One of the most talented writers covering games right now is David Kushner, who penned Masters Of Doom, on "the Lennon and McCartney of video games: John Carmack and John Romero" (oh, and a reader recently unearthed a priceless 'Bill Gates in DOOM' video featured in the book), and also wrote this year's 'Magic CCG geek becomes poker king' true-life fable, Jonny Magic and the Card Shark Kids.

Kushner's latest work in the game space is an in-depth feature on 'The Neopets Addiction' for the December 2005 issue of Wired, profiling the kid-oriented virtual pet website, and it's just as good as his earlier longform work: "Every day after school, 11-year-old Tyler Gagen hurries home down the country roads of Hastings, Minnesota, to play with Buddy. "He likes hot dogs and cake," Tyler says of his pet. "I haven't brought him to the grooming parlor yet, but I will. He gets the royal treatment!"... Buddy is a winged, wide-eyed baby dragon that lives in the online land of Neopia. Tyler "adopted" Buddy five months ago and personalized his color (green) and gender (male). Now he spends two hours a day at Neopets.com, shopping for Vonroo toys and Cornupepper soup to keep Buddy happy and healthy."