Friday, October 27, 2017

Regarding This Month's Drought and My Social Media Presence

Hey, all. Things have been quite slow this October, and when also factoring in some recent Twitter comments of mine about leaving the platform, I figure I should clue y'all in on what's going on.

First and foremost, I desperately wish this drought could be explained by it being a really busy work month (although it certainly has been that), but I'm afraid that's not the case. Earlier this month, my cousin's wife was diagnosed with an especially rare form of the paraganglioma, a cancer that's already rare in itself. While we've since approached this situation with optimism -- this isn't the first time a close family member had a brush with cancer -- as I'm extremely close with the family in question, it's naturally still on my mind 24/7, and we won't know the cancer's severity until the operation on Halloween. As two (very) young children are involved, needless to say it's a scary time.

Not to mention...honestly, it's already been an overloaded month as it is. Never mind all the hours of work, I took an insane amount of workload for Hey Poor Player earlier this month (three feature articles in three straight days), and I've been working beyond my limits to raise awareness for the site and match my monthly post quota. Furthermore, my next review...well, I won't spoil it for those waiting, but it's been a long time coming and given the massive size involved, it's been a huge stress factor as well.

In short, things may stay Hey Poor Player-only for a little while until I get my scheduling/life in order. It's a huge bummer personally since I finally set a proper set-up in penning my reviews and whatnot, but the extra workload has prevented me from carrying it out. Regardless, I hope you understand.

There's also the issue of Twitter; for the uninitiated, I have expressed a desire to drop the platform entirely. Over the past year, I have felt immense guilt associating myself with a site that, thanks to piss-poor moderation, has allowed the likes of racists, Neo-Nazis, misogynists and harassers on their platform, and I could no longer in good conscience tolerate their presence. It's immensely useful tool for sharing my work, yes, but would I be any better than those who value ad revenue over their users' safety?

However, a certain...incident threw a monkey wrench in my plans. NeoGAF, a forum I frequented for four years, underwent chaotic anarchy following sexual assault allegations against the owner, and I, like many others, did not wish any more association with the site. The exodus was immensely disheartening for everyone involved, and Twitter was the only reliable tool we had to stay in touch with old friends. In many ways, there was truly nothing like NeoGAF, it being one of the final gaming bastions of progressive ideology and a zero-tolerance policy towards any any of the alt-right rhetoric that's plagued our medium for the past several years.

Thankfully, since then we've made a smooth transition towards spiritual successor ResetEra, and while I personally couldn't be happier with how that's turned out, I'm still a little shaken by what happened. NeoGAF was set to be my one and only social internet connection once I left Twitter, and with that suddenly ripped from the equation, I'd be left with nothing else. Again, ResetEra's shaping up to be a worthy replacement, but that whole incident forced me to reconsider all my internet-related plan, and so that's why I'll be giving Twitter one last shot to redeem itself while being more proactive in calling out the filth plaguing the platform. This may, however, change depending on any further scandals with the service, so please bear that in mind.

Anyway, that's about it. I'll probably be spending the next week sorting this all out. Reset assured, Leave Luck to Heaven has some big plans in the future.


 In the meantime, it's time for me to Do the Odyssey. See ya soon!

Thursday, October 26, 2017

The Fire Emblem Warriors Beginner's Guide (Hey Poor Player)



This one's already caught up to my Star Fox 2 guide in views: over 700! Looks like you'll be seeing more guides from me in the future!

Only problem is...what would the next suitable game be? Super Mario Odyssey (COMING TOMORROW!!!) should be as accessible as any other Mario game, Skyrim's six years old, and I'm getting Xenoblade Chronicles 2 for Christmas...will I have to wait until Kirby Battle Royale?!?

Saturday, October 7, 2017

Star Fox 2 Review (Hey Poor Player)



This week just about killed me, so I wasn't able to go too in-depth in this review. Perhaps you can view this and The Beginner's Guide as two parts of a whole?

Thursday, October 5, 2017

Super Nintendo Classic Review (Hey Poor Player)




Another thousand in a day. I think I'm getting better at this, but as I'm working the next two days, the Star Fox 2 one is gonna be a doozy.

Regardless, two down, one to go.

Tuesday, October 3, 2017

The Star Fox 2 Beginner's Guide (Hey Poor Player)






That's the second time this year I've written an extraordinary amount of words (over 1700!) in one day for a Hey Poor Player article! Seeing as how I'll also be reviewing BOTH the SNES Classic and Star Fox 2 this week...well, it goes without saying Leave Luck to Heaven won't be seeing much action for a while.

By the way, this is the first guide in some time for the site. I was surprised to discover how much attention my Kirby: Planet Robobot guide for GameSkinny received after a year later, so I figured a game everyone's asking questions about would draw similar attention. Did I make the right call?