2012 A Year In Review 2012: Letter From The Founder-In-Geek

2012 is just about a wrap and soon most of us here at GND will be posting up our GOTY picks for 2012, but I wanted to take a minute to talk about the state of the site and what you guys can expect come 2013. 

This year has been an interesting one for us. We’ve grown bigger than I ever could have imagined when I started this site 2 years ago — Yes, it’s been that long now. 

Galaxy Next Door was birthed from the idea of a place where it wasn’t the usual PR speak with ‘Negative Nancy’ cynicism but a celebration of gaming culture and games as a whole. A place where games writers of different social environments and points of view could share their voice about gaming, art, music and the impact that gaming has had on their lives. Its been a crazy journey but one I think we’ve achieved, a least a little bit. And it seems some places have taken notice. This year we were highlighted by Mashable as one of the ‘Top 12 Tumblrs for Gamers’ and have amassed over 80,000 followers. To say, “WOW” doesn’t even begin to express my thanks and astonishment at all it. I can only say thank you, from the bottom of my dorky heart and all of the amazing contributors here at GND.

With that said, 2013 promises to be a huge year for gaming. The arrival of new consoles brings with it the excitement of new franchises to like, loath and fangirl or fanboy over. We aim to cover all of it. From the newest PlayStation, the Xbox whatever Microsoft decides to call it to Nintendo’s ‘new gen’ console the Wii U. Expect more reviews, contests (which we LOVE to do) hands-on impressions and industry interviews with the artists, musicians and producers that bring to life the hobby that we’re so passionate about. We even plan to bring some dorkiness to YouTube with more ‘First Taste’ videos of some of the biggest and not so biggest games in 2013. My promise to you is that GND will always strive to bring you passionate and fun gaming entertainment in 2013 that celebrates the reason why any of us plays games to begin with — for the fun. 

Thanks, 

-Mike ‘Elginer’

Founder-In-Geek

Halo Friday

Happy Friday all. Can you believe we’re already in November?! It’s kind of crazy that next week is the launch of Halo 4, a game that it seems many Halo fans have been waiting forever for. The following week we’ll all be digging into Black Ops II and probably bitching about hacks. Hopefully, that won’t be the case but… well history has proven that it’s a strong probability. Here’s hoping that Treyarch is gonna work hard on that not happening.

A big thank you to all who gave us feedback on what sort of video content you’d like to see. Expect to see some of that showing up next week. Also congratulations to up-u-lar.tumblr.com who won the Halo 4 Mega Bloks set. Check your inbox for details. So what big games still left for this year are you looking forward to?

GND Minute - 10/25/12

Just a heads up on some stuff going on at the site this weekend and also next week. 

• Interview with Silent Hill Revelation 3D Director Michael J. Bassett 
• Roxio Game Capture HD Pro review
• New Unpopular Opinion and One-Sided Interaction
• Assassin’s Creed III Let’s Play over on our YouTube Channel (Oh boy)
• Twitch stream of some classic and not so classic Horror/Halloween games — Jericho, Costume Quest, Super Castlevania, Resident Evil 6

-M

Happy Friday, Halloween is almost here

Thank god it’s Friday. It has been one crazy long week and the weekend is looking pretty busy as well. That’s nothing compared to what we have in store for you next week. Monday ends our Elgato Game Capture HD giveaway (there’s still time to enter *US only) and we have a few surprises to announce next week for you guys. One upcoming contest we have coming is sure to please Halo fans, and just in time for Halo 4’s launch too. ;)

We’re also celebrating next week our milestone of hitting 55,000 followers with yet another awesome giveaway. More details on that Monday as well! Expect a few new editorials on some awesome suggestions for gamers looking for some creepy Halloween time gaming and a review on Roxio’s new Game Capture HD Pro (man, that is one long name for a product!). Thanks for sticking around and supporting us. We wouldn’t have made it this far without you and we aim to give back to you awesome guys and gals as much kick ass goodies as we can!

See you guys Monday.

Oh, and Happy October 19th! ;)

-Mike

It’s Shocktober

Hello guys and gals, it’s officially October. Oh, how the year has just kind of flown by.  We have some pretty big giveaways and features planned this month. If you’re a fan of horror gaming or just weird crap stay tuned to the site. Another small announcement I want to make is we are now over 46,000 followers. Holy crap! A big thanks and much love to all of you for your support and continued reblogs and comments on this humble blog of gaming geekery. 

