Site Update - Late with Regular Content, Sorry

I know there has been some big news in the way of Project Cafe, the rumored codename of Nintendo's next home console, and I plan on making an opinion piece on that, but there have been some good changes in my work schedule, and I'm shifting my sleeping habits around and thus the rest of my life as well.

There won't be a roundup of the podcasts for this week's Sunday, but I am going to do a round of any podcasts discussing Wii 2/Project Cafe/general Nintendo rumors, which should include a couple non-regulars. Today is also my third week anniversary of owning a 3DS, so you'll see the final part of those impressions up soon.

My sincere thanks to my readers. There aren't many, but you make it worth the effort for me.

Just Saw My First U.S. 3DS Television Commercial - UPDATED

I was wondering when they were going to start advertising. Unlike other people, I don't think it's at all late to start advertising the 3DS. For one, they have been promoting it without commercials, like appearing with it on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Advertising a month in advance or so seems like it's really only meant to build hype, and as hard as it is to convey the 3DS's stereoscopic 3D without glasses to someone, it seems to me it would be better to advertise as closely as possible to when you plan on having playable demo units available.

I missed the very first moments of the commercial (busy on the computer) but it seems like they're only showing off the blue 3DS. They highlighted the augmented reality, though they didn't explain that it was augmented reality, and they showed off Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition over a first-party game as well as Steel Diver. They of course took the time to say that it was glasses-less 3D. I've forgotten if they put the price or date on the commercial, but I'm fairly sure they advertised a "learn more" website, so hopefully the 3D without glasses bit will get people interested enough to learn all there is to learn about the 3DS.

Do you guys think they should have advertised sooner/later? If you've seen the commercial, what do you think? Could they do better?

EDIT: I mistook the "Take a look" moniker as "here's a website". I'm surprised they didn't at least point people towards Nintendo.com, but right at the moment, the first Google results for "nintendo 3ds" are Nintendo's own sites.

Bit.Trip Series Article Update

Slow week for news. Perfect time for some other features.....if I didn't live a little too closely to the idea of a lazy Sunday.


You may remember a little update where I mentioned I wanted to write about the Bit.Trip series, now that the final game in the hexalogy had been released. Well, it's about a week later and there hasn't been a word on the subject. You might ask why. Well, it's mostly just because of the existence of this trilogy of articles from Nintendolife.com. This was pretty much what I was hoping to make (though I haven't fully read them, from skimming it sounds like they went much deeper than I originally speculated, but maybe in the process of working on it I would have been reminded of all the material worth writing about) so maybe you can imagine the distress I felt to see that a bigger site (and one of my favorites) beat me to it. At least I got the word out about my idea before they published the first part of their's, save a little face. I thought I might change gears and do more of a review for each game, specifically comparing and contrasting each game to the other games in the rest of the series. Now it's all opinion, and at the end of the day that's easier to do (for me) than Googling and cross-checking information, so I guess I'm grateful to Nintendolife for that and a very detailed article that I can reference.

One of the first things I'd prefer to do is re-beat each game. Err, well, I couldn't beat RUNNER, but at least re-experience each area and boss of the games (all have three except FATE's six), but that might take awhile, so I'll probably post some first drafts and remind you guys that they've been revised with a post. Six parts are planned, though I'd love to take a look at the future of the series with another part, but it really doesn't seem like there is enough to write about so it might be thrown in with the last part (FLUX, unless I discover a different order that I think is more appropriate).

If you guys have some ideas you're willing to give away that you think will make the series better, feel free to share them. I'm guessing I'll strike an idea that comes up organically from writing about one of the games which I'll want to venture into on one of the ones I've already written up, so hopefully they'll improve over time, if only a little.

Site Thoughts - Knuckling Down

Oh man, I feel like I've been neglecting the internet for the past week and a half or so. I've been playing games more than usual, and I feel like I'm getting my money's worth out of Neflix again instead of ignoring it for days on end when there is so much great content to watch. Both of those are great in their own rights, but I've completely fallen out of my usual internet browsing habits and I feel pretty lousy for it. Part of that is directly affecting the site; if I don't pick up on interesting topics or news, or if I don't even touch a computer some days, it means things don't get posted or discussed. I kinda loath the thought of posting up bits of news even 2 days late, but I'll try to be more lenient with that; if it's interesting, then it's worth the chance of discussing it.

I'd like to add some much needed accountability by being open about planned content on a week by week basis.

Picking a Video Game Review System (You Can Help)

Long before I ever thought about writing on a personal blog, I pondered the best way to express a rating for a video game in a written review. I've seen all kinds. Reviews with a single score at the end, out of 5 points, out of 10 points, out of 20, 30, 100. Reviews with scores from 4 different people. Reviews where they break down and review each component, sometimes they average those numbers for the final score, sometimes they don't count at all.

One line of thought says you should let the words speak for themselves. no number, no letter, no rating at the end at all. It's a nice sentiment, but everyone writes differently; some people focus more on the things they didn't like about the game as they write about it, without giving praise to enjoyable portions. Without a black and white rating, it could come off more negative then the writer intends.

Here's my own little conundrum, though; I don't really use reviews anymore.

I Guess I Spoke Too Soon - UPDATE

So we got a big dose of snow. I knew of the chance of snow when I posted up that "coming soon" bit, but it wasn't supposed to be anything serious. In fact, I was watching the radar up until about 4 hours before the snow was predicted to start, and I'm not sure how all that snow migrated to our area.

Roads are frozen over and it isn't too safe to get to the computer that I've been working on the site stuff from. If you haven't guessed, the update is delayed. My apologies.

UPDATE - The update is up!

A Little Site Update Coming Soon - UPDATE

Not that big of a deal, and as far as I know only one person would even know something changed.
Hope everyone likes it when they see it.

UPDATE
It's up!