Welcome / About Me

Hello,

My name is Nick Michetti and I’m a freelance video game journalist, editorialist and blogger. I primarily write editorials about video game industry issues, but I’ve also written hands-on impressions / previews of video games, in addition to reviews. Most of what I’ve written has been for Kombo.com, a fairly well-known video game site, which I joined in late April 2006 as a PlayStation3 editorialist. Now, I’m openly accepting opportunities to write editorials and video game content for web sites and publications.

This site will primarily serve as my portfolio page — every piece of video game-related content I’ve ever written. If you like my work and would like to get in touch with me about writing video game editorials or other video game-related content for your site or publication, please contact me via e-mail at cervantes240@verizon.net

I hope you enjoy my writing.

–Nick

inFAMOUS: A Welcome Shock To Superhero Games

Author’s Note: This editorial was published June 17, 2009 and originally appeared on Bitmob.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

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I never had a problem with the concept of inFAMOUS as a game. Shooting lightning at enemies, climbing up walls “urban exploration” style, open-world gameplay — in terms of gameplay appeal, inFAMOUS was a winner. However, for a little while, I was kind of skeptical about inFAMOUS’ ability to deliver as a comic book superhero game. I never questioned the validity of the idea, but I remained a bit skeptical about exactly how faithful to comic book superhero concepts inFAMOUS would end up being. I love video games as a medium, but when it comes to superheroes, they’ve rarely ever captured the essence of licensed superheroes, let alone lend enough confidence that they’d deliver full-fledged original ones.

Imagine my surprise when I found myself nearly immediately sucked in by Sucker Punch’s electric adventure.

I haven’t read or collected comic books in nearly a decade — since I was twelve or thirteen years old. Yet, inFAMOUS pulled me into the game by opening an enormous gate right back to my childhood nostalgia and everything I ever loved about comic books. The reason why dawned on me within a few hours of gameplay: Sucker Punch gets it. Cole McGrath, his story, the gameplay, the setting — these certainly weren’t a bunch of video game developers stepping outside of their element. They understood how to make a superhero and exerted that understanding throughout inFAMOUS.

But what exactly does Sucker Punch get so right in terms of comic book style?

Feedback: Understanding The Wii Vitality Sensor

Author’s Note: This editorial was published June 5, 2009 and originally appeared on Bitmob.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

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At E3 2009, Nintendo President Satoru Iwata surprised everyone with a new peripheral for the Wii, known as the Wii Vitality Sensor. The Wii Vitality Sensor is supposed to detect how relaxed you are while playing games. The audience, mostly gaming journalists with core gamer audiences, were left scratching their heads at the revelation.

Truthfully, it’s very difficult to try to understand how the Wii Vitality Sensor has any application to the realm of videogames at all. However, the reality is that the Wii Vitality Sensor is most likely another important step in Nintendo’s Blue Ocean strategy: getting as many people to play and enjoy video games as possible.

Turning The Tables On The Alien Invasion

Author’s Note: This mini-editorial was published February 5, 2009 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

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Games like Resistance 2, Killzone 2 and Gears of War 2 have a lot of things in common. They all have great graphics. They all have great online multiplayer. They all have great presentation. They all take place in alternate timelines or the future. They all tell the story of man’s epic struggle against overwhelming alien invaders that will inevitably result in a major clash of good versus evil. But games like Killzone 2, Resistance 2 and Gears 2 have something else in common as well. It’s something held in common by many games with alien invasion storylines: they don’t ever let you play as the aliens!

How To Create The Ultimate LOST Video Game

Author’s Note: This mini-editorial was published January 26, 2009 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

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I’ve been a fan of Lost going on two seasons now (including this one), struggling to play catch-up while embracing its awesomeness as one of the best shows on television. I got into Lost sometime after the Writers’ Strike took all of my other favorite shows on television (Chuck and Terminator: TSCC, namely, which you should be watching because they’re great, too). I was immediately sucked into the world of the island, Flight 815, The Dharma Initiative, Desmond’s psychic powers and Sayid’s undisputed badass Bourne-style activities.

So, naturally, as a Lost fan and a gamer, when I found out about Lost: Via Domus, I was happy. Lost + video game = awesome, right? My friends — also Lost fans and gamers — who bought Lost: Via Domus before I got a chance to, though, weren’t so happy and their reactions convinced me not to buy it.

Just because the first attempt to turn Lost into a video game didn’t work out doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be future attempts to make one. We (as gamers) are always talking about how video games are so powerfully creative and their capabilities in terms of immersion, writing, direction and presentation — areas that Lost excels in as a television show. If the video game industry was able to put together a Lost video game that was as high a caliber as the show deserves, that would help add some credibility to our claims about the capabilities of video games as a medium.

But who could handle such an undertaking? There’s one developer I can think of right away capable of creating a great Lost video game: Quantic Dream, the developers of Indigo Prophecy and Heavy Rain.

Does Final Fantasy XIII Going Multiplatform Spell The End For PlayStation3?

Author’s Note: This editorial was published August 5, 2008 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

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The PlayStation3 has had a pretty rough-and-tumble time in the market. It went from having the best exclusives out there, such as BioShock and Grand Theft Auto IV, to losing nearly all of them to Microsoft in either exclusive or multiplatform fashion. PlayStation fans held on to two near-absolute truths: Metal Gear Solid 4 and Final Fantasy XIII. These have been the cruxes of the pro-PS3 argument for years now, ever since we knew that both games existed. However, only one of those cruxes has held (that crux being MGS4), with Final Fantasy XIII having gone multiplatform in an E3 shocker that won’t soon be forgotten. There have been a multitude of claims about the PS3’s future issued in light of this major event, with the most popular being: “There is no longer a reason to buy a PS3.”

