I has a blog thingie

[Tigranes]

So I was thinking about having a little blog/article-type site for a while - nothing so formal or polished as, say, Winterwind (see Gorth's sig), but somewhere I can put my thoughts up. As my postgrad work on media studies now requires a research blog of some sort, I thought I might as well get something off the ground.

 

Alley of Infinite Angles (No, I'm not good with names) will be both a personal blog and a research blog - I'll mainly talk about the world of games as a field (industry, marketing, fans, communities, etc), but occasionally other stuff as well. Sometimes rather academic-ish, sometimes not, but usually similar to the tone of my posts here, I think. Nothing big, but nothing small, either. The main topic I will discuss is how different people see and get impressions of the industry and video games - e.g. companies thinking gamers like big boobs and violence; non-gamers thinking gamers are/aren't basement nerds; gamers thinking companies don't/do care about them; etc.

 

Note that the CSS is totally rubbish, if anything doesn't work yell at me. Comments and reads aren't really necessary for the uni side of things, but I wanted to share it with you guys, as I'm sure you'll have very valuable critique and thought some of you might find it interesting. And as it says on 'About', I'd love to talk about your views on the industry if anybody is interested - I know we have people from all sorts of backgrounds here.

 

A-yup.

[Xard]

Cool beans

 

 

(whose expression that was again? Volourn's? Gromnir's?

[Walsingham]

Cool beans

 

 

(whose expression that was again? Volourn's? Gromnir's?

I dunno. I know a guy who says "cool bananas".

[Tigranes]

Cool beans is Volo, or Sand, isn't it?

 

Anyway, still looks pretty horrible and messy due to my complete incompetence with web design/coding. Getting some help to make it suck less, though. Meanwhile, go nuts telling me how bad it is, before I fix things.

[theslug]

It's kind of nice Tigranes. Text could be more discernible from the background but its good for a noobsite. I was actually toying with the idea of starting a blog in which I'd chronicle the demise of America's top financial institutions and eventually how and why the nation will eventually plunge into the economic dark ages; however I'm not an economist so it would just be a bunch of some random doomsayers angry and misinformed rants. There is hope, though, I may just use what I know out of school and start a blog detailing some tips and tricks for the average Joe to stabilize their finances and add some humorous anecdotes about my cats and reflect upon the current economic trends in America and throughout. It'd be nice; I even have this sweet name picked out too but it's just too good that people would try to steal it.

 

edit: Btw I believe the phrase "cool beans" originates from the television show called Even Stevens. So it's no ones.

Edited July 29, 2008 by theslug

[thepixiesrock]

I used to say cool beans.

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

I'm going to say Cool Beans.

[Gorth]

I am going to say, nice visuals, although a bit hard to read. Something appears slightly broken towards the top frame and You might want to consider disabling Anonymous comments to your entries. Off to a good start

[Volourn]

"Cool beans is Volo, or Sand, isn't it?"

 

I've used it; but I most certainly didn't create it. It's an old expression from some thing i don't remember. L0L Then again, I didn't even create R00fles. *shrug*

 

ON TOPIC: I'll check it out.

 

P.S. Skimmed the part on casuual gamers.. Let me tell you that hardcore players find themselves everywhere. If you spent your time on the EA sports game forums, you'd see this. There are absolutely rabid people there. Plus, there are leagues for the game (heck, I created one).

 

Like anything - including RPGs, the main base are casual, and you always have a subset of 'hardcore gamers'. Even games like FO which are usually considered 'hardcore' are mostly played and enjoyed by 'casual players'.

Edited July 29, 2008 by Volourn

[Xard]

Then again, I didn't even create R00fles. *shrug*

 

Wait, you didn't?

 

No way, that's like claiming earth is flat

[Guest The Architect]

Edited for lameness.

Edited July 29, 2008 by The Architect

[qt3.14159]

Cool beans

 

 

(whose expression that was again? Volourn's? Gromnir's?

 

Trixie!

 

 

Though, I think it's really just a 1960's beatnik thing...

[Tigranes]

Hey guys. Definitely taking on board feedback I've heard here and elsewhere about being too messy and hard to read, etc: it's a consequence of both me having to rush things and my ineptitude at CSS getting in the way of better solutions. I now have someone who actually knows that stuff helping me polish it up, so it should look more professional in a few days.

 

You might want to consider disabling Anonymous comments to your entries.

