Sometimes, I think that GSW commenters cock a snook a little unfairly at 'powerhouse game blog' Kotaku - and while I agree that the informedness of its contributors varies, like any organ, I really enjoyed the newly posted, Brian Ashcraft-penned feature 'Sex, Gambling, But Not Games in Japanese Arcade Hell' - as a work of photojournalism, as well as a downtrodden ramble through the dysfunctional Japanese psyche.

Why? It has fluid writing like this: "A row of taxis lines up across from the New Shinbashi Building, not the Shin Shinbashi Building. An old lady is laying in the street, and I can hear the rhythmic siren of an ambulance. Businessmen in ill-fitting suits move in transit from work to bars, and a gaggle of young girls wearing thigh-highs and mini-skirts cluster near the doorway, putting on eye liner and talking on cell phones."

And it has depressing, neon-flecked prose like this: "An old man sits down in flannel, stuffs a coin in and begins playing. His fingernails are dirty, and I write down the game's title: Cherry. Bonus. IV... Another Konami banner tells me that "Wing" has mahjong — Along with Virtua Fighter and Tekken. The game cabinets are deserted, and salarymen sit hunched over, lighting cigarettes, putting them out, lighting them again. They don't notice me." So it works. More fatalistic urban decay in video game blogs, please.