I finally did something I set out to do, however inconsequential: I created my physical screenshot gallery.

Six months ago, I wrote about wanting to create a such a thing. It seemed a daunting task given the sheer number of screenshots I’ve taken (and loved) over the years. I’ve written about my love of screenshots no less than 15 times, and I find it one of my favorite aspects of modern gaming; if a game has a photo mode that is even remotely competent, hoo boy, I’m all in.

In the interim since I had the idea, I started going through the thousands of screenshots I’ve taken. The more screenshots I looked at, the more excited I was to be creating the physical gallery.

But I was also overwhelmed.

So I made a decision.

I decided to go through some of the more recent games I’ve completed and choose my favorites from there. I also decided to change the number from five to four, if only for wall space limitations.

The picture above just barely didn’t make it into the gallery but, to be fair, I had so many screenshots from Everything I wanted to put in, I could have framed half a dozen and still felt constrained. Also, the whole point of this gallery is to change out images periodically, so if the spirit moves me to put some of those Everything moments up, I can do that.

I bought the frames, then chose the images, then had the mats cut, then put them all together and got them on the wall. I put it right by our front door so I can see them often and I love that this tiny gallery exists. I think it hits the same notes game guides do for me: I love when gaming related items can exist in reality. I’m not super huge into collectibles, but I adore games guides and maps and in-game items (e.g.: my life-sized splicer mask from BioShock) made to exist physically. I don’t get to travel much due to my health, so having these images from my digital “vacations” is lovely.

I chose the following four images:

This was the easy choice from Everything. I AM SNAIL.

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Asemblance: Oversight is a visually stunning game (and an excellent game, period, in my opinion) and this is one of my favorite screenshots I’ve taken in any game.

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Destiny and I may have a tenuous relationship, but I still love it in so many ways even if I’m not playing it like I once was. I have an attachment to my hunter and I really liked that sword.

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I may have fallen off my time with The Division 2, but holy good gravy, the game was ripe for beautiful screenshots. I took this in some random room while exploring and I was in love with the color saturation and lighting effects.

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It took me an absurdly long time to cement those selections.

I printed out more than those four because I was still trying to decide and, as you can see from my oops image below, I mistakenly had the incorrect screenshot from The Division 2 in there:

Though, to be fair, I really loved that screenshot of the red lighting on the elevator shaft.

Because I wanted to preserve the aspect ratio, I knew I’d need to have mats cut to fit the frames so that added some time to the project. The frames are 11×14 and the images are around 6×11.

But.

I’m so happy with the finished product:

It was surprisingly difficult to take a decent photo of them on the wall because of the massive glare from the zillion light sources in my living room. They look so much better in reality than they do here. I also just realized you can see my coffee table in the reflection of the one on the lower left. Oh whale.

I know this isn’t a big deal in the slightest, but I’m sort of proud of myself for taking this from concept to reality. It took so much longer than I thought it would (or should), but I love seeing these images every day.

Small victory for me. I’ll take it.

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I haven’t been playing much of anything over the past couple weeks, so my goal this weekend is simply to play. I have lots of games I’d love to dive into (e.g.: VA11-HALL-A, Truberbrook, Tales From the Borderlands, Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture), I just need to hunker down and choose one.

With that I ask: what will you be playing this weekend?

Please be kind to yourself and others. Cheers, friends.