Niko Nirvi (born 16 February 1961 in

Jokioinen Jokioinen ( sv, Jockis) is a municipalities of Finland, municipality of Finland. It is located in the Tavastia Proper regions of Finland, region. The municipality has a population of () and covers an area of of which is water. The population de ...

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

Malin, Aarno
Niko Nirvi on suomalaisen pelijournalismin pioneeri, jonka olemassaoloa moni ehti epäillä – kameran karttamisesta tuli pakkomielle
''

Suomen Kuvalehti ''Suomen Kuvalehti'' (lit. "Finland's picture magazine", or "The Finnish picture magazine") is a weekly Finnish language family and news magazine published in Helsinki, Finland. History and profile ''Suomen Kuvalehti'' was founded in 1873 and pu ...

'' 16 February 2021. Accessed on 17 February 2021.), pen name Nnirvi, is a long-term major icon in the

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

gaming Gaming may refer to: Games and sports The act of playing games, as in: * Legalized gambling, playing games of chance for money, often referred to in law as "gaming" * Playing a role-playing game, in which players assume fictional roles * Playin ...

world. He is well known for writing

computer game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device to gener ...

reviews since the 1980s in '' MikroBitti'', '' C=Lehti'' and the computer game yearbooks that were predecessors of the ''

Pelit ''Pelit'' ("Games") is a Finnish video games magazine published in Helsinki, Finland. History ''Pelit'' dates back to 1987, as an annual extra games-only issue of '' MikroBitti'' and '' C-lehti''. Another annual issue was published in 1988, and in ...

magazine A magazine is a periodical publication, generally published on a regular schedule (often weekly or monthly), containing a variety of content. They are generally financed by advertising, purchase price, prepaid subscriptions, or by a combinatio ...

. He has worked for the latter since its founding in 1992, and holds a column in addition to making reviews and other reports. Nirvi began his career as a game reviewer in 1986 on pages of MikroBitti. He had made a bet with his friend that he could get his review published in the magazine. He sent two reviews,

Zoids , or simply , is a Japanese science fiction media franchise created by Tomy that feature giant robots (or "mecha") called "Zoids". A Zoid is essentially a large mechanical animal, with designs being based on animals; including dinosaurs, insect ...

and

Uridium ''Uridium'' (released on the NES as ''The Last Starfighter'') is a science fiction side-scrolling shoot 'em up originally designed by Andrew Braybrook for the Commodore 64, and later ported to other 8-bit machines. It consists of fifteen levels, ...

and the former was published (they already had one Uridium review). Nirvi wrote reviews and a regular column about new games for Mikrobitti and became the "game editor" of the magazine. He also wrote reviews for C=Lehti. When ''Pelit'', that concentrated solely on gaming, was founded by the same publisher, Nirvi joined its ranks as an editor, and has written a regular column for each issue. Nirvi's trademarks include signing with "Nnirvi" or a variation, and never showing his face in the magazine. Photos of him are always either covered or edited in a way that the face is unrecognizable. His personal picture in his articles is usually a gaming or movie character whose face is blurred (for example Master Chief) while the rest of the crew's articles feature their real faces.

Wallu Harri Sakari Vaalio (born 1956 in Järvelä, Kärkölä, Finland), also known by his artist name Wallu, is a Finnish cartoonist. He is known for his strip '' Punaniska'' (Finnish for "redneck") comic albums and his strips in Finnish magazines su ...

's drawings of Nirvi depict him as a bearded man with

Spock Spock is a Character (arts), fictional character in the ''Star Trek'' media franchise. He first appeared in the Star Trek: The Original Series, original ''Star Trek'' series serving aboard the starship USS Enterprise (NCC-1701), USS ''Enterprise ...

's Vulcan ears. According to Nirvi, his avoidance of publicity started in 1988, when a MikroBitti reader asked for a photograph of him, which Nirvi instantly declined, and this avoidance has strengthened ever since. Nirvi does not even allow verbal descriptions of his appearance. In 2012, Nirvi was awarded as Game Journalist of the Year at the FIGMA audience awards.Vuoden Pelijournalisti 2012 on Niko Nirvi
''figma.fi''. Accessed on 26 October 2015. Avoiding any publicity, Nirvi did not arrive to collect his award. Nirvi's style is typically humorous, and sometimes unorthodox. Some of Nirvi's most unconventional reviews were published in C=Lehti. The review of

Domark Square Enix Limited (formerly Domark Limited and Eidos Interactive Limited) is a British subsidiary of the Japanese video game company Square Enix, acting as their European publishing arm. The company formerly owned ''Tomb Raider'', which was in ...

's motorboat game Hydra was written as a nursery rhyme from the beginning to the end. The review of Battle Island contained just two words: "Paska Commando-klooni." ("shitty

Commando Royal Marines from 40 Commando on patrol in the Sangin">40_Commando.html" ;"title="Royal Marines from 40 Commando">Royal Marines from 40 Commando on patrol in the Sangin area of Afghanistan are pictured A commando is a combatant, or operativ ...

clone.")

Personal opinions

Nirvi has made it clear that he does not like sports or sports related video games. He has been a big fan of

Babylon 5 ''Babylon 5'' is an American space opera television series created by writer and producer J. Michael Straczynski, under the Babylonian Productions label, in association with Straczynski's Synthetic Worlds Ltd. and Warner Bros. Domestic Tel ...

Star Wars ''Star Wars'' is an American epic film, epic space opera multimedia franchise created by George Lucas, which began with the Star Wars (film), eponymous 1977 film and quickly became a worldwide popular culture, pop-culture Cultural impact of S ...

and

Star Trek ''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the eponymous 1960s television series and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has expanded into vari ...

. He has also stated that he has read ''

The Lord of the Rings ''The Lord of the Rings'' is an epic high-fantasy novel by English author and scholar J. R. R. Tolkien. Set in Middle-earth, intended to be Earth at some time in the distant past, the story began as a sequel to Tolkien's 1937 children's boo ...

'' over ten times. Nirvi has given several statements about the usefulness of computer gaming. At one interview he said that gaming is a completely useless hobby. On the first issue of Pelit (1992) he wrote that gaming helps people overcome their fears towards computers (that is typical for some old people). In another interview he declared that many strategy games can develop the players' intellectual capabilities: they can teach English, history and strategic thinking. Nirvi's favorite games from the 1980s are

(

Atari Atari () is a brand name that has been owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by French publisher Atari SA through a subsidiary named Atari Interactive. The original Atari, Inc. (1972–1992), Atari, Inc., ...

's arcade game), Ultima IV, Hack (the precursor of

NetHack ''NetHack'' is an open source single-player roguelike video game, first released in 1987 and maintained by the NetHack DevTeam. The game is a fork of the 1982 game ''Hack'', itself inspired by the 1980 game '' Rogue''. The player takes the role a ...

Elite In political and sociological theory, the elite (french: élite, from la, eligere, to select or to sort out) are a small group of powerful people who hold a disproportionate amount of wealth, privilege, political power, or skill in a group. D ...

and Dungeon Master. In 2000 he stated that the best PC game ever is X-COM: UFO Defense.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nirvi, Niko Finnish journalists Living people Video game critics 1961 births