15 Blogs to Follow if You’re a Gamer – Blancer.com Tutorials and projects

Just like ?animated movies, video games in the past few years have transformed from something that kids like to a passionate pastime of people of all age groups. Doctors suggest taking up video games to blow off steam and even the military uses gaming to train recruits.

Started as a gadget that was attached to TV, video games are now available on all major platforms, both static and mobile. The graphics, release cycle and the number of titles are exponentially on the rise. Read on after the break to find the best online destinations to know about the hot happenings of the video games industry.

Kotaku

From the famous blogging network Gawker Media comes Kotaku. Written in typical Gawker style, Kotaku covers everything—gaming news, reviews, previews and tips—with some spice. The Press Play feature (it’s actually a tag) lets you watch the press play your favorite video games and talk to your favorite developers, publishers and gaming creative types. Despite having a great layout and content, the auto playing trailers with audio turned on is downright annoying.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes, lots of them
Genre: All.

N4G

N4G

N4G is a social game news site that is part of the NewsBoiler network. N4G uses its passionate community and an unique news ranking algorithm, to ensure quality content. News, previews, reviews etc. are tucked away in dedicated sections for each major gaming platform. Plenty of cheat codes are available to one up your opponent as well. N4G takes its community seriously and in addition to participating in discussions, users can contribute stories as well. There is also a leaderboard with the list of users from the community with top scores.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes, lots of them
Genre: All.

Game Life

GameLife

Game Life blog is part of the always awesome Wired network. Just like each and everyone of the Wired blogs, GameLife also features in depth articles with high quality content. Extensive interviews with game developers and comprehensive reviews with high resolution screenshots are highlights of this blog.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes, lots of high quality ones.
Genre: All.

IGN

IGN

IGN could probably be the well known gaming blog in the Internet Universe. From gaming to comics and movies IGN is basically an ideal hangout and one stop shop for everything of interest to gaming & entertainment junkies. Their game ranking system is something that can be trusted before making a purchase. What makes the experience at IGN uncomfortable is the in your face ads. Immediately after entering the website we land on a full page ad and as soon as we skip it, we land on one more hovering on top of the content.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes, lots of them
Genre: All.

Gamasutra

Unlike conventional gaming blogs that delve into game news and reviews, Gamasutra focuses on the behind the scenes aspects of the gaming industry. As their blog title claims, Gamasutra covers the art and business of making games. Gaming is a multi million dollar industry and a great domain to start a career. Check out their expert blogs to gain insights into game design and development. They also have a job board for those looking for work in the video game industry and a list of contractors available for developing games. Surveys, reports and statistics regarding the gaming industry is available for sale at their online store.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: A few.
Genre: All.

FPS Videogamer

FPS Videogamer blog is dedicated only to First Person Shooting games. Popular games like Halo, Call of Duty, Medal of Honor etc. are FPS games and the blog covers those among other similar titles. The blog is quite young and has been around for just six months but has content posted at regular intervals. They have exclusive blogs for Modern Warfare 2 and Call of Duty: Black Ops in their network as well.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: A few.
Genre: First Person Shooter

The Escapist

The Escapist aims to capture and celebrate the contemporary video gaming lifestyle and the diverse global video game culture by way of in-depth features, articles and columns authored by leading video game authorities, as well as cutting-edge video shorts, engaging forums and robust social media elements that incorporate the video gaming experience. The famous video game review series, Zero Punctuation is produced by the blog. They also hold the credit for introducing the first-of-its-kind Internet Film Festival for Gamers and the March Mayhem game developer competition.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes, lots of high quality ones.
Genre: All.

Wonderland

Wonderland was started as a blog that covered social software and slowly it got turned into an out & out gaming blog carrying game reviews, news, previews and the like.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes, lots of them.
Genre: All.

Joystiq

Joystiq is part of the Aol blog network (formerly Weblogs Inc.) and has a pretty cool design. From PC to mobile, the blog covers everything about games available on major platforms. Content is categorized neatly and presented with as much excitement, enthusiasm, insight and fun. There is an exclusive section for screenshots from games to gawk at.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes, lots of high quality ones.
Genre: All.

Firing Squad

Firing Squad calls itself the home of the hardcore gamer and focuses a lot on the gaming hardware. There is as much content on the fastest hardware, graphic cards, mouse/keyboard input, mouse sampling, video framerates, stereo sound with headphones as there is for games. A poor site layout and design makes sifting through so much content a very cumbersome process.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes.
Genre: All.

Pure Nintendo

The name says it all. Pure Nintendo is a source for all video game news that is purely-Nintendo. The blog strives to provide the Nintendo community with the most up-to-date news about the Nintendo DS, Nintendo Wii, and all other Nintendo-related news. A clean design and frequent posting schedule are the highlights of Pure Nintendo.

Gaming Platforms: All
Videos & Trailers: Yes.
Genre: All

Giant Bomb

When Giant Bomb claims to be the world’s largest editable video game database, they aren’t lying. With Wiki like actions, users can actually edit the content of a large portion of the content posted in the site. If you are a fan of Anime or comics, do check out their sister blogs in the network.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes.
Genre: All.

Destructoid

Destructoid is a real gaming community – both on and offline. They have a very hectic publishing schedule – on a typical day they publish anywhere between 40-60 pieces of industry news and commentary, alongside an additional deluge of stories submitted by their community. Some of the user submitted content is also promoted on the home page. Destructoid conducts events in select cities for the community to interact and mingle.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes.
Genre: All.

Shacknews

Shacknews is part of Gamefly media which runs some pretty popular websites including the online video game rental store Gamefly. Shacknews covers games across every major platform with news and in-depth previews and interviews, and is home to a large community of dedicated gamers.

Gaming Platforms: All.
Videos & Trailers: Yes.
Genre: All.

WoWGrrl’s World

WoWGrrl's World

I know a lot of people who say any list on video games is incomplete with an entry on World of Warcraft. WoWGrrl’s World has been covering the uber famous online MMORPG game from circa 2005. The blog offers advice on gameplay , WoW news and play guides. The founder of the blog is available for paid consulting to improve your WoW skills!