VITAL STATISTICS Date of Birth August 20, 1989 RPGamer Hire Date November 25, 2007 RPGamer Position Currents Columnist Location Murfreesboro TN, USA Personal Homepage Um..its a secret? Hobbies 1) Gaming 2) Collecting Marvel comics 3) Watching Anime 4 Writing Favorite Movies/Anime 1) The Lord of the Rings 2) Fullmetal Alchemist 3) Ergo Proxy Favorite non-RPG's 1) The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 2) Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones 3) Shadow of the Colossus 4) The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess 5) Metroid Prime Favorite RPGs 1) Final Fantasy VII 2) Final Fantasy XII 3) Dragon Quest VIII 4) Xenosaga Episode I 5) Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn

me, complete with sleep deprivation

Greetings, all who take the time to read this. Go ahead, give yourself a cookie. I insist. And get me one too. My name is Oliver, and I am a student of MTSU down in Murfreesboro, TN. My major is journalism, and there's a very good reason for that: I'm hoping one day to write about video games and get paid for it. To be honest I would love to enter any field of journalism, but "game journalism" as I call it, would be like a match made in heaven for me.

    Now, as for my life as a gamer...well, the truth is that I've only been seriously gaming for about six years now. I didn't play any video games at all as a small child, and as a result I missed out on a lot of classics back in their heyday. This, of course, is my single greatest failure in life. But I blame my parents for it, so I don't feel any personal guilt. (What family back in the 90's didn't buy their son a SNES, or a PSX, or at least a Gameboy? I mean come on.) But that aside, in these last six years I've played enough games to make up for my late start. I have a Wii, an Xbox 360, a PS2, and a DS currently, and I plan to own a PSP and a PS3 within a year or so. I found out fairly quickly that RPG's were my true love, and they currently account for about ninety percent of the games I buy and play. Final Fantasy manages to top the list as would be expected, but I also really enjoy the Xenosaga series, Tales, Dragon Quest, and Fire Emblem, just to name a few. As far as non-RPG's go, The Legend of Zelda is probably my all-around favorite series ever. (If I was forced to choose between the two, Ocarina of Time would probably beat FFVII as my all-time favorite game.) I also enjoy the Metroid and Prince of Persia series.

    But what it boils down to is that I have this insatiable desire to play every good game on the face of the earth, RPG or otherwise. Unrealistic goal to say the least, but still a goal I strive for. There are so many games that I want to play, both new and old. And the list only gets bigger every day. (And I literally keep a list). Very rarely do I replay a game; I'd rather spend that time adding a new title to my list of defeated games. And that's another thing about me-I beat every game I buy, no matter what. Once I start a game, I do not stray until said game is completely and utterly beaten. I'm not a fan of backlogs, so I make it a point never to build one.

    However, I have a love for the industry in general that goes beyond just playing games. I'm the sort of person who might follow the stories for games like Halo 3 and Manhunt 2, even though I'd probably never buy either one of them. Staying on top of the latest happenings in the game industry has become a sort of addiction for me- I spend almost as much time on the web reading about games as I do playing them.

    And that about covers it I guess. If you want to get in touch with me, feel free to send me an E-mail, and you can find me on IRC under the name Metaridley.

   Last Updated: November 26, 2007