Blog Hiatus Announcement

At the beginning of this year I posted some huge plans for this blog and other projects I was thinking about trying out over 2017. While I am proud of everything I do, especially that grueling Legend of Zelda Retrospective (which, I'll have you know, was completely spur-of-the-moment), the fact of the matter is this blog simply isn't pulling in numbers and I feel like my time could be spent on something more productive.

When I first starting posting on this blog at the beginning of 2015, I only ever expected for my reviews to get a handful of views and I'd call it a day after a few months. Two and a half years later, I somehow accrued somewhere in the neighborhood of 7,000 lifetime views with several posts being read per day. Frankly, I don't know where these views are coming from since Google won't show exact traffic sources, but the fact that anybody has read my stuff gives me a tremendous sense of joy.

At the same time, I can't shake the feeling of ambivalence my blog seems to give off. In two years, the blog has received no followers on Google and my Facebook page is filled entirely with my very close and beloved friends and family to whom I reached out. Internet frauds are always lambasting how they're under abuse and get doxxed or whatever, but you have a platform on which to expound upon your views.

I never once expected to reach any sort of heights with this blog, but I will admit the main point I wanted out of this was to have a dialogue about the things I liked. And no, I don't mean "shouting about stuff, turning off comments and ratings and telling everyone I'm a victim," I mean I just outright wanted to discuss stuff here. Looking at the general feedback of my blog, conversation isn't really what people are here for.

One of the most frustrating elements of Blogger--a problem I don't think can be solved--is that I can't tell the engagement rate of my content. Blogger does share important information with its users, especially when it comes to the likes of traffic sources and demographics, but the most all-important statistic of all is completely missing: viewer retention. On my equally tiny Youtube account, I can see just how long people watch my videos and what point the viewer becomes disinterested--if I were a more active video producer, that kind of information is extremely constructive as it gives an idea of what audiences want to watch in their videos.

I'm totally willing to admit that people just don't want to read blogs on the internet anymore. I'm also willing to admit that my blog is probably just niche and uninteresting for people, though I take great pride in what I do and how I create content here. I have never gone out of my way to promote my blog outside of my small social media accounts (which will be linked at the bottom), so just thinking this blog has gotten so many views this far is nothing short of miraculous. Fact of the matter is, this is the only type of content I'm interested in producing. I don't care about Youtube, I don't care about making videos. I've always been a writer, and I will be until the day I die.

I don't like talking much about myself, but my goal in life has always been to write fiction. But on the other hand, I'm not a very popular guy and I don't have professional contacts at all. I'm more of by-the-bootstraps type of person and I want to succeed with my own talent, though Subjective Objective has kind of revealed exactly what that entails and it's pretty demoralizing. Maybe if I can squeeze it in I'll go and make a few silly videos on Youtube. But these twenty-page nightmares are simply more trouble than they're worth, and without the all-important critical feedback I can't tell if people are dropping my blogs after reading a sentence or coming back for more every day. This is all for your entertainment, and if I don't think you're entertained then I'm not entertained.

Long story short, I'm not done with this blog entirely. Just last night I was thinking about writing a review for Edgar Wright's new film Baby Driver, but I'll wrap it all up here by just saying you need to go see it. But when people can just go to highly-produced content like Red Letter Media or Matthewmatosis, it makes these quaint little blogs feel obsolete. I'm working two jobs and going out of my way to stress myself out over this blog, especially like I did for the Zelda Retrospective, does more harm than good. And since I'm a pitiful Millennial working with a useless degree, I don't have insurance to cover the stress of "nobody is reading my blog on the internet."

But that all goes back to my main goal: fiction. I took a very long break from writing to find a voice with this blog, and at the end of the day I think it more than succeeded with that goal. I want to say with absolute clarity that I understand getting anywhere with fiction, especially at the rate publishers are picking up and dropping new titles on a daily basis, is even more of a pipe dream than finding an audience with this blog. Even if I write the best story you've ever seen, there's no guarantee that it'll even be looked at. I'd love for that to happen, but if you've read this blog you know I'm a pessimist.

So to wrap this all up, I'm not quitting the blog entirely and I'm not announcing that I've got some big novel coming out or whatever. Simply put, I lost my focus and this blog helped me get it back. After all is said and done, you'll definitely see more here. I'm just way too busy and spread way too thin to continue at this rate. You should see how many drafts I have that I simply never finished, if I had the time I wish I could write them all at this moment but I just know I'd kick myself for distracting myself unnecessarily.

