I have to admit I was pretty excited when I saw Halo 3 on the cover of Time magazine. Of course after reading the article, I’m damn near livid. It’s rare that we see games covered in a fair (or even remotely balanced) way. Well the trend continues.

We’ll start with the simple stuff. The stuff that points to the laziness of the reporter in doing even a minor amount of research. Take the following pictures that talk about Halo merchandising. The picture of the Scarab is not a “sculpture” as the caption states, but a Heroclix game piece used in the table-top game. The “Halo 3 branded console” is also completely wrong, and looks nothing like the picture included.
halo3-time.jpg

Lev Grossman does his best to devalue and marginalize video games and, by extension, video game players. I’m not entirely sure what the point of the article is, but with comments like games working their way out the ghetto to one day play with the popular kids, one must assume that Grossman simply and completely disregards video games as anything other than a mere distraction to the serious work he must think he engages in (just so you know that link there points to his story about the godlessness of Harry Potter).

Click the link for mind-numbing quotes.

Here’s the choice cuts from the full length article (emphases are mine).

“There is an invisible subculture in America. Those who belong to it love it with a lonely, alienated, unironic passion. Those who don’t belong to it walk right by, uncaring, just as people walk right by that unmarked building in downtown Kirkland [Bungie's offices]“.

“It’s doubtful that many people reading this could say exactly, or even approximately, what the Halo games are about.”

“The Bungies bring a grinding, jeweler’s meticulousness to what most people consider an unhealthy amusement for children.”

“This devotion is fueled by a belief, not shared by the world at large, that video games are an art form with genuine emotional meaning and that Halo 3 will be the premier example of that art.”

“There’s an opportunity beyond video games, too, for Halo to break out of the ghetto and become a mainstream, mass-market, multimedia entertainment property.”

“Not that the Bungies care. They don’t need to legitimize Halo by associating it with other, more respectable media. They sell enough units and make enough money. They’re happy in their invisible geek ghetto. But that’s the logic of the marketplace: it can’t leave subcultures alone; it has to turn them into cultures. It may be time for the Master Chief to come in from the cold and join the party, with the popular kids.”

His assertion that most readers of Time couldn’t possibly describe what the Halo games are about is the most laughable. Though Time magazine’s circulation numbers have dropped from 4 million down to 3.4 million in the past year, those numbers are still EASILY dwarfed by Halo 2’s sales numbers alone, so far moving 8 million copies. So maybe Grossman shouldn’t assume that no one who reads Time magazine plays Halo.

Of course they’ll have one less Halo playing reader, since I’ll be canceling my subscription to Time magazine today. I think I’ll be taking my money to Newsweek, who staffs one of the most respected game journalists in the field, N’gai Croal.