My Favorite Gaming Websites/Blogs

Even though they were bought out by IGN several years back, VE3D is still one of my most frequent stops every day as I try and keep up on the latest happenings in the gaming world. In general, they're more PC focused than console, which suits me just fine as I'm not a big console gamer. The writers are snarky, and often times brutally honest. Their content isn't as good as it used to be, but it's still better than most sites out there.

Bill Harris used to write the Night Call column for the now-defunct gaming site GoneGold.com. He's not an industry insider, he's not a wanna-be game developer either. He's a huge gaming nut who is extremely good at analyzing what's going on in the industry. His posts about the financial reality of Sony and the PS3, or the constant blunders of Take2 Interactive are some of the best you'll find. Since he's not part of a larger site, and doesn't make money off his blog, there's no way these companies can influence what he says.

And liberally sprinkled throughout the blog are great stories about his son, wife and the crazy adventures that ensue when you have a little kid in the house.

The blog is a great read to get an honest view on news that the game media may not be interested in covering.

Now owned by GameSpot/CNet, GameRankings is my most useful tool in researching any game to purchase. The idea is that given a bulk of game reviews from a number of different sites, you can find an average, and thus "true" score for a game. Think of it as the RottenTomatoes.com of the gaming world.

But don't go there for community. The forums there are terrible, there's no real user participation aside from submitting reviews. It's a gateway site to other sites. Still a very useful tool.

Yes, it's part of the evil GameSpy/IGN/Fox Interactive empire. Yes, you have to pay to get good downloads and content, but for what I paid way back ($10/mo for some founders deal that gives me access to everything GS/IGN) I've gotten more than my money's worth out of this site.

MMO patches, first-shot at new demos, exclusive beta tests... oh and some of the best download speeds I've ever gotten from a file site. To get all the goodies, it does cost. But if you're a big PC gamer, it's definitely worth it.

The mother digital distribution site of them all! Originally built to deliver Half Life content to customers, Valve has grown Steam into basically the premier digital distribution channel for PC games. The only other site that comes close is Direct2Drive, which doesn't do half of what Steam does.

They have a great games library and a very active forum community.

This is, without a doubt, the single best gaming article site out there. The content is unique, extremely well-written and very very interesting. In addition to their weekly magazines, they have daily news, editorial coverage and features. This site shows you what Game Journalism could be.

One of the oldest gaming news sites out there. Blue is still at it, posting his link roundups, news bits, media links and more. I visit this site less often than I used to, but I still find myself wandering back every few weeks to see how things are going. This is the nostalgic old-geezer site of the game media world.

Tired of reading about games from people who haven't even left their teens yet? Who devote their entire lives to gaming, don't go outside and likely have never even seen a real, live girl? GWJ is the site for you then.

Not a news site in the typical sense, they cover games and gaming news with a very mature and realistic eye. Like the site says, they're gamers with jobs, meaning gaming isn't their entire life. The site also has probably the best community of any game site I've seen. They're friendly, polite, and don't use much 1337 sp34k at all.