Jason Karney

History

Member for

6 years 38 weeks

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Critic

Brief Bio

Jason's heritage in gaming started at a young age with toys like Simon Says, Mindbreaker, and the venerable TI Speak-n-Spell. Eventually, playing Defender on the TI-994A computer in 16 colors with the add-on speech synthesizer cemented "gaming" in Jason's mind.

In the late 1980s, Jason was exposed to the NES and the Japan-originated classics of Super Mario Bros., Castlevania, The Legend of Zelda and many other titles. Shigeru Miyamoto was not yet a legendary game designer, but Jason still remembers an interview with the budding star in Nintendo Power. This was Jason's first glimpse of the game industry, and the fact that making games was a process that involved actual people.

The TRS-80 computer led to tinkering with programming, which culminated with Jason studying Computer Science at The University of Akron. Tabletop, pencil-and-paper games Dungeons & Dragons and Shadowrun and PC games like Doom were popular past-times for Jason and his roommates in their dorm.

After college, Jason took a hiatus from gaming while working at the now-defunct NetGenics Inc., a biotech startup which occupied a great deal of his time and energy. Later he rediscovered his passion with titles like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and Final Fantasy VII on the PlayStation, and Jet Grind Radio and Space Channel 5 on the Dreamcast.

Jason stumbled upon GameCritics.com in its nascent form, and joined what he felt was an intelligent community of articulate gamers. Progressing from playing and talking about games to evangelizing and critiquing them through reviews seemed natural to Jason as he joined the staff of GameCritics.com. He finds time to play and review games while working as a software configuration manager in the financial industry.

Ten All-Time Favorites Games

Streets of Rage II, Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy VIII, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow, Sly Cooper (series), Bangai-O (Dreamcast), Jet Grind Radio, Rogue Galaxy, Xenosaga III

Five Current Favorites Games

Persona 3, Rock Band, Cooking Mama, Folklore, Tales of the Abyss

Favorite Types of Games

RPG, shmups (not good at 'em but like 'em), music, story-driven