Greg Kasavin on Competitive Gaming, Game Design, His Roots and Dota 2

Greg Kasavin shares his passion for Dota 2, why he attends The International, his thoughts on competitive gaming and more.

By Erick Tay on July 25, 2014 at 1:50PM PDT

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Edited By chechak7

long time Greg Kasavin nice to see ya

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Miss your reviews Greg! Good to see ya man.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By coldfusion25

He had great reviews.

Still remember his line: "...and stuff like that"

2 • 11 years ago

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He reviewed many great games :)

Doom 3, Metroid Prime, World of Warcraft are the first that come to mind.

Check out the video review of Doom 3, with Greg standing in a dark room with red light shining on him. I loved those little touches :)

http://www.gamespot.com/doom-3/videos/doom-3-video-review-6104164/

2 • 11 years ago

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@brainiac1988 Him and Kevin Van Ord imo

Upvote • 11 years ago

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I heard that when GameSpot gives out editors choice awards (games with 9.0 or above), the trophy they hand out is a plastic model of Greg Kasavin holding up the game's box art.

Also, at the end of Greg's final On The Spot, he was given 2 of these that, instead of holding the box art, he was holding mini pictures of himself. :P

Is this true?

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Greg was without a single doubt the best reviewer Gamespot has ever had. Nuts, I was just at the International. I can't believe I didn't run into Greg!

Upvote • 11 years ago

Shirotakahahshi

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Shirotakahahshi

I don't have enough time to like every comment, but I can't say more on how I agree that Greg was the best reviewer Gamespot ever had.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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@Shirotakahahshi I second that. :)

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Greg is such a cool guy! Love his Metroid Prime reviews. :-)

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By ChiefFreeman

Greg was the best editor this site ever had. Go watch some of his old video reviews, and see how it was done during Gamespot's "Golden Age". Also, that interviewer sucks.

6 • 11 years ago

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Edited By duffarama

@ChiefFreeman Indeed. I love Greg's Elder Scrolls: Oblivion video review in particular because he convinced me to buy a game from a genre that I wasn't familiar with and I ended up enjoying it.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Ahh good old greg :)

Always loved his video reviews.

3 • 11 years ago

IndySandbagTrik

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IndySandbagTrik

Greg was always my favourite RPG reviewer, miss you bro!!

3 • 11 years ago

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Shout out to you Greg! Gamespot has never been quite the same ever since you left... Cheers

2 • 11 years ago

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Edited By Valkeerie

He's a creative director now? Wow, great job! For some reason Kevin Van Ord lives up to the same standards. Who knows if he manages to fulfil a dream like Greg?

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By Kakaroti4

Good ol' Greg Kasavin, miss his reviews.

2 • 11 years ago

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he was the best reviewer .............really !

3 • 11 years ago

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Whoa Greg

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Miss Greg haha, was a great reviewer.

3 • 11 years ago

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This guy is freakin awesome. Too bad he got kicked out of GS for giving an honest review for a bad game.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By NTM23

@FKlepackiFTW

That was Jeff Gerstmann that got fired for dumb reasons, this is another great reviewer, Greg Kasavin. He left in 2007 to pursue other things; Jeff was dismissed later that year. I'd say him and Jeff are some of the greatest reviewers out there, though Greg was the one that had many reviews and opinions that I agreed with most of the time. There aren't any reviewers now that are like him when it comes to agreeing with a review, not for me at least.

4 • 11 years ago

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Ah you might be right since I think Greg and Jeff were both the best reviewers GameSpot has ever had. Now we got these silly idiots like Carolyn who writes stupid articles and gives bad reviews to good games, and Kevin Van Ord who acts like a pro but really is nowhere as intelligent as a reviewer as Greg and Jeff were. Pretty much the whole crew in GS doing reviews right now sucks. There are some exceptions to the rule but mostly it's all shit.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By brainiac1988

@NTM23

yeah, it was about the video review Jeff did on Kane & Lynch: Dead Men.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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@Crackhe4d Someone's got sand in his vagina.

