Social Platypus

Opinion Releasing unfinished games: The perfect storm of hubris and ambitious deadlines By Josiah Sapp     My very first gaming console that I remember playing was the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). Playing games like Donkey Kong Country and Mega Man X to my heart’s content. As a young lad, it would be incredibly disappointing to get half way through the game to only find out that I could never finish it unless I paid for another cartridge. Unfortunately, games today do have that problem and it’s infecting the industry as a whole. With the invention of beta demos and live updates, unfinished games are going up for sale and people still buy them. Why do gamers buy into a practice that is blatantly hurting the gaming community and why do game developers/producers feel like they can get away with it? It’s a combination of excessive pride and ambitious deadlines.     In today’s fast paced world of gaming, not being able to p...

Culture Reflection Idioms; Their meanings and where they come from. By Josiah Sapp     If you were to tell a goldfish that they were in a bowl surrounded by water, it would be difficult for them to wrap their mind around it. What is a bowl? What is water? Why am I here? Isn’t everywhere like this? It’s all they know so it would be confusing to point it out or ever give it a name. There are weird things we do as a culture and I think it’s healthy (and fun) to put a mirror up to ourselves and ask why we do the things we do. Being such a diverse country made up of people from all over the world, there is bound to be traditions and sayings that bleed into our day to day. We say phrases every day that we understand but don’t know where they come from. Folklore and myths often surround these phrases but that doesn’t stop us from saying them anyway. I’ll be creating a non-exhaustive list of popular phrases with their meaning and a brief origin explanation. If y...

Opinion Video game graphics; Going backward is moving forward. By Josiah Sapp     When I was growing up, the main thing that told me if a game was good or not was what the game looked like. The more realistic the graphics the better. That proved to me that a game was going to be entertaining because it was a cool thing to look at. I remember bringing home a Sega Dreamcast and playing it for the first time. The realism was unbelieveable. It was so good that my grandpa sat down to a watch a football game and didn’t even realize that we were actually playing that year’s iteration of Madden. Recently, graphics have been taking a back seat to gameplay and storytelling. It seems like a step back but the industry is moving forward as a whole. Minecraft     The independent (indie) game scene has really exploded over the past ten years. You can’t look at a top ten games list without including an indie game or two. Whether it be for originality...

Opinion Video game HD remakes; The power of memories. By Josiah Sapp Remakes make the gaming industry go round. It’s like their bread and butter . If a game was popular back in the day, it more than likely has a remaster, remake or HD release. Those terms are interchangeable and they essentially mean the same thing but one thing is for sure, when a remake gets announced the fans go nuts. At 2017’s Electronics Entertainment Expo (E3) a remake of Team Ico’s classic hit, Shadow of Colossus, was announced and a trailer was even shown. Fans lost their minds. The original was released in October of 2005 for the Playstation 2 and nothing like it had come out but this time around there are already games that are similar. God of War, The Last Guardian, and even Uncharted 4 has elements that are pulled from Shadow of Colossus. The question is, what makes this remake (and remakes in general) so special? Our memories do. Gamers long to experience their...

A blast from the past; My arcade cabinet restoration journey. By Josiah Sapp     Your pocket is full of quarters. It’s Friday night and the year is 1983. You’re on your bike with your friends, all heading to your town’s local arcade. You arrive and the place is packed with kids your age all lining up to play their favorite games. Pac Man; Galaga; Centipede; Donkey Kong. This is the only place these games are played and this loose change is burning a hole in your pocket. You stand in line waiting for a shot at the high score. You think to yourself that this place will always be magical. As the years go by, more of your favorite game cabinets go out of order and get carted off. A few years later, the whole arcade has to shut down due to so many of their regulars playing games at home. It’s 1992 and home video game consoles dominate the market. Arcades are closing left and right but those out of order cabinets are finding a new home.     Over the pa...