Emma Kent joins Eurogamer as our new reporter

Hi everyone. This is one of those welcome-new-staffers posts - with the twist that if you've been reading the site in recent months, you'll already know these writers' work.

First up, I'm delighted to announce that Emma Kent is moving straight from a successful internship with us to join Eurogamer permanently as a reporter. Emma has impressed us since day one - before that, really - with her tenacity, willingness to ask difficult questions and nose for a good story ( and also her frankly scary Dance Dance Revolution skills.) In the short time she's been with us, she has investigated the toxic Team Fortress community and the aftermath of the controversial ArenaNet firings, not taken "we're not talking about that right now" as an answer from the Battlefield 5 developers, and gathered industry reaction to Sony's stance on cross-play. She's also reported on how fans were deciphering the runes in God of War and brought us the frankly troubling tale of Bowsette.

I'm super excited to see what Emma takes on next - and very pleased to be expanding Eurogamer's reporting team.

That's not the only good news on Eurogamer's news desk. For the past year, Matt Wales has been heroically working the evening shift, keeping Eurogamer updated during US office hours. Until very recently he was working as a freelance contractor, but I'm now happy to confirm that he has joined the Eurogamer family as a permanent member of staff, so you can rest assured that you won't want for Sea of Thieves stories at any time in the near future - and that Eurogamer's notorious platform bias has been bolstered with the addition of yet another Nintendo fanboy (albeit one who doesn't have quite as bad an amiibo problem as Martin).

We're very proud of our news offering here at Eurogamer, and with Emma and Matt joining us permanently - as well as the recent addition of weekend news cover courtesy of Wes and Vikki Blake - our news desk, under news editor Tom Phillips, is immeasurably strengthened for the future.

Incidentally, we won't be stopping our search for new games writing talent just because we've hired someone new: the Eurogamer summer internship will return next year. We won't always be in a position to offer our interns permanent jobs, but it was never just about that. We believe that bringing more fresh talent into video game journalism and giving them the best possible start is good for everyone, including games sites, the industry and, above all, readers. Look out for more details on our 2019 internship in the spring.