Lunch with a Legend

After meeting him, I know he'd scoff at me calling him this, but I was fortunate enough to have lunch with game reviewing legend Bill Abner.

Bill is an alum of OSU, from Trenton Ohio, and lives in the Columbus area, as do I. Since I've been working for him at Gameshark, we've communicated back and forth a bit, and I think we've gotten to know each other fairly well. As mentioned below, my next review is Pirates of the Caribbean - At World's End, and instead of mailing it to me, Bill suggested that we meet for lunch. It so happens that he lives about 10 minutes away from where I work, so we met at a local Bob Evans.

I've been reading Bill's work in various magazines and on various websites for nearly 10 years. I've secretly always wanted to do what he did for a living, and often thought of trying to contact him just to find out how you get a job like his (at the time), but I never did (why would he want to share that with a total stranger?). Ironically, I'm now in the industry, although nowhere near his level, and even more ironically, I'm working for him. I never dreamed that I'd be in the position I'm in now, but it just goes to show you, through hard work and perseverance, you can achieve your goals.

Bill briefly mentioned our luncheon on his blog, and offered his highly-accurate first impression of me. His wonderful little girl joined us, although I think I scared her a bit. She livened up as the lunch went on, and stole the show, as most little girls can do. Seriously, we had a nice discussion on a variety of topics. He really seems like a nice guy, and we tentatively planned getting together again in the summer. It was fun talking shop with him, but beyond video games, he's a regular mid-30's (I think) OSU fan super-dad family-man gaming-junkie like me. Honestly, it was kind of like hanging out with one of my roommates from college, which is about as relaxed and comfortable as you can be, the only difference being he picked up the check. Although, I must admit, I was a bit nervous to meet him. He'd scoff at that, too.