Hello again! May’s already almost over, and we’re on the verge of the Switch 2 launching! I’ve been busy with IRL stuff and playing various queue games for review, along with my plans for Switch 2 coverage and such, plus some housekeeping things I need to do. And of course, a status bit on The Article that keeps on taking forever. Let’s dive in!
SEARCH IS BROKEN I’M SORRY
Right before this went live I had to amend this post since as I was finishing my Technos Super Pocket review, I learned the site search is completely busted; this may be why traffic to some of my older articles has been down this month, since wordpress search decided to not work. I don’t know what the heck is going on but I will investigate sometime later in the week and hopefully fix it on the site end, either via a theme update or a plugin, if needbe…
On desktop, searching just does not bring up posts by the body text of the article anymore, which is completely against the point of searching on SFG, as posts are what every review is classified under.
Sincere Apologies. Now back to all the stuff I wrote Sunday.
LRG Part 3 is not Half Life 3
I’m making this priority no 1 (edit: now 2) in the status update to get things outta the way. As noted in February’s update and in prior postings, I’m reminding readers again, LRG Part 3 isn’t meant to be a gargantuan expose or anything that reveals stuff about LRG as a whole you probably don’t already know; I will go more in depth on certain aspects of that quality control based on stuff I’ve heard from sources/seen on the open internet/recent actions LRG has done, but yet again, I’m reiterating the whole piece is to bookend my coverage of LRG’s quality control and conduct, and if they improved at all (spoiler alert: no), and to finally stop talking about Limprint in big articles for good.
Just restating it, since I finally finished my rewrites of the LRG article, am nearing the end of the conclusion paragraph, and now have to touch it up with links/extra paragraphs inbetween to give context. Is it a wild, rambly road per the usual LRG article norm? Probably. Is it worth it? I don’t think so, it’s just an opinion piece, but I will say the journey from me doing it as a ko-fi goal a single person had me reach in August, followed by a certain someone clearly trying to rig my opinion with a subsequent donation, to someone’s own video coming out doing their own investigation on LRG, on a completely different path and scale than my own, kinda made this whole process a wild headache of a ride.
I don’t want people to expect my piece to be a big revelation; just part chronicle, part ramble on LRG’s QC habits and the behavior of both of their founding members which I have been aware of for multiple years. It kinda shows the whole reason for them to be doing QC the way they did, and my prior LRG pieces even stated as such too. So yeah, I have no ETA still, I’d like to get it out in may, but I’m still not confident enough to lock in yet, but I’m hoping to get the skeleton finally, finally all finished by the end of the month to have it go through checking with some sources and press pals. I really want to get it just right. And then I can be left alone on this subject and discussing the market forever. Needless to say, my next Ko-Fi goal will be a much simpler one.
Opencritic Cleanup + Gaming Journalism Woes
In a weird way, this section connects back into my prior article when I rambled about why parts of the bigger gaming media haven’t investigated the contents of the video I recommended the other day, to dive into what exactly is right or wrong with the video and if the allegations within are worth diving into it further.
For one thing, I mellowed out quite a bit in the weeks since upon learning more from press peers why it hasn’t been a thing the media would focus on, (tldr: bigger priorities to focus on compared to investigating a youtuber’s own investigation into a niche company of niche products) though I still would prefer they stop giving Limprint companies in general more media coverage than they need. The next aspect is how games media across the board have been hit with layoffs and various destructive habits from the big corporations that own them, and in a media scape that’s shrinking and bigger priorities even struggle to get satisfactory coverage, I should have realized that “oh yeah, they have a lot of issues of their own to deal with right now”.
Unfortunately this also hasn’t stopped assholes from dunking on people getting laid off because heaven forbid someone passionate about the gaming industry is frustrated they got thrown to the wolves by corrupt buyouts and big corporations, and it personally irks me that I saw another gaming website openly allowed one of their own writers who participated in such behavior to write a little blurb about Space Invaders for them. I may have gotten after certain websites in the past for how they handled indies or coverage of controversial gaming systems, but I still never would stoop to the level of wanting layoffs. Yet here we are, in a frustrating world where people will do such a thing and still get a games writing job while hard working, long-term games writers get thrown to unemployment because of crooks like Valnet.
Oh, that also ties into an awkward aspect I just realized while watching the whole polygon situation unfold. So apparently, the notorious new buyer of Polygon, ran by a guy who made abusive video websites and has ran multiple websites into the ground is the owner of Opencritic, a site I have used for SFG reviews to get spread far and wide and have been a major factor in SFG’s growth as a whole. This is incredibly awkward since I did some catchup on making all my reviews on opencritic up to date a few nights ago, but I really do not like the idea of working indirectly or directly with a corporation like Valnet. Rest assured, I’ve never been in contact with Valnet, will never accept contact with Valnet, and will terminate my opencritic status the minute they try to meddle with things or put pressure on me.
I know this may really hurt SFG’s views and reach if this happens, so hopefully it won’t and Valnet stays semi-hands off of Opencritic, but quite bluntly, I like my independence and enjoy covering games and having more people find my reviews, so I won’t hesitate to terminate a relationship with OC if Valnet were to come knocking at my door or try to meddle with SFG in any way. If you have any concerns, don’t hesitate to email me. Considering how I went so long without updating OC anyhow, I wouldn’t exactly be opposed to being slow on my OC updates in the future, either.
