I'm always torn, on my first post at a site like this (I've had a few blogs in my life, all of which were equally pointless and, eventually, time consuming).  I don't know if I should introduce myself, or jump right into content.  I'll settle for both...

My name's Garret, I'm from Madison, WI, and have been playing videogames for the last 15 years of my 21 year-old existence.   My interest in them has come and gone, but like a lost dog it always comes back.  For the first two years of college, I scarcely touched videogames outside of a seriously unhealthy addiction to Guitar Hero, but now I've landed a fairly lucrative college job and can afford a 360 and other goodies.  This summer I'm working my way to become more of a true nerd than I ever anticapted by building a PC suitable for gaming.  Despite all of this, I'm still a pretty busy guy with school, work, a girlfriend, and other friends, so I don't get to play more than 10 or so hours in a week usually.  

In a sentence, I'm what you might call a casually hardcore gamer.  I love Blizzard and Valve, I know who Cliffy B is, and I've played my fair share of JRPG's.  I visit a smattering of videogame websites and forums, I talk with my friends often about videogames, and I used to read EGM religiously.   But I don't waste (I use that term loosely) entire days playing videogames anymore, and I rarely play them as a social outlet.  It's something I try to squeeze into my free time now, not something I try and make free time around.  I think as my generation of gamers is entering and graduating college, this kind of behavior is becoming common.  We are the audience who sees the appeal of casual games, but still play the proverbial "hardcore" games because they best reflect the kind of games we grew up on.

So that's where I'm at.  A casually hardcore gamer, for better or worse.  I've decided to start a blog because in the past I've enjoyed publishing game reviews and other things.  I had a fairly large blog over at 1up that I put more time into than I'd like to know.  I'm back, because I want to get back into formally reviewing games and sounding off on current video game news.  Not sure how often I'll roll content out, but hopefully I can get something up every day or so.  I hope at least a few people find it as entertaining a read as I do a write.  

- Garret