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Category: 2024

The Game Awards Are An Embarrassment To The Industry

Published January 11, 2024

Where I live, that being Ireland, the Game Awards tend to start sometime after midnight so I don’t tend to see much of it live when it airs. Not that I’m the kind of person to sit down and watch an awards show for hours when I could just look up the news afterwards but I do tend to look at the beginning of it before heading off for bed. However, while it’s certainly not all bad, I personally think we’ve gotten to the point where I have to say that I think the Game Awards are an embarrassment to the entire video game industry! That might sound a bit harsh but let me tell you why I think this.

Let’s start with a brief history of the Game Awards and the embarrassing moments that have predated this year’s event. The Game Awards were first held in 2014 as a replacement for the Spike Video Game Awards and are hosted by Geoff Keighley. The viewership of the awards has consistently grown year upon year with the 2014 Game Awards being watched by 1.9 million people to a staggering 118 million people watching the 2023 Game Awards. You’d think that this success would have led to a better awards show but issues continue to plague the Game Awards year after year. While the 2022 interruption of the Game of the Year Award may have ultimately been amusing, it highlighted the poor security of the event and the potential for dangerous actions to those attending.

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Some Anime That Have Short Episode Runtimes

Published January 8, 2024

Whenever I sit down to watch an anime series, I generally assume that the episodes will be somewhere between 20-25 minutes long. I’ll occasionally come across a series whose episodes are longer than that, Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne and Hellsing Ultimate being two in particular that come to mind, but there are also a surprising number of anime whose runtime is actually below the average, sometimes drastically. Therefore, I thought I might take a look at some anime that have short episode runtimes and how they air on television.

I should start out by saying that I have seen relatively few of these series. My focus on physical media as well as value has always limited the amount of anime with short episode runtimes that I end up seeing. I also get the feeling that they are a harder sell for licensors as I don’t recall seeing many of these series released here in the first place. Off the top of my head, the only anime that I can recall seeing that would fit this criteria is Hetalia: Axis Powers, a series which personifies nations and runs for about five minutes per episode. While the show can be a little uneven in quality at points, it’s one that, particularly as a fan of history, I ended up greatly enjoying.

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What Are The Japanese Playing Cards Karuta?

Published January 4, 2024

I was recently watching the Higurashi anime series and there was a scene, which in Higurashi fashion we saw again later on, in which the main characters partook in a card game that involved grabbing them quickly when something was said. I recognised that I’d seen this game in other media and decided to take a look into it. Therefore, I thought I might explain what karuta is and as well as some of the history of these Japanese playing cards.

First off, let’s take a look at the cards themselves and, more specifically, the types of games you can play with them. Karuta cards are broken up into two groups, cards that are descended from Portuguese-suited playing cards and cards whose lineage hails from E-awase. The two most popular card games, Uta-garuta and Iroha karuta, come from the E-awase group while cards of Portuguese-suited playing cards descent continue to be used for gambling games such as Koi-Koi, Oicho-Kabu, Tehonbiki etc.

An example of two cards, a pair, that are used in Uta-garuta.
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My Suggestion For Sony And Their Efforts On PC

Published January 1, 2024

I recently saw an article which mentioned that Sony was looking for a “PC Planning Analyst” who would assist in “driving sales success and shaping strategy for PlayStation’s fast growing PC business.” While I feel like I should be pleased to see Sony expanding their PC division, known as PlayStation PC, I am simply reminded of my growing frustration with them instead. While it’s highly unlikely that any people from Sony with the ability to make significant changes to their PC strategy will read this, I thought I’d keep yelling into the void we know as the Internet in the perhaps vain hope that something I say may make a difference in some shape or form. Given all of that, here is my suggestion for Sony and their efforts on PC.

I’ve already made a bunch of suggestions in the past with regards to Sony and their efforts on PC but my new suggestion is inspired by a few news articles that I’ve been seeing lately. The first was a news article from last year that stated fans had developed a PC port of the first Jak and Daxter game that is remarkably high-quality with numerous features such as higher framerates and resolutions. The second was from this summer where a fan ported the PS1 game Wipeout to PC and dared Sony to “either let it be, or shut this thing down and get a real remaster going” while adding “I’d love to help.” The final news came from November, just last month as of the writing of this article, and noted that the fans who had ported Jak and Daxter to PC had now ported its sequel, Jak II, to PC.

The fact that a native PC port has been developed by fans is a remarkable achievement and opens up a myriad of possibilities for Sony and their games on PC.
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