I value my morals as a solo games writer over view chasing, and that’ll continue to be the case. On that front, i’m very happy the SwitchScores guy is pretty chill and does great work for his site, and I do think I’ll try to put my page there on the sidebar in the near future. Go check it out if you like my Switch/Switch 2 stuff!
Common Sense regarding GenAI + Pitches + etc
I’ve gotten an unusual amount of emails, most of which are clearly spam, from weirdos who want to write “guest posts” and “guest articles” about stuff not even related to games in the slightest, but if they are related, it’s usually something about GenAI or Crypto/gambling. I updated my contact page with similar warnings, but let me reiterate my stance here since I figured it was common sense before now.
Seafoam Gaming is 100% solo operated. I will never allow a second staff member to join the site. I am open to collaborating on various things with artist/translators/writers in the past and have done so with things such as my major interviews. But I want to compensate people I work with for their help, and thus, I cannot even take on a second person if I wanted to.
So thus, I commission when the time is right, and am doing so now with my drafts for the new SFG site logo. And of course, SFG will never partake in Generative AI, NFT, Crypto, or real world/sports Gambling content in any way, shape or form. They go against my morals and everything in those fields is almost always terrible. Please stop asking me. If people keep asking me after this and my new contact page, I’m gonna assume you are a spambot and will block you from my email address.
Go read Ed Zitron’s blog if you somehow think Generative AI is close to a good idea that won’t implode in the future and make all the tech investors realized they lit mountains of money on fire.
OK finally review updates
Now we’re back on track, sorry for all that preemptive rambling! I had a lot on my mind from recent events to get off first. But yes, as of when this article goes live, you should be able to see a review of a Technos Super Pocket soon. If not, then I’m almost done and probably got caught up in IRL stuff again, but that’s my first hardware review of three things I’m covering, soon to be four. Kinda nice to be doing a hardware review again!
Next up is Justice Ninja Casey, which goes in nicely with the whole Technos stuff despite not being a Technos game, due to feeling a lot like some of the Kunio titles. And speaking of, the actual Technos collection, Super Technos World, should have a review out next week! That’ll get the current Switch queue down to just Clock Tower, and the Steam queue all fully freed up before Fuga 3 comes by to hopefully let me cover it and end that trilogy off for good. Fingers crossed I can get that done before Switch 2 drops in early June.
As for the legacy queue, I’m at a bit of a crossroads with it. I’m nearly done with my notes for the parts of Deadly Premonition I played, and the port is old enough I think I’ll cover that on my Switch 1 and review it as such. By the time I get to Mary Skelter, I’ll be on Switch 2 and will likely be playing it there, and I don’t expect performance changes to be a factor whatsoever. Luckily the remaining two queue games are both games that a more powerful system won’t impact at all, but if I do take up future Switch titles, that may be a tricky aspect to consider moving forward; reviewing them as Switch games even if Switch 2 makes them better? Scoring them strictly based on Switch 1 performance, or Switch 2? Or just covering the package as a whole regardless of Switch model? I gotta figure out something soon, and hopefully I can. I’ll also be covering the Evercade EXP-R and Analogue Pocket when I have a chance to as well.
Lord help me for PS4’s queue. With Switch 2 as a focus that’ll go even more into the backburner, but I stick with my queues until they’re all clear, and that will still apply to the PS4 queue. There’s a slim chance though I may play on PS4 quite a bit for a game to take notes on that version for the review, and then end up buying it on Switch to play more in-depth as a game. I’ll have to debate what to do next in that aspect, especially with some of these queue waits getting ridiculous by my standards. Could I just punt on them and cancel the reviews? Maybe, but I still enjoyed the queue games I covered last year, and readers did too, so I’m gonna stick with the queues until the very end.
The Nintendo Switch 2 is also near…
Of course i’d be remiss to not bring up the fact that the Switch 2 is in sight, and I am indeed getting one ASAP. I’ll do a hardware review on that as soon as I can, and I have one launch game I plan to cover with my own money that fits in nicely with a PS4 game on the queue.
Can you guess what that launch game might be? Either way, i figured it’d be a fun warmup for getting back to that PS4 game, and a nice way to kickstart Switch 2 reviews when I do. I will still be careful when accepting coverage for S2 games as I do now with other platforms, but I definitely have very high hopes for this great hardware, which seems to be accomplishing all my dreams of a better switch and then some! Forgive me if the week after the system comes out, I punt everything else to focus on covering Switch 2’s hardware and maybe the launch game I pick up.
Conclusion & Thanks
Sorry for another ramble, but I enjoy these. These status updates help me take a break from reviews and keeps my mind sharp enough, while also updating my readers on stuff that’s going on, especially with me continuing my social media absence. It’s pretty nice, not seeing people in panic attacks every day and having that spread onto me as well. I do miss some of my readers, but with the auto poster mostly working well, (it missed my Magic John review though, go read that if you haven’t already) I think I still am in decent communication with you all.
And of course, don’t hesitate to shoot me an email if you want to keep in touch or note something to me, just be kind. Or post in the comments down below. Until next time, take care and be safe!