Hey there friend!
My name is Nina Hanson, and I’m one third of the team of people that make VideoGameTavern (VGT) a functioning website and, hopefully, one day, blossoming reviewing community.
VGT is our digital homebrew version of a game review hub. Myself and Jenny, who you can read more about below and I sometimes mention in our content, are avid video gamers and all round micro-obsessive fangirls of anything that tickles our fancy.
We live for the joy of exploring fictional worlds, primarily in games, but also in books, movies, tv shows, music, and everything in between.
If you’re interested in finding out more about who we are and how VGT came into existence, keep reading.
The VideoGameTavern team
As mentioned above, the VGT team is comprised of a three-person campaign. We all have our unique functions within the project, and we all try to fit in working on VGT while maintaining full time jobs and busy lives.
The truth is, we absolutely love having a little passion project we can turn to in our free time. So we hope VGT can become a cozy nook of its own for you.
Nina Hanson
That’s me - I’m the writer of our trio. If I haven’t written the page myself, then I’ve at least heavily edited it.
I was born and raised in Toronto, Canada but I’m currently a digital nomad travelling round the world and working on freelancing gigs as I go.
I was a latecomer to the world of videogaming, because I only really got into it once I met my best-friend Jenny. We would meet up at her house, boot up Kingdom Hearts I on her Playstation 2, and spend hours trying to collect and synthesize all the components to make the Ultima Weapon.
Those were the days.
Nina’s favorite cozy games:
- Gris
- Grimm’s Hollow
- Ori and the Will of the Wisps
- What Remains of Edith Finch
Jenny McDougal
Jenny is our designer, she’s all the brain power behind capturing the cozy aesthetic for our site. Aside from this, she designs all the covers and images we use on different pages.
She puts into the attention to detail, like how centered the little sparkly pixel is next to the logo. All the things I have absolutely no patience for, so gods love her for it.
Jenny hails from Toronto too, and she still lives there right now.
Jenny’s favorite cozy games:
- Gris
- A Raven Monologue
- Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
- Journey
Isaac Aziz
Isaac is the man behind the curtain in our team. He makes the nuts and bolts of VGT work and run the way we need them to just so that there’s a site for people to find.
Isaac is also a saint, because he constantly has to explain to myself and Jenny, in very dumbed down tech lingo, why it’s not possible to have a commenting section and login account functionality in the span of a week.
Isaac is also from Toronto, but he currently lives in Bath, in the United Kingdom.
Isaac’s favorite cozy games:
- Kinoko
- Cozy Grove
- Haunted Chocolatier
- Dordogne
The birth of VideoGameTavern
We kicked off working on VGT in the summer of 2023 after a lot of back and forthing.
To be honest, we just wanted to put our love of video games and cozy games in general out there for the world to see. And, maybe, hopefully, potentially, for someone who loves cozy games just as much to start a conversation with us.
Isaac told us it doesn’t take much to get a basic site up and running, Jen wanted to take a crack at designing cozy images, I just wanted to write about games.
Et voila`! VGT was born.
What VGT is all about
Celebrating cozy stories and games, and how much they give back to people who just want a safe space from the anxiety of the modern world.
Yes, we try to rate all our games according to the same scoring system and keep it fair. But, how objective can you really be when cozy games are all about how they make you feel on the inside?
So much so, that the definition of ‘cozy games’ itself is very hotly debated. Does the game need to look a certain way, sound a certain way, have no combat at all, nothing scary or spooky at all?
We don’t know about all that, but what we do know is that gamers seem to instinctively know when a game is ‘cozy’ or not. And that tells me, at least, that it’s more about how the game makes you feel!
Talk to us!
We’d love to hear from you.
Turning on comments and all that is a bit complicated for us right now because we’d need to moderate them, and we barely have time to maintain the site as is.
But, we do have a Contact Us page with a Google form if you wanted to strike up a convo.
Let us know what games you want us to review next.
VGT signing off!