In a stunning shock of shockingly stunning proportions, a mainstream English broadsheet newspaper has published a sensible comment regarding, well, comments in the mainstream media about video games.

Having already published its Top 50 currently available games ^*, The Independent has now given columnist Thomas Sutcliffe the space to write in a considered manner on the subject of gaming. Answering his own question as to why the mainstream doesn't take video games seriously, Sutcliffe opines, "There are two reasons why this should be so. The first would be that video gamers get this stuff elsewhere – from magazines such as Edge or Wired, and from online gaming sites, where no one needs to explain what "respawning" or "first person shooter" actually means. And, since they get it there, they aren't that fussed that it doesn't exist elsewhere.

"Unlike jazz enthusiasts – persistently besieging Radio 3 for a better deal for their favoured art form – gamers don't need to nag. The other explanation would be that the traditional media still doesn't get it. That, despite all the articles about the scale of the industry and its threat to older forms of diversion (and older forms of fiction) it isn't something that needs taking seriously. Or, possibly, that it isn't something that can be taken seriously, in the sense that a film or a pop record can."

Many gamers will heave sighs of relief not only that we have an ally in what was Fleet Street... but also that we are not comparable to jazz enthusiasts.

The full interview is available here.

<sup>* The Top 10 is...

Wii Sports
Braid
Halo 3
Fallout 3
Rock Band
Burnout Paradise
Dr Kawashima’s Brain Training / Sight Training
Gears of War
Guild Wars
Rez HD

The full list is available here.</sup>