If you like what I've written, please share it with your friends. Blast me in the comments if you want, say hi on Twitter, I really don't care. If I see any sort of increased traffic, I'd be glad to come back and continue churning out more hyper-contrarian reviews for all of you. But right now, I have a story that needs to be written--not read, but written--and me reviewing the Akira manga or Twin Peaks can wait until my pet project is done.

I hope that you all enjoy my blog, and I'll see you at the end of the tunnel.

Social media:

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Cdepineda

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EssoReviews/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/essoreviews
Personal Twitter: https://twitter.com/wordsmith_chris

E3 2017 Day One Wrap Up: EA

I'm so done with this shit. E3 is the pits: an indulgent, hedonistic ritual to showcase video games we could all just watch as press releases. Since developers need game journalists and game journalists need to justify their jobs, E3 is half a celebration of excess and half game journalists just repeating what we could have watched with our own eyes with a snide "take" on everything. You're game journalists, nobody cares about whatever conversation you're trying to peddle.

EA, the first developer to create video games out of their own employees' blood, began the show a day early--as if they couldn't inflate their ego any further--and opened their show with a completely detached and boring show from a drumline in sports uniforms that I could not possibly care any less about. The reason for this needless waste of time? Why, announcing the new Madden product will feature a story mode, because that worked very well for 2K's NBA 2K16.

After some meaningless business talk from an EA suit, the conference then switched over to Battlefield 1, a game which single-handedly ruined the release of my favorite game of last year. Apparently they're putting out paid DLC with more maps to divide their playerbase--a draconian practice Titanfall 2 discarded because that game and Respawn are awesome. Beginning with their Battlefield 1 showcase, EA introduced the main thesis of their show: EA is hip with the kids, so here are a bunch of lame, unfunny, cringe-inducing game streamers who shouted at the TV and caused much euphoria among pre-teens who don't want to play video games.

The subsequent twenty hours of the show were dedicated to FIFA, announcing...??? It was here that the streaming thesis fell apart entirely with some no-name Youtuber fumbling over the most basic of tasks: reading a teleprompter. I would have been embarrassed if I wasn't choking to death on my laughter. The game this nobody ruined his life over? The new Need for Speed product. Did you play the last one? You won't play this one either!

The developers of the critically-acclaimed Indie Darling Brothers then took the stage to announce their new game, A Way Out. This new game will force the player to ruin their experience with a co-op partner through the entire experience. The presenter couldn't remember his own name, so why would I trust someone like this with my very hard-earned and valuable money? Pass.

EA's disgraced team Bioware teased a new game which was only a CG trailer and promised the "full trailer" at Microsoft's presentation. I'm sure Bioware can definitely handle a new project after Dragon Age II, Mass Effect 3, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Dragon Age: Inquisition, and Mass Effect: Andromeda. If you're not comfortable showing me gameplay--and Bioware should never feel comfortable--then please get right out of my rugged face, I don't care at all about CG non-game trailers and you shouldn't either; these don't show you a thing about the game and can be manipulated in ways that don't reflect the game at all. The presenter also referred to the game as "vast" so I'm sure it's going to be a worthless open-world title.

~sports~

"Thirty minutes of pure, unadultered Star Wars" sounds like a brand new circle of Hell that Satan created just for Millennials. "Someone," whose name I can't remember and will be referenced solely by the name "Someone," very excitedly announced that EA took common sense into account and will implement a new offline single-player campaign into Battlefront 2. However, Someone's enthusiasm rubbed on me so much that I'm probably going to skip the game out of spite. It looks pretty fun, actually, and all the vehicle combat looks great--it's just a shame that the actress involved had to be excited to show off the story mode, because now I'll just think about how annoyed I was for a few seconds while watching EA's conference.

All in all, I'd give EA's 2017 conference an F-. I'm sure a lot of people would really appreciate the Star Wars stuff, but as a human being who can't handle anymore of the franchise at this point I'm lukewarm. The presenter was obnoxious and I'd rather just play Titanfall 2, but I'm mildly interested. That indie game threatening me with forced co-op pissed me off, and a combined hour of sports was purely uninteresting to me. Of course, there's Bioware's new embarrassing game to look out for, but only for the fact that if this game does poorly, EA will probably sell them off or something.

A note on the other E3 conferences this year: I'm extremely busy the week of E3 so I probably won't have my reactions up as timely as this one. Truth be told, they'll probably be up the day after the conferences air, if not a bit later. I'm trying to keep things on track but life stuff is more important than video games. As always, follow my social media accounts (one of you better do it this time) if you want to stay updated.

Social media:

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Cdepineda

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/EssoReviews/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/essoreviews
Personal Twitter: https://twitter.com/wordsmith_chris