 

Hah, would you know, that's actually my friends.

 

P.S. Skimmed the part on casuual gamers.. Let me tell you that hardcore players find themselves everywhere. If you spent your time on the EA sports game forums, you'd see this. There are absolutely rabid people there. Plus, there are leagues for the game (heck, I created one).

 

Like anything - including RPGs, the main base are casual, and you always have a subset of 'hardcore gamers'. Even games like FO which are usually considered 'hardcore' are mostly played and enjoyed by 'casual players'.

 

Yeah, I agree. In Part 2 I want to talk about those 'hardcore gamers' that are everywhere - and you know, it's complicated. Some hardcore gamers call other hardcore gamers casual, or they just dont see themselves as part of the same group - and as you say, there are 'casual' gamers for the most 'hardcore' of games. But to what extent does the industry/gamers themselves realise it?

 

Anyway, I've heavily edited that casualisation post - I realised that it was way too 'academic' and dull, and not really something I would read, either. That's what happens when you write your blog inbetween your thesis and your presentation. Oy-vey. Check it out again.

 

Thanks for all the feedback, it's really important to me, no matter how harsh they might be. (Mainly because I'm so harsh myself. )

[taks]

No way, that's like claiming earth is flat

??? it isn't?

 

taks

 

PS: i was using the phrase "cool beans" back in high school, over 20 years ago. i got it from my mother, i think. she's 66.

[Xard]

oh I didn't mean who originally used to say "cool beans", just to whose repertuary it belongs/belonged in here as central word

 

Where Volo learned R00fles?

[LadyCrimson]

If the font was bigger it'd be easier to read....at least on my 1600 desktop. I haven't looked at it in lower resolutions. But yeah...you usually want to stay away from textured backgrounds for text.

 

Otherwise, it looks nice to me. I don't know why you think it looks "unprofessional" - the layout looks fine. I like the images by the menus and stuff, plus the menu boxes have some personality. Are you using a particular blog software or doing everything yourself? I finally resorted to WordPress because of the easy-factor, but I'm always too lazy to make things look personalized. :D

[Tigranes]

The CMS is drupal, but the skin is built from the ground up with CSS. I should probably have gone with something easier and more pre-made, but I'm a sucker for total control.

 

1600 resolution huh? Yeah, I didn't accoutn for people with such high resolutions. I touched it up a bit more today and made it a bit more readable.

 

Another post, this time concerning pelvic hyperdrives. Wanted to find a nice picture of a pimp fashion rapper to go with Thorton, but kept finding hardcore pornography, as you tend to do.

[LadyCrimson]

Heh. I used 1280 for a long time but would switch to 1600 for photos (more space)...finally got tired of switching back and forth so stick with 1600 now. I can just increase text-size thru the browser. Doesn't work for all sites very well, but it seems to work fine with yours.

 

Drupal's a decent program...I checked them out a couple times. My ability with CSS is limited tho and I didn't like available templates much, so I went elsewhere.

[Tigranes]

Well, if that works, good enough for me. I'm really not a code-person and unfortunately won't be able to invest too much time on that side of things for a while.

 

Glad to have it running somewhat smoothly now though, presenting it to my class tomorrow, though that's not really that big a deal. Gonna see if I can stick to my bi-daily schedule, should finish that casualisation discussion next week.

[Tigranes]

Just bumping to say that the interview with our very own Obsidian employee Matthew Rorie is up on the site, just go to main page at http://alleyofinfiniteangles.com/ .

 

Really didn't want to put it up because my brain died while writing the questions and they turned out horrible, but Matthew very kindly answered them, so...

 

Will have an interview with our former nwn2 community manager Rob in a few weeks, and also hope to start asking some of our forumers some questions soon, if there is any interest.

[Walsingham]

I have a question. How come we're so awesome?

[Tigranes]

Midichlorians.

[Pidesco]

You could have attacked Matthew with your zombie brain. A lost opportunity right there.

[Tigranes]

Necropostin' from the depths of helllll, but it's better than starting a new topic, right?

 

Vince has kindly answered a few questions about Age of Decadence, game design and more on the Alley - a fledgling blog/site of mine.

 

Go to http://alleyofinfiniteangles.com/ and check out the top news post, or the left-hand side bar.

 

All comments/feedback, here or on site, are welcome.

 

A snippet:

 

3. You have previously described your team as