Tag Archives: Ricardo Torres

Long-time staffer Ryan Davis is to leave Gamespot, says this, the reason apparently being the November departure of Jeff Gerstmann following a 6/10 review for Kane & Lynch. The news brings the tally of lost staff due to the incident to four, if Gerstmann himself is included.

New editor-in-chief Ricardo Torres confirmed the decision.

Davis wrote in a blog post last December, “It’s been almost 8 years since I started working at GameSpot, and Jeff was there for nearly all of my fondest and most memorable experiences on the job. Simply put, I would not be in the video game business at all were it not for Jeff Gerstmann, and I am loathe to imagine what I might be doing with my life right now without the focus I’ve earned from having this ridiculous job. But now, Jeff’s gone, and I’m not afraid to say that it absolutely breaks my heart. I felt the departure of Rich Gallup from the site earlier this year in my bones, but this goes deeper. Jeff was a rare constant, and this marks the end of an era for both GameSpot and myself, a fact that doesn’t seem to be getting any less upsetting for me.”

Hardcore. Good luck to you, Ryan.

In his first interview since being promoted to editor-in-chief of US site Gamespot, Ricardo Torres has admitted that the high profile departure of long-time editorial boss Jeff Gerstmann could have been handled “differently”.

“We were all pretty taken aback and surprised by how it all went down,” he said, speaking in this interview. “Hindsight’s always 20/20, and I think we’ve made it clear that we would have loved to have done things differently, but dwelling on it isn’t going to help things… Our goal really is to just acknowledge what happened, that we’re bummed about it, but we do still need to take GameSpot forward.”

Gerstmann, as you know unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past couple of months, left Gamespot last November after internal friction over a 6/10 score for Kane & Lynch. Torres admits the entire farce was a shock to the site – one of the “big two” in the US alongside IGN – but things are moving forward.

“From the outside, because we were quiet and because of how things got painted, the assumption is everyone’s really anal right now and very down,” he added. “But people are coming to work, we’re putting out content, people are getting back into the swing of things. Everybody’s human and this was a shock to the system. Everybody’s working through it. Everybody’s moving forward in their way. People are going to get back up to full speed in their time. I’m kind of the caretaker; I’m here to help people any way I can.”

Take a look at the full thing.

Ricardo Torres is to be Gamespot’s new editor-in-chief, the US site has announced, replacing Jeff Gerstmann after a torrid departure last November. Torres was previously editorial director for the site (isn’t that a step backwards?) and has done loads of awesome stuff, like being “instrumental in bringing the GameSpot audience groundbreaking live coverage of the PlayStation 3 and Wii launches on the East and West Coasts”. Seriously, he’s well experienced. Good luck to you, Ricardo.

“I’m excited to have the opportunity to help further GameSpot’s position at the forefront of the industry,” said Torres. “I’m eager to continue the site’s tradition of excellence and I’m confident we can move forward into 2008 and set a new industry standard for how video games are covered.”