4 • 11 years ago

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Great seeing Greg Kasavin. Makes me miss the good ol' days.

3 • 11 years ago

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Greg is AWSM. Loved his reviews. Loved his Oblivion and Skyrim 12 hour marathon.

3 • 11 years ago

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Kasavin was the man when it came to reviews. Good to see him doing what he loves now in the dev seat, although, I miss his reviews.

7 • 11 years ago

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I trusted Greg's reviews the most. I miss that guy.

12 • 11 years ago

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Gamespot died once guys like Greg and the Giant Bomb crew left.

7 • 11 years ago

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Edited By NTM23

@wEEman33_IV

I actually left the site, as in didn't watch, read or listen to any of their stuff for about a year after Giant Bomb started up. I didn't really care to get used to the crew here, but over time I grew to respect some of their opinions as I started coming back here.

I sometimes listen to GameSpot gameplay, like I sometimes do the Giant Bombcast or a podcast on IGN; Game Informer as well as stuff on GameTrailers. I like them all equally now, since all I want is news, and sometimes it's interesting to hear discussions about the games I'm interested in.

2 • 11 years ago

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Jeff Gerstman was great too.

2 • 11 years ago

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Nice to see you again Greg. Your style of reviewing is the best, ever!

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Edited By DiamondDM13

Greg was a great reviewer, and that payed off, as now he's making games himself. Kevin and Tom should take a lesson from this guy, if they ever hope to get further in the industry. Making controversial reviews will only get attention might you help on the short run, but if you want to go for the long run, learn to properly review.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Good to see you again Greg!

2 • 11 years ago

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Edited By ElDuderino1

Greg is the man. I miss his reviews.

6 • 11 years ago

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Edited By jose2390

@ElDuderino1 Me too. My personal favorite game reviewer!

Upvote • 11 years ago

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It won't be long before those who idolize Greg Kasavin bitch about how this video misspelled his name. :P

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By Erick Staff

@Gelugon_baat thats on me. I mispelled it and will own up to it. I apologize to the internet but to Greg especially. So I will fix the third too.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By Gelugon_baat

@Erick Hey, if there is anyone that you should be apologizing to, it's Kasavin and Kasavin only - certainly not the Internet.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By farhadd

@Gelugon_baat Yeah, it's not like Gamespot should be held to even the lowest standards for journalism. Misspell everything, why not? It's just video games, after all, right? It's definitely not compounded by the fact that he used to work for this site- no way that's insult to injury. At least they spelled it right on the article page, if not the URL for said page or the headline on the home page.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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@farhadd What 'standards'?

I will say here that a lot of people, including you, think that there are "standards", but there really aren't any official conventions on these.

Also, I wouldn't be wearing a tin-foil hat just to be thinking that the misspelling was deliberate and an attempt to besmirch him for being a former GameSpot editor.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Edited By Gelugon_baat

@farhadd "Common sense" is a subjective thing.

It is also a weasel word used by those who cannot bring up anything convincingly concrete to support their assertions.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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I'm pretty sure if you asked anyone who considers themselves a "journalist", amateur or otherwise, the following question:

"When referencing a proper name in your work, should you make sure it's spelled correctly before publishing?"

Their answer would be yes. Perhaps it's not a standard. I guess it's more common sense. And it shouldn't really just be limited to journalists. My apologies for the confusion.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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Unless that is how his name is pronounced in Cyrillic of course. He is born a Russian in Moscow, unbeknownst to some.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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@Gelugon_baat yes, Greg migrated to the U.S. when he was about 3 or so.

Upvote • 11 years ago

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@ChiefFreeman

Whoa, -how- did you know about that? All I knew are from Wikis and such on him.

Upvote • 11 years ago

YearoftheSnake5

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YearoftheSnake5

Man, I miss Greg. He did great reviews for Gamespot. I'm glad to see he's doing what he loves.

2 • 11 years ago