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Updates from May, 2008 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

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  Jonathan McKinnell 9:00 pm on May 20, 2008 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Haze, PS3   

  Haze: Poor guys :( 

  Well the reviews are in for Haze, the PS3 exclusive shooter that releases this week. This is not a review at all but a comment on the reviews the developers and free radical have received. On Metacritic Haze is currently sitting at a 54. Yikes indeed. So what happend? What went wrong in the development?

  I see this happen so many times, where a great developer puts out a sub-par game. Did they loose some members on staff that made everything click in previous games? Or did they simply not have enough time?

  A few reviewers mention the fact that Haze came out AFTER Call of Duty 4. So is that it? in order to be a good game you have to one up the other guy? The industry is pretty saturated with shooters right now, maybe we’re all sufering from gun fatigue. Wait wait wait, what am I doing? Why am I defending a game I haven’t played? If the media says it’s bad, then it must be bad right? I do ask a lot of questions.

  So maybe the moral of the story here is don’t make an FPS game, unless you’re Bungie or Valve or Infinityward. Hear that developers? you can stop now. There’s no need to bother…except you Killzone 2 team…you keep trucking.

  Anyway I’ll probably give Haze a rent when it comes out, and I’ll let you know what I think.

  Until then keep on fighting the good fight.

   

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  Jonathan McKinnell 10:37 am on May 15, 2008 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: web trends, webcam girls, youtube   

  Web trends: Webcam Girls 

  You’ve seen them, but did you know that what you were seeing was indeed an advertising web trend?

  It all started with lonelygirl15, which managed to fool us all. Lonelygirl was a video blog that was actually produced by a company. In the beginning it was made to seem real, but as the story became more elaberate and internet geeks finally figured out that it was indeed a production the company in charge finaly came out into the open and admited that it was indeed all a farse. Even with that though the series still remained popular and became even more involved with their fans through discussion forums and contests to be included in the story.

  Back to today, you’ll find all sorts of “Webcam girls” on youtube. You can tell that these are either produced series or are created for the purpose of ad revenue simply by the ad placement on the right and usually some sort of branding.

  Here’s an example of one I saw today.
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kT1VfrOtxv4&feature=dir

  It’s an interesting form of income, and not that much different from a video podcast. I just feel sorry for all the young lads out there who may think that this is simply some girl on the net being creative. Wake up guys, there are greater forces at work here.

  As Youtube continues to grow in popularity it’s interesting to see all the different content that pops up, and how people are making money from it..

   
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  Jonathan McKinnell 2:48 pm on May 7, 2008 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: advertising ( 2 ), widgets   

  Web trends: Using tech for the sake of using it. 

  This is something that bothers me constantly. Clients wanting to use a specific web tech or tool just for the sake of using it. Somehow they think that if they use it, they’ll be cool. Lets use the example of a desktop widget. Widgets are great, when filled with the right content. The daily weather? Sure. An RSS reader? Great. Those are both applications that someone might actually use. Now lets say that a Candy company wants to create a branded desktop widget that has some random RSS Feed content in it. Ok, now we all like Candy right? But would you as the average user want to go to the trouble of downloading and installing what is essentially a 24/7 Advertisement sitting on your desktop? No I imagine not.

  So get this out of your head advertisers. Seriously, think before you try to sell something, put yourself in the users shoes. Think from their perspective. Even if the client really wants something, sometimes it’s better to save yourself the pain down the road when you program is a massive failure.