Happy Friday, tomorrow is the first day of Fall

It’s been a crazy week and we’re currently working on some contests for you guys that should present themselves in the next month or so. As you know, this week has been all about TGS. Sony showed off their new PS3, which is slimmer and slightly uglier. The Vita is still in need of some heavy duty software announcements and Nintendo is showing the world that is has Japan on lockdown tighter than Van Damme has a patent on those sweet split moves. 

We’re just a few shorts weeks away from the launch of Resident Evil 6, Dishonored,  Assassin’s Creed III, Black Ops II and it goes on and on. Hope your wallet is ready! 

PS: As I mentioned about a week ago, we’re still looking for game reviewers and bloggers interested in spitting out a weekly column here. Hit us up if you’re interested and we’ll lay out more details. Previous writing experience a plus.

The Weekend is finally here! We’re also looking for bloggers!

Thank Odin it’s Friday! We have some pretty interesting stuff for you next week. Hopefully the announcement of a new feature here at GND, which we hope you’ll really dig. Can you believe it’s already September? Gesh, this year is going by in a blur. This month sees the release of Borderlands 2, which is sure to take up a lot of many of you guys time and then begins the tsunami of titles like Resident Evil 6, Assassin’s Creed III, and Halo 4 ect. 

It’s an exciting time to love video games.

In other news, we’re currently looking for bloggers. We’re expanding our weekly/bi-weekly columns and looking for more bloggers with a unique voice. If you’re interested, hit up our inbox or email us at [mike@galaxynextdoor.com]. Please submit some writing samples along with your email. What we’re looking for are personal weekly or bi-weekly blogs. [Example] Send along an idea on what you want your column to focus on. Random gaming, art, music, offbeat gaming rants, social stuff — let me know!

New guidelines for Gametag Lounge

We love getting all your submissions and are constantly trying to post them as quickly as we can. But we have one new guideline that will be helpful for anyone looking to check out your blog and maybe be a new friend. If your blog has some NSFW material, please be so kind as to LET US KNOW in your submission. Hey, we love creative freedom of expression with the human body as much as anyone; we’ll call it art for lack of a better term.

Some people want to define that as Bukkake.

If that’s you, let the general public know. We don’t someone surfing the site being at work and casually clicking a link which could lead to them getting sh*tcanned. Thanks!

Say hello to our new Community Relations manager

Say hello to our new Community Relations manager Alex AKA AlySedai. Aly is a spitfire and will be managing our social media connections — Facebook, Twitter etc. and also be working on getting more awesome giveaways for you guys!

Along with being an all around awesome human being with lots of snark, Alex is also a huge MMO gamer and will be one of the contributing video directors producing playthroughs, tactics and impressions on our new YouTube channel. 

GND is diving headfirst into the land of YouTube (Would you kindly subscribe)

Attention awesome people: We’re not just sticking our toe into the world of video content, we’re jumping in drunken and full of nachos.

We wanted to make a big deal about it all but we’re going with a more subtle approach; or at least as subtle as we can be. GND is investing heavily into our YouTube channel. So what can you possible expect to see there? Well, we’re going to be producing a good deal of HD game content like ‘Let’s Play’ videos of classic games and some of the biggest games coming this Fall like Guild Wars 2, Halo 4, Assassin’s Creed III and Resident Evil 6; Hell,  even some video Previews and Vlogs somewhere in there… maybe. It’s a learning process so give me (Mike) a break as myself and some of the other staff here slowly learn our way around making quality video content. And yes, that includes us totally sucking ass at a game for your amusement on purpose. Yeah… *shifty eyes* on purpose. 

What’s coming up this week on GND?

Happy Sunday! To all of our new followers, welcome! We really hope you enjoy your time visiting GND. It’s our goal to provide a chilled and fun atmosphere where video games and the awesome culture it has spawned is served up daily along with a melting pot of editorials, reviews, blogs and more. Here’s what you guys can expect this week slated for posting. 

- Elgato Game Capture HD Review - If you’re a gamer looking for a new way to capture your Call of Duty nights, you’re going to want to check out our review.

- A brand new One-Sided Interaction from Blaine - Here’s hoping he’s actually positive this week. He’s been a bit of a grump the past few weeks. 

- A plethora of gaming news, art, music and our usual silliness -  We wouldn’t have it any other way. 

We also have some BIG news to share with you guys soon-ish. We hope you dig it!