The whole situation just looks so bad even after reading Gamespot's full response which wasn't really anything we didn't already know. I appreciate the "semi transparency" that was given but you can still tell that a corporate string is attached to them even if they don't want to admit it to themselves. It sucks. It makes me feel like there is a firewall up between the Gamespot staff and the readers which should never happen. I hope the staff finds a way to unite the readers with the site again. I love this freaking site and now something stupid like this has to happen. Cnet must have had a great reason to fire Jeff or knows something that I don't.
Well it has been a while since my last blog post. I have been really busy with work and other things so while i have been dropping in a haven't really done more then lurking around. It also looks like I picked a hell of a time to come back to gamespot with Jeff Gate and all these people leaving Gamespot over it.
Kind of sucks I was going to try to be a little more active but if most of the community leaves I don't see much reason to. It looks like 1up's forums are where most of the "GameSpot Refugees" are heading to so I guess if enough leave I will head over there my account i made over there a while ago is still good.
As for my Opinion on this whole Jeff thing well. I never have really agreed with any of the Gamespot reviews for a while now, but i still did read them over along with others to try and get a feel of the game so this doesn't really change much in terms of my feeling on the reviews. Just that now when I try to get a feel on if a game is worth buying I won't even bother to check out GameSpot's review like I used to.
Though I really feel bad for the Staff still left after this and even more for the ones who write the reviews. As no matter what pretty much anything they say and score they give will get the response of either they developer/publisher didn't pay enough and that is why they got a bad score or they paid for that good score. I don't know about you but if I was a reviewer at Gamespot i think i would be looking for a new job. I couldn't work knowing that people can't trust my review is my honest opinion or that if the developer doesn't like my "tone" in the review i could show up with my office door locked one day.
Well that is my two cents on this.
Oh if you like RPGs you have to play The Witcher so far that is the best RPG i have played in many years.
-legends-unlockables: Stone Cold, The Rock, Bret Hart, Hulk Hogan, Jimmy Hart, British Bulldog, Mr. Perfect, Jerry Lawler, Dusty Rhodes, Bam Bam Bigelow, Jim Neidhart, Roddy Piper, Tazz, and Eddie Guerrero.
-legend stuff- unlockables: old Steel Cage, enferno match, buried alive match, King of the Ring, Eddie lowrider, undertaker motorbike, Jimmy hart megaphone, bret hart sunglasses, british bulldog's bulldog, kane mask, and ECW One Night Stand, Novenber to dismember (2th ECW PPV), Cyber Sunday, and Money in the Bank.
non legend stuff- unlockable: kurt angle gold metal, john cena lock chain, JBL limo, carlito apple, Unlimited CAW-points, Unlock all hidden moves and Satureday Main Event.
-Current: CM Punk, Kevin Thorn, Sabu, Tommy Dreamer, Sandman, Ariel, Ashley, London, Kendrick, Charlie Hass, Jeff Hardy, Victoria, Rene Dupee, and Sylvain.
Tag teams: DX-Shawn Michael and Triple H, MNM-Melina, Nitro and Mercury, Kane and Undertaker, Shelton and Charlie , Brian Kendrick and Paul London, Matt and Jeff-Hardy Boyz, Rated RKO, ECW New Breed, ECW Originals, and Sylvain and Rene Dupee.
-Add to- General Mode, in exhibition: having the option to interfer in a match, more storylines-with title belts (WWE, Heavyweight, Intercontinental, US, World Tag, WWE Tag) until you lose it, with out title belts- dealing with divas and such like in svr and here comes the pain, more voice over choices for created-wrestler, being able to go through the crowd and wrestle, being able to do suplex (powerbomb, chokeslam) and moves next to the ropes and make the opponent landing outside the ring, and having the choice (option menue) to wear the title belt on your shoulder, waist, or on your pants (MNM), and keeping record of each wrestler's title reign (season and exhibition, like here comes the pain with season).
-Changes to make: Bastista's entrance, entrance showing the created wrestler on the screen, like in svr: show promos building of PPV and main event, work on stone cold's head shaking.
Unlockable Trophy ListTough Enough Trophy, Match Veteran Trophy, 100 Wins Trophy, Amateur Challenge Trophy, Rising Star Trophy, WWE Superstar Trophy, WWE Legend Trophy, WWE Challenge Trophy, Legend Killer Trophy, Royal Rumble Trophy, Elimination Chamber Trophy, Unlockable Collect A Diva Trophy and Bar Room Brawl Trophy.
WWE Legend Titles- unlockables: Hardcore Championship Belt, The Million Dollar Championship Belt, and Smokin skull Championship ( stone cold's old title) and ECW title.
Everything from the last game is okay except these things above.
if anybody has anymore ideas, post it right here.
man, exams stink. at least I'm done with 'em now and the semester's over. that means that I'm already halfway done with darn modern world history, or should I say, modern European history because it's always Europe this and Europe that and this European guy did this and that European guy went over there, oh, and a 500-year-old Chinese empire did this during its long reign, but that's not as important because it's not about Europe. AAAGH!! I just want to stab European history in the head! I'm not meaning to offend any European people out there, I'm just going after how much Europe's brought up in class. Oy!
Ah, well. Anyhow, I finally get myself another Monday off cuz the teachers need to do their grading and such. Four day weekend for me since tomorrow's make-up exam day and I obviously wasn't sick on any other day this week.
Speakin' of sick, everybody wish Rudy a "Get well soon!" cuz he got a cold. If ya don't, ye shall face the wrath of my flying squirrel-monkey-zombies (unless you've already wished Rudy a get well soon, then you're fine)
The world will never be the same when Reggie the Mighty roams the Earth in her search of handsome game characters, sushi and strange french comics. Fear her red glasses and blue hair of DOOOOOOOM!!!!:
I've also managed to get my fingers on World of Warcraft since my Visa card finally found out that cooperating is a good thing.
I'm playing as a Tauren Huntress named Anuket and right now I'm lv 8 and usually hang out in Bloodhoof Village. I'm on the European server called Stormscale. Come visit me!!!
And I hate wolfs. Because of them, I have probably died over 20 times!!! And I've been playing for two days!!! *mumble grumble*
