As a journalist John has covered everything from rural town meetings to the U.S. Congress and even done time as a crime reporter and photographer.|His first venture into writing about the game industry came in the form of a computer column called "On the Chip Side," which grew to have over 1 million circulation and was published in newspapers in several states. From there he did several "ask the computer guy" columns in magazines such as Up Front! in New Mexico and Who Cares? in Washington D.C. When the Internet started to become popular, he began writing guided Web tours for the newly launched Washington Post online section as well as reviews for the weekend section of the paper, something he still does from time to time.
His experience in trade publications came as a writer and reviewer for Government Computer News.
As the editor of GiN, he demands strict editorial standards from all the writers and reviewers. Breeden feels the industry needs a weekly, reliable trade publication covering the games industry and works tirelessly to accomplish that goal.
When Grand Theft Auto 3 was being shown at E3 running on a PC, my interest was peaked a bit. I had played the game on the PlayStation 2 and had a pretty good time. But my lack of console savvy really kept the game from becoming a top favorite for me. So when the game arrived for the PC, I figured I would give it another go. Basically, GTA3 on the PC is essentially the same game as on the PS2, with a few notable exceptions. If you are a PS2 whiz and went all the way through the … Continue reading Kickin’ with GTA3 PC→
Operation Blockade is the type of game that I don’t normally like. Basically you are charged with defending a bunker against waves and waves of enemy troops. Its kind of like a shooter, but you don’t move from your position. You can spin around and look up and down, but you don’t go anywhere. That said, I played this game from start to finish, and whenever anyone in the test lab was walking by and happened to see it, they all asked if they could play. In the past games of this type suffered from one major flaw, and that … Continue reading Operation Blockade is Mindless Fun→
The development of wargames over the past few years has followed two distinct tracks. The far more popular one has been in the direction of real-time strategy games, with a role-playing modification being the feature of note lately. The road less traveled is turn-based. Despite wonderful real-time games, I have remained a steadfast fan of turn-based games. The genre almost died out a few years ago, but was saved mostly by the Might and Magic, and perhaps the Warlords series. (Does anyone still remember when Might and Magic was an RPG?) Today, turn-based strategy remains popular, though I doubt it … Continue reading This Wonder Takes The Throne→
No, this isn't going to be an editorial about having to walk to school in the snow, uphill both ways and how you kids don't appreciate anything, as my grandfather used to always say, again and again. But I did notice that there seems to be a change in the industry. And unlike the downward spiral of the GiNDex, this one is actually pretty cool. We normally try to mix up reviews from different genera's, but over the last few weeks the reviewers have been churning out a plethora of reviews of new games in a specific category. The category: … Continue reading RPGs Come Back Strong→
I am impressed with Neverwinter Nights, but I did not start out that way. I guess it’s just a matter of perception. Given the long development time and the many, sometimes conflicting press releases and various other information I read about the product, I really did not know what to expect. Some people thought, and based on the feedback I get from our readers still do, that Neverwinter was a massively multiplayer game in the realm of Ultima Online or Asheron’s Call. Its not, though you could hardly blame gamers for thinking the wrong thing. Basically, the development of the … Continue reading Neverwinter Means Never Bored→
In the United States, this is a holiday weekend. At least as long as you were smart enough or at least able to take the Friday following the July 4th holiday off, which occurred on a Thursday this year. July 4th is the time when we celebrate our independence from England. Sorry Chella, we like England and all, but if we never broke away we would all be speaking, well, English? Ok, but if we never became independent then we would be drinking tea. Well, ok, I do drink a lot of tea. But, we would all love soccer! And … Continue reading Happy July 4th Old Man!→
They say if you build a better mousetrap, the world will beat a path to your door. We guess the same can be said about building a better mousepad. Everglide, quite by accident, began life in 1997 as a way to improve the overall game experience indirectly by making the existing mice more functional. This was done by creating a better surface for the mouse to rest on and glide across. Over the years Everglide has grown to include illumination devices, PC carrying cases and a host of other products aimed at the PC game player. As the company grew, … Continue reading At Everglide’s Pad→
A long time ago Steven King produced a movie based on one of his short stories called Maximum Overdrive. Having read the story, I was pretty excited when the movie came out. But what really got me going was that King himself did television commercials to support the project. "I’m going to scare the hell out of you!" King would say. So I went into the theatre expecting a fright. Unfortunately Maximum Overdrive was so bad it was almost comical, and nothing at all like the book. So while some people say beware of Greeks baring gifts like giant wooden … Continue reading Fatal Frame is Fear Squared→
It looks like the developers at Bethesda are actually going to be releasing their Morrowind RPG in May for both the PC and Xbox, which is pretty amazing considering how much depth is contained within the game world. Well, I guess they have been working on it for quite some time, but after playing with the preview version of the game, I can say that their efforts were well worth the wait. Put simply, Morrowind is quite possibly going to revolutionize the way people think about role-playing games on the computer. I’ve played about every RPG for the past six … Continue reading Getting a Lot More with Morrowind→
The Siege of Avalon Anthology is a welcome breath in the world of role-playing games. No, the game does not break any technical benchmarks or cause your processor to smoke under the weight of the graphics processing. But Siege does do something that few other RPGs ever have: provide solid entertainment without breaking your bank. Siege can be had for just $20, a price that most RPGs won’t reach until they have been bested by their own sequels several times over. For that price, I was expecting a very cheap game that would not impress me in the least, much … Continue reading Siege Anthology is A+ Value→
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