Review: Metal Gear Online (PS3)

Author’s Note: This review was published June 23, 2008 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

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Kombo’s Review Policy:
Our reviews are written for you. Our goal is to write honest, to-the-point reviews that don’t waste your time. This is why we’ve split our reviews into four sections: What the Game’s About, What’s Hot, What’s Not and Final Word, so that you can easily find the information you want from our reviews. 

What the Game’s About
Metal Gear Online is an online third-person shooter that supports up to sixteen players. It is based around the stealth action principles of the Metal Gear franchise and is powered by the Metal Gear Solid 4 engine. Bundled with MGS4 is a Metal Gear Online “Starter Pack,” an offering of MGO’s basic foundation, which will be expanded upon by future downloadable content and updates. 

What’s Hot
Metal Gear Online, as mentioned above, is a third-person online shooter built with the principles of Metal Gear. What does that mean? It means that MGO is not a “frag anything and everything” shooter. It’s slower paced with a fewer players and a focus on on-a-dime kills, which emphasizes strategy over fragfests. Think of Doom and Quake as lightning-paced games of frag checkers — if that’s the case, then MGO is a fine-tuned game of war chess. Just like chess, MGO can be a game of positioning, strategy and knowing when to strike. You’ll need to know the best places to hide in and attack from in order to do your very best. There’s a maximum of sixteen players on any given map, who are all setting up their own attack strategies. A great part of the fight is knowing the strengths of each map — i.e. the close-quarters situation in Blood Bath or medium-range warfare in Groznyj Grad — and using them to your advantage. There are only a few maps (the maps from the beta and a few new ones), but each one is well designed and offers maximum opportunity for everyone to have viable strategies.

Review: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns Of The Patriots (PS3)

Author’s Note: This review was published June 16, 2008 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

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Kombo’s Review Policy:

Our reviews are written for you. Our goal is to write honest, to-the-point reviews that don’t waste your time. This is why we’ve split our reviews into four sections: What the Game’s About, What’s Hot, What’s Not and Final Word, so that you can easily find the information you want from our reviews.

What the Game’s About

Metal Gear Solid 4 is the story of Solid Snake’s final mission and allegedly is the final installment of the Metal Gear Solid series, concluding every aspect of the franchise’s enormous plot introduced over the course of Metal Gear’s twenty-year history. In Snake’s final mission, he has been assigned one goal: kill Liquid Ocelot before he can unleash his private military insurrection.

What’s Hot

First of all, it nearly goes without saying that Metal Gear Solid 4 is possibly the best-presented game of all time. From graphics to art direction to cutscene direction to sound direction to gameplay, it’s clear from the beginning that Hideo Kojima had a vision of the epic story that he wanted to tell and it’s fully realized. Everything works in conjunction and weaves perfectly with the other parts — nothing feels out of place or unwarranted. This is one complete, unified game — a unified vision of Metal Gear Solid’s final installment and it just makes MGS4 a better game as a whole for it.

Heavy Metal #7

Author’s Note: This feature was published May 27, 2008 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

Welcome to Heavy Metal, a weekly series on Kombo.com dedicated to trying to unravel unanswered questions and theories related to the Metal Gear Solid series. Every week leading up to the release of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, a question or theory will be analyzed or presented as extensively as possible.

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It is important to note three things:

1.) This is all speculation, created using information presented in the Metal Gear Solid games and any MGS4 trailers or information released to the gaming public.

2.) This is as much for fun as it is thought provoking, so please do not take it too seriously.

3.) This feature will contain spoilers about existing games in the MGS series without warning or precaution. If there are MGS games that you haven’t beaten, it’s a good idea to stay away.

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Questions: Is Solid Snake the real deal or are we looking at Raiden syndrome all over again? Is the man we believe to be Solid Snake actually Big Boss? Will Snake be old and face certain death or will he find a way out?

Heavy Metal #6

Author’s Note: This feature was published May 18, 2008 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

Welcome to Heavy Metal, a weekly series on Kombo.com dedicated to trying to unravel unanswered questions and theories related to the Metal Gear Solid series. Every week leading up to the release of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, a question or theory will be analyzed or presented as extensively as possible.

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It is important to note three things:

1.) This is all speculation, created using information presented in the Metal Gear Solid games and any MGS4 trailers or information released to the gaming public.

2.) This is as much for fun as it is thought provoking, so please do not take it too seriously.

3.) This feature will contain spoilers about existing games in the MGS series without warning or precaution. If there are MGS games that you haven’t beaten, it’s a good idea to stay away.

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Question: Is Otacon a mole for The Patriots?

Preview: Metal Gear Online Beta Impressions (PS3)

Author’s Note: This preview was published April 28, 2008 and originally appeared on Kombo.com. Clicking on this link will take you to its original location.

Hideo Kojima seems to have an obsession with pleasing gamers. First, he announces that MGS4 has an online component. Then, he announces it’s a separate online action game, Metal Gear Online, which will be bundled for free with MGS4. Finally, to top it all off, Kojima Productions & Konami announce that those who pre-ordered MGS4 before a certain time would gain access to a private beta of MGO. Well, after what seems like eons of eternal wait, the beta has finally arrived. How is it? What is it like? 

In a word, awesome.