So if you here now you must have clicked the link and therefore are in one of three groups of people:
1. You are an adoring fan wanting to worship the ground beneath my feet, and to that I say: “Thank you but seriously, if one of your ‘heroes’ is a guy that does reviews on the internet either you yourself should have a reassessment of what you consider a hero to be or the world has gone to the crapper faster than I do after bad takeout.”
2. You are an angry person wishing to accumulate a substantial amount of dirt on me so that he can flame me wherever I go and badmouth me to all across the net and to that I say: “Seriously, I am sure you angry can be put to a much more productive use on the internet. However, if you feel that I am so wrong in my posts that I should be textually/verbally abused, well worded comment, text or video blog will show me that, your opinion should matter to me as you actually generate a formidable response.”
3. You are an average person who has come across my stuff on the net and wished to learn a little bit about the guy behind it, and to that I say: “Sorry for a long winded intro and now I can officially begin.”
Well…how do I start? I guess I got a head of myself here but I think I can manage.
I guess my drive to begin writing reviews began about three years ago when I began finding some really good video reviews, both positive and negative, on Youtube. At the time they were mostly videogame reviews but as time went on, my palate expanded to other sites and written reviews about anything. It was then I began to think, like many others probably did: “Hey, I can do this too.” Really, that’s all the thought process that went into my reviews.
You might have noticed that I have, well for lack of better phrasing, a unique writing style. This is because what you are reading is a near perfect transcription of how I actually speak. Some of you may be put off by this, but since I do not have the equipment I need to make (what I believe to be) adequate video reviews, I am stuck talking to myself as I type these words. Sure this freaks out those around me to no end, but hey it is how I work. Although in the future, I may begin to make video reviews, but at the moment that idea is not so important. However, there are some slightly important things I would like to impart to you about my reviewing style.
1. I like to include personal experiences. We have all read or watched straightforward reviews, I mean there are people who do that for a living. Still, if I wanted to read or watch those sorts of reviews, I would and the same goes for writing; however, I don’t. I mean reviews no longer solely exist to give opinions on the newest things. With the advent of cheap recording equipment and easy distribution platforms on the net, any one can review anything. While some people still like to review what is in the now there is a huge amount people out there reviewing older things that not only do they find interesting but so do their readers/viewers, despite the fact that most people will not go out and buy said product that is reviewed. In fact, most comments you hear regarding these type of reviews are more nostalgic or critiquing the reviewer. Reviewing products has now become another art form on the net in a way: It allows people to express their opinions and get responses from others. Now what does that have to do with me? Well a lot of my reviews do contain little tidbits of information about my life. Now nothing extremely personal is ever revealed, but I feel more of a connection to the piece if I add a paragraph explaining how I came across the item or some memory I have about it or something related to it. It’s just something I like to do, and there is nothing wrong with that (or is there? Please tell me if there is).
2. I will not review bad items for the sake of doing so: Now let me clarify, I love and respect people who review bad products. If they are reviewing something new, they are doing a service to the public by routing out speculation and giving truth (okay, I may be too optimistic about this but hey that is just me), and if they are reviewing something old, they also help by either defogging our minds of our nostalgia or to be honest, give us some of the best entertainment the net has to offer. Still, I prefer to review stuff I enjoy. Now of course what I enjoy or my thoughts on something are of course going to differ from everyone else’s and therefore should controversy come up, as it sometimes does with these things, I will not charge head on like a raging fanboy and verbally abuse my oppose. Instead I want to make another thing about me clear by saying, “You are initialed to your opinions, and while I may not agree with you, I still accept them as valid points. I mean they are just opinions, not definite answers so why should I criticize?” I also think huge flame wars are kind of immature, and there are better ways of spending your time and energy. That being said I love criticism (I mean that’s why I love reviewing in the first place) and will gladly accept any thoughts you have on my work. Coincidently this leads me to my next point.
3. I enjoy tangents: If that last paragraph was any indication, I enjoy tangents and sometimes I ramble a lot even when I am writing. Again this leads me to my next point.
4. My reviews are long: Yes, it is true. It may be because I sometimes have so little visual aids/user submitted video help flesh out certain aspects, that I add back story of not only the given item but personal paragraphs that I feel accent the reviewed item, or it could be that I have a lot to say (I prefer this last one, but you can come up with your own reasoning). I will try to shorten them as much as possible but sometimes I just can’t and that could be the result of sloppy editing. In the end if you think my reviews are too long, don’t read them, or skip to the parts you think are interesting (I will label sections if need be).
5. I do accept requests: I will soon post a list of the items I own to review so that if you are so inclined, my offer a suggestion of what to review next. Now it might not be immediate, but I will try to get to every request, and if you feel the request isn’t accepted soon enough, I will try to give a sufficient reason why.
Before I finish (and this is the last thing I will say I swear), I just want to clarify my user name with this simple formula:
Ace: Basic name prefix like “Fire”, “Cool”, or “Sephiroth”
Of: A preposition meaning “Relating to”
Opus: A composition, generally associated with music.
There is a story that relates to this, but I have rambled far too much on my introduction. Hopefully you enjoy my work as much as I enjoy writing it.
-AceofOpus
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