Author: John Breeden II

John has spent his journalism career covering just about everything, from small-town meetings and crime scenes to Capitol Hill and the U.S. Congress. He got his start writing about games and technology with a computer column called On the Chip Side, which grew to more than 1 million in circulation and ran in newspapers across several states. Today, John is an award-winning journalist with more than 25 years of experience. His work has appeared in The Washington Post, Newsweek and many other publications, and he writes a regular technology and government column for Nextgov/FCW and hosts security and educational webinars for FedInsider. He is also the founder of the Tech Writers Bureau and the chief editor of GameIndustry.com. He still loves disappearing into games, whether that means crawling through Baldur’s Gate dungeons deep into the night or planning one more big offensive in the latest wargame.

A DLC With TLC

The Honest Hearts DLC for Fallout: New Vegas adds the beautiful and deadly Zion National Park into the mix, where you are just as likely to be mauled by bears as rolled by raiders. It’s a nice change of pace.

THQ Kills Red Faction series

Amid slumping sales, THQ had quietly killed the Red Faction series. Sales for Red Faction: Armageddon have been lackluster despite an unprecedented marketing campaign that included an original movie on the sci-fi channel, leading to a decline of THQ stock prices. THQ reported a net loss of $38.4 million, or 56 cents per share in […]

Teacher Sets DanceDanceRevolution World Record

Carrie Swidecki, a 35 year old public school teacher from Bakersfield, CA, got her exergaming groove on and broke the Guinness World Record for Longest Marathon on a Dance / Rhythm Game playing DanceDanceRevolution (SuperNova 2 arcade game) in Charleston, West Virginia yesterday at 12:30 a.m. EDT. Ms. Swidecki broke the previously held record of […]

An Independent RPG +1 vs. Boredom

Avadon: The Black Fortress is a hardcore, old school RPG created by an independent studio and sold directly from their Webpage for Mac, PC or iPad. And it happens to be darn good.

Cooperative Couch Mode Returns

Dungeon Siege III attacks the PC and, for the first time in the series, consoles. It brings amazing graphics, balanced gameplay, and a perfect implementation of on-the-couch cooperative play to awaiting fans.

A Sexy, Superb RPG Experience

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings perfects what the prequel already had in spades: a hardcore, adult-themed RPG with lots of fighting, lots of thinking, plenty of role-playing and a bevy of sexy babes.

Innovating The Old Hack And Slash

Hunted: The Demon’s Forge takes the normal hack and slash action RPG and adds a lot of great features like the first-ever level creation engine for the console. Yet it keeps that dungeon crawl flavor we love.

A Treasure Trove of Fun

Seeing four blockbuster movies recreated as legos for the Lego Pirates of the Caribbean title is a real treat. The fact that it’s also a great game with fun for all ages is like icing on the cake.

A Zentastic Experience

The UnderGarden lets you swim through an enchanted underwater world while you bathe in ripples of sound and colors. Oh yea, and solve puzzles along the way.

Not Quite Bringing It Home

For all the hype that surrounded this title, Homefront is remarkable only in the fact that it’s a completely average shooter, neither great nor terribly flawed. Overall, the game is fun but forgettable.