A Sad Week For Gamers And Geeks Everywhere…

This week has been a heartbreaking one for gamers and geekdom alike as two luminaries of this popular past time were taken from the world. First and most importantly is the sad  passing of web animator, screenwriter and voice actor Monty Oum on February 1st. I first discovered Monty’s superlative work on the video-game, mash up web series, Dead Fantasy. Monty took two beloved video-game series, one on one beat-em-up, Dead or Alive and turn based RPG, Final Fantasy and utilising close approximations of the in-game characters delivered a CG movie series of Battle-Royale type fights between the various characters of the respective universes.

Monty was employed by Rooster Teeth and was also known for his work on the popular Red vs Blue franchise of animated comedy episodes starring the opposing forces of red and blue Spartans from video game heavy hitter Halo. Monty fell into a coma in January and passed away on February the 1st, our thoughts go out to his family at this time.

 

And on a lesser note, but still a loss to gaming communities as a whole is the closing of the virtual doors of the greatest video-game news and reviews website ever … Joystiq, after close to ten years of impartial reporting on gaming and general geekery. Joystiq was a bastion of non-discriminatory and unbiased reporting and had been an everyday constant in my life since it’s inception all those years ago. Not only were the reviews fair and concise, but the staff as a whole had a grudging respect for it’s readership, something that cannot be said for a lot of the other larger video-game review sites.

But what really made Joystiq the place it was and why I returned on a daily basis, was it’s community, an intelligent, insightful and accepting group of like minded individuals who came together to discuss and share their love for a mutual hobby. In a world where most gaming communities could (and quite often are) home to bitter fan-boy rivalry, toxicity and racist and sexist individuals, Joystiq was at large free of such ‘trolls’, a place where most people got along and were respectful of differing opinions, as a member of this community for many years … I am really going to miss my day to day interactions on this site. So long Joystiq, best wishes for the future to all the staff therein.