Does Game Journalism Need A Style Guide?
So, there’s this new Videogame Style Guide and Reference book, right? And I actually know and like the folks behind it – David Thomas of the IGJA is a tremendously smart, affable guy – though I’m a bit scared of his new moustache, I think. Kyle Orland has matured into a very smart journo for Joystiq and others – heck we even used him for a neat Capcom interview last week. And Scott Steinberg, setting aside his habit of billing himself “gaming’s most prolific journalist”, is obviously a smart enough person. But I don’t see the point of a universal style guide for games, and here’s why – at the root, I find the whole concept of superdetailed style guides simply overkill. To be honest, I think these gigantic overarching glossaries in general are a dying breed. They’re old media, they’re tremendously overformal, and they’re not even interactive. Unless you’re managing a gigantic staff writing formal articles up the wazoo (perhaps at GameSpot and IGN), I don’t believe they’re particularly u
