ValenMorrow

Currently enrolled to earn my bachelors degree in communication and minoring in professional writing.

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    Latest Topics

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    Video Games and Crowdfunding: A Retrospective

    Kickstarter is the crowdfunding platform many video game developers have turned to in order to fund the development of their personal project. Take a look back at the biggest games of the last five years that have been created with the help of Kickstarter (Undertale, Mighty No. 9, Shovel Knight, etc.). What caused some of them to succeed upon release? What made some of these games disappoint backers and players alike when they released?

    • This topic is so good. It is incredibly relevant to the current gaming landscape. With Yooka Laylee out soon and Bloodstained: ritual of the night coming in 2018, the topic is not going away. Shovel Knight is a fantastic game and has thrived really well, with new expansions coming out every year or so. It has a great following. Mighty No. 9 was extremely disappointing for a variety of reasons. – SeanGadus 8 years ago
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    • A lot of people are losing hope in projects that feature in Kickstarter just like how people now naturally assume that Steam greenlight is filled with shovelware. A lot of people ought to know this is a platform that has made success possible for a lot of determined developers. The message seems to be deteriorating as time passes. – TheUbiquitousAnomaly 8 years ago
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    The Allure of Spending: Mobile Games and Gashapon

    "Gashapon" is used to refer to capsule toy vending machines that are popular in Japan. People are able to see which characters are featured in a machine, but won't know who they'll get until they put in money. Multiple mobile games from "Pocket Mortys" to "Puzzle & Dragons" use this system, where premium currency will offer a chance to obtain a rare and powerful character at the cost of getting an entirely different character. What is it about this system that gets players to spend their money once or multiple times? How many of top-earning mobile games use this system? Is there a "good way" or "bad way" to implement this system in a mobile game?

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      Latest Comments

      I’m glad that Twitch exists since it gives most game genres a chance to shine. I’m terrible at fighting games, but still buy them to learn them. I don’t have much time to put into fighting games, so at least I get to enjoy tournaments like NorCal Regionals or EVO.
      I also usually watch Twitch whenever events like Awesome Games Done Quick or Summer Games Done Quick are on. It’s always fun when you see screenshots of games like Ape Escape and Katamari Damacy getting more viewers than CS:GO or League.

      Twitch: Gamers Selling Games

      I hate that I understand the frustration that comes with Googling the phrase “why are comic book nerds so pretentious.” I started reading comics with Avenging Spider-Man, which are stories that involve Spider-Man and one or two other superheroes teaming up and usually defeating the bad guy in the same issue. It was a simple premise that was meant for younger audiences that nonetheless drew me in because they were straightforward, self-contained stories.

      What I believe leads to the sense of pretentiousness is when readers want to see a change occur that isn’t occurring. Yes, it makes sense business-wise that Marvel and DC change up their comic book storylines to match up with whatever is going on in the movies since the movies are likely to make people pick up the latest issue. It becomes frustrating when characters go through sudden changes in terms of design or personality to reflect these business decisions, which leads to writers and/or artists switching what they work on when all you want is a consistent story. Comic book readers also get frustrated with events in comic books that are marketed as changing the entire Marvel or DC universe “as you know it,” especially when they happen one after another. The issues about the event sell well because of the characters that get involved, so it tells Marvel and DC to keep doing these types of events, becoming a constant cycle.

      The Social Stigma of Comic Book Reading

      Bojack is definitely worth watching. Being able to nail down the tone and jokes that shows of different eras that the show draws from is an amazing feat.

      Personally a running gag that still gets to me is how a character actress throughout the series continues to come back when they were put in a situation that they shouldn’t have come back from.

      Bojack Horseman: Balancing Humor and Dark Themes

      The part of the article that stuck with me the most was how video games get players to participate in the story, even if choices can be restricted. That restriction has its positives and its negatives.

      One way I see it as a positive is how dialogue choices are handled in Persona 4. The story will usually move along no matter what choice you make, but the responses and reactions from other characters keeps the player engaged. If you make the right dialogue choice, stats can even be raised to make conversation with people that are smarter or more stubborn possible.

      Dialogue is unfortunately a negative in Fallout 4 when compared to the previous Fallout games, where a range of dialogue options — some of which can only be done if you have a high enough stat needed to complete the action — present in the earlier games is now down to only 4 options.

      Are Video Games Worth Studying? (A Literary Perspective)