Written by Matt Swider  on February 17, 2005

Specials: As Gaming Target celebrates its anniversary of 6 years of online video game coverage, Matt Swider talks about the details of the site's future.

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Gaming Target celebrates its 6th year as an online source for video game coverage today. As proud as we are of the site's past, everyone here is still looking toward the future and focusing on new features to come. You're currently experiencing one of the features we worked on for quite some time: our new design. It launched in December, replacing the drab-blue look with a layout that is brighter. Brighter is how I like to think of the future of Gaming Target as we head into 2005, taking our current features to the max as well as taking on a new set of challenges.

New Features at Gaming Target
The first exciting new feature for Gaming Target visitors is the benefit of becoming a free registered member of the web site. This allows you to have a voice in the forums, keeps you logged in as you surf the site, and displays your post count on the header. Furthermore, it allows you to respond to every author's news, reviews, specials, even interviews at the bottom of the exact same page. So, if you want to leave us a comment, you can easily do so now directly on the pages.

Leaving comments on our updates isn't the only cool member benefit. Once you've registered, it's possible to score and review games in the reader reviews section of the site. Let others see what you think of the latest video games and get your score counted where it'll be seen. If a game has yet to release, simply head over to the most wanted section, find a game you're looking forward to on the list and click УvoteФ right next to it. The resulting votes tally is intended to give you an idea of what games you and other users are looking forward to the most. Be sure to check out these two impressive additions to Gaming Target as you surf the site; just be sure you're registered so you can participate.

Besides growing in terms of reader interaction, Gaming Target has also expanded its game profiles. Take, for example, the Halo 2 game profile. There, you'll find all of the information relating to Halo 2; every news piece we've writing, our two reviews, three previews, and four specials. On the sidebar of each game profile, you'll find a slideshow of screenshots, the basic game stats, and an УIn The SeriesФ box. If you're not familiar with this box, it's a very useful tool. When looking at the sidebar of Tony Hawk's Underground for PS2, the entire Tony Hawk lineup is displayed under УIn The Series.Ф This gives you easy access to different platform versions as well as Hawk titles released before and after this game.

The point of the all-inclusive game profiles and the УIn The SeriesФ box is to provide speedy access to our content in one or two clicks. You won't have to click on an excess number of pages to find your content and can always attempt our search field in the header if you're still unable or just unsure of what to look for.

Genres and companies also benefit from profile features. You can now find games within a specific genre and on a particular platform. Companies makes a return as a useful tool to find out the full lineup of games each publisher/developer has released. Our Staff section works in a similar way, only it displays the articles each member has authored and a brief description about the person. Check out my profile to see how it works.

The final sections I'm here to reintroduce are Accessories and Contests, both returning due to popular demand. We're currently working on a handful of fresh accessories reviews and we already have a contest running, another benefit to becoming a free site member. Please click here for a chance to win a copy of The Getaway: Black Monday (ends: 03/10/05). We'll have a contests coming to you each month, so stop back and enter if nothing else.

New Challenges for Gaming Target
Gaming Target has seen a bunch of exciting improvements, but that doesn't mean we intend to slow down any time soon. Instead, you'll see us tighten our current list of features and add even more enhancements to the site. We want to take things to the next level and we're definitely up for the challenge.

For starters, expect to see some of the most accurate release dates on the web. A helpful tool for avid video game consumers is our eight upcoming games displayed at the bottom of the main page and each system section. Although it would be easy for us to only pay attention to these soon-to-be-released games, we're striving to update each game profile with the proper release date whenever there's a delay or the rare case of a bump up in the release.

When games do ship, we're going to make every effort to review the game early enough to influence your decision. We want to recommend the good games and have you stay away from the bad ones because at $50 a pop, it's not all fun and games when you get stuck with a Superman 64. To accomplish this, we're in the mist of hiring. So you may see some new faces around the site writing reviews and previews as well as reporting the news. You can become familiar with each veteran and new staff member of the site through the upcoming blogs, a feature that I'm very eager to start.

As for the other sections under УFeaturesФ on the navigation, expect to see a start-up of new specials, interviews and mailbag questions answered. Now that we launched the new look, Gaming Target is on the ball and will bring these sections to life soon.

Also, we're determined to satisfying those looking for the easy way out of games with easy access to a massive amount of codes in our new cheat codes section. There'll be an occasional walkthrough and game help from our УGame CounselorsФ designated to your video game needs and queries. If winning the game is what counts, we've got you covered.

The final set of УProfilesФ includes People, Timeline, and Dictionary, some of the more unique sections you'll see on a gaming site. People will consist of a brief background of industry leaders, Timeline will chronicle major events in the gaming industry, and dictionary will define words associated with the gaming universe.

Considering the current slate of features and the ones to come, we hope that you'll find Gaming Target to be a primary source of video game information that you want to check out daily. Everyone has been doing a lot of work here and it's always rewarding to hear positive feedback from readers and earn their respect at the end of the day.