Kenneth Shepherd – Hi, I’m Kotaku’s new staff writer

Oh hello. I didn’t see you there. I am Kenneth Shepherd, KotakuNew Staff Writer.

If you don’t know me, I’ve spent the past three years writing about the video game industry at Van Byte As a staff writer, and I did so through a lens Something strangeAnd the social communicationAnd the Introspection. I’ve also written about those things in places like ribbedAnd the IGNAnd the Paste MagazineAnd the Gaming MagazineAnd many other places that I won’t mention here. But if you’re kind enough to read my words there, you’ll find it all right here at Kotaku, like that. But on top of that, I’m here to help Tips and Advice Where we talk about the reasons and reasons for playing video games.

I started out as a reporter working for local news. What started with writing for my college newspaper eventually turned into running it, and then working for my local newspaper for a short while. The end goal has always been to get a job writing about games, but I think writing about people on a more grounded level has informed a lot about how I think and talk about the industry. Where I was once interested in watching behemoths run around in the name of conquering the market, I now care more about what gaming means to us as a culture of gamers and creators. I tell people that the best question I asked in interviews while working at the newspaper was, “What does this mean to you?” And I was watching one of them light up as he answered. I like to keep the same mindset when I write about video games and what they mean to people who don’t sit at a board and brag about record profits while laying off half their workforce.

Outside of writing about video games, I also talk about them Normandy FMa bi-weekly retrospective podcast that I co-host alongside destructiveEric Van Alen. If the name doesn’t tell you, we started as a file mass effect The podcast that went through the entirety of BioWare’s sci-fi saga, with episodes that take on every game alongside incredible guests from across the industry. The performance of this show made a huge impact on my critical voice, shifting a lot of my thinking about games, narrative, and player expression into really dissecting a particular moment, rather than trying to encapsulate things in broad, reductive strokes.

In the years since, the show has become more of a generic video game retrospective. We went to cover Dragon AgeAnd the Jade EmpireAnd the The last of usAnd the Final Fantasy XAnd we’re currently two episodes away from wrapping up our retrospective Cyberpunk 2077 movie. In the new year, we’ll start playing through yoke series, which is exciting, because it’s the first time I haven’t played a game on the show before we covered it.

Oh my God, what is there to say about me? Pokemon She is my vice president of life and I have a private collection of six Pokémon that I consider my primary party (Raichu, Palkia, Latias, Beautifly, Torterra, and Houndoom). Pre-pandemic, I lived in movie theaters and you’d see everything that was shown, good or bad. I’m still trying to get into the habit of watching movies again, but this transition back in as theaters reopen has been an ongoing process. Before writing about games, I was on track to be a music teacher teaching high school choir (I obviously have a knack for choosing career paths that have very stable job markets), because every gay teen who sings in their high school choir early on is caught On the 2010s elation They are and may be in therapy at the moment trying to forget Matthew Morrison’s “Blurred Lines” performance. I don’t play music professionally anymore, but I sing a track in my car and I paid a lot of money for a replica of Eli’s guitar from The last of us part two For not turning it on from time to time.

Before Kotaku, I lived in small town Georgia with a 16 year old Yorkie-Chihuahua named Lily, who has all my heart. I don’t know how you’ll react to city life when we move to New York, especially in its old age, but I’ve been working for a long time to get us here. I started writing about the video game industry as a wide-eyed college student in 2013 with a shocking review of… Grand Theft Auto V for my university papers (which were thankfully lost due to a redesign of time and location), but what I didn’t tell most people at the time was that I started writing about video games because I was sure the career would get me out of the stifling confines of small town Georgia and into the big city that I longed to live there. Years of college, a pandemic, health issues, and a layoff later, I’m writing this from the G/O’s New York office as a staff writer for Kotaku. I can see tall buildings from the window and hear the city bustle below. For the longest time, seeing a city skyline felt like your family taking you to a nice restaurant. It was a special event that you knew would set you back a paycheck or two. Currently? Once my work day is over, I’ll go out on the town and know I’m no longer just a passer-by.

So, as I write this, it’s time for a big change for me. It’s one thing to go from writing for one website to another, and another to move your entire life to the city you’ve been dreaming of for half your life. Well, here are the new beginnings in an exciting new place. Both in the big city and here on Kotaku. Look at you all on the first page.