Nerd Bacon News: July 2015 (2)

Well, summertime is upon us...and it shows! Is everyone outside "enjoying" this wretched heat!? Don't get too comfortable! Keep those reflexes sharp and keep on gaming. We'd love to reach a steady goal of 100 reviews per month, but together we're going to need your help and a little bit of fresh blood in our ranks.

I apologize for being so late with this issue of Greased, but time got the best of me. The good news is that there isn't a whole lot out of the ordinary going on, so you haven't missed too much! But let's try to catch up and let's get ourselves out of this proverbial summer slump. Articles are steadily trickling out, but we know you guys can do better! We also haven't handed out any badges in the last couple of weeks, so get to work and earn a few!

This issue is a little bit shorter than usual, for a couple of reasons. As mentioned above, there hasn't been a whole hell of a lot of note happening recently, and secondly I haven't quite had the same amount of time to continually add little tidbits here and there. But hey, we feel strongly about keeping Greased relevant and worth reading, so we're not going to go out of our way to add fluff and filler.

---

Nerd Bacon Has a Birthday Coming Up!

Midway through August, Nerd Bacon will officially turn 2 years old! That's a huge accomplishment and although we still have a lot of goals left to reach, we've come much further than we expected. With a grand total of just over 1,500 published articles and a fairly solid crew of writers working with us regularly, there's nowhere to go but up!

To celebrate, we're going to look towards the number "2." Moreso than books or films, video games have the ability to carry franchises for years and years. Let's celebrate the sequel and review as many first sequels as we can, even if they don't necessarily have the number "2" in the title. What do we mean by "first sequel"? We mean the second game of the series - whether or not its expicitly titled "Game 2" or not. Dig out those Super Metroids and Mario Kart 64s and Street Fighter IIs. You can go ahead and start working on them right away since August is literally only a couple of days away and who knows? There just may be a special birthday badge in development...

---

The BLT Needs Streamers!

Some of you have offered up your help in hosting shows for future BLT slots, but we need solid committments to dates and times. We really need to get these slots filled so go ahead and tell me what Monday you can go on and what time. As always, these dates are handed out on a first come, first serve basis. August has 3 more Mondays to fill so let's fill them! We have AbyssalOblivion coming up on the 3rd and Doc Croc the following Monday on the 10th. Beyond that, we're planning for The Watchman to host another show during the month but we definitely want to get all these details in order as far ahead as possible.

We certainly don't mind having the same hosts rejoin us time and time again, but for those who haven't yet hosted, remember that this is a chance for Nerd Bacon to show off its diverse membership. We will be glad to help anyone with setup who needs it.

---

The Bacon Needs FRESH MEAT

I know we're constantly nagging you guys about this, but we really could use a strong influx of additional writers. We have Social Media Managers to help with the load of article dissemination (ZB and Steroid Gamer) and with Doc Croc as our newest editor, we definitely have the capacity to handle a more robust outflow of information. I encourage all of you to keep tapping into whatever resources you may have and driving the herds to the application. And to those of you active on social media - both on our direct behalf and those assisting us from their personal accounts - get creative! Create a Facebook post that advertises our application URL ( http://nerdbacon.com/apply/ ) or shoot out a Tweet with the URL once or twice a week. We can just as easily use social media to bring new writers to the site as well as new readers.

We had an amazing dearth of applications roll in around May and June and out of roughly 10 to 12 members who joined during that period, it appears that only 1 or 2 are still with us, and even they are on the fringes of acceptable activity. Earlier this evening I got rid of the last few of this batch after multiple emails, grace periods, and wishful thinking. Maybe it's just bad luck that we weren't able to sink our hooks into at least 3 or 4 of them, so let's get out there and continue to hit as many people as possible with the message that we need enthusiastic video game writers.

---

Review Spotlight

• Final Fantasy II - NES - Paladin
• It's easy to get carried away with big games like those in the Final Fantasy series, and here's a great example of keeping a review restrained and readable for those that haven't already played the game. It does get bogged down with specifics and intracies, aspects which can and will quickly loose casual readers. Reviews are not the place for minute discussions and explanations of in-game mechanics, and Paladin's article is a solid reminder that you can talk about complicated games without getting tangled up in those complexities.

• Hocus Pocus - PC - Action Zero
• Acion Zero rarely misses a beat when it comes to writing reviews, and Hocus Pocus might be the best entry yet in his Apogee series. With its impeccable flow and organization, this is precisely the sort of work we're looking for when we differentiate ourselves with "in depth reviews."

• Splatoon - Wii U - Steroid Gamer
• I can tell you from first hand experience that Splatoon is not the easiest game in the world to review. This article may be a little on the longer side, but it's a review where the length is warranted. Splatoon has a number of different modes and Steroid's review does an awesome job of covering the game's multiple facets. He even gives readers a glimpse of the updated material, an aspect of newer games that sometimes gets unfairly neglected.

• A Brief History of Tremor: Mortal Kombat's Lost Ninja - The Cubist
• I'll only spend a second tooting my own horn here, but I did want to draw attention to a very different type of article than we usually host here on The Bacon. At various points several of you have expressed interest in writing history-based pieces and/or those that reflect your own expertise in an area. Well, here's an example of how to pull that off. Put your knowledge to good use! Get people interested in a subject! Readers love it when writers can condense their knowledge into entertaining and digestible chunks of information, so if there's something out there you can talk about in a similar fashion, go for it!

---

Get Greasy!

Help us fill Greased with the things that you want to know about the site! What do you want us to talk about regularly? What kind of updates are you hoping for? What sort of information would inspire you to be even more productive? Let us know how we can make Greased yours and we will do our best. Don't hesititate to share any tips or tricks you may wish to share as well. We'd love to have more of you guys' and girls' input. We'd also love to field any questions that you guys and girls may have: questions about grammar, spelling, or punctuation? Maybe an ambigious piece of policy you want clarification on? Or maybe there's a technical aspect that you've seen in another article or on another site that you're interested in using? Chances are that if you have a question so does someone else, so please, speak up and ask us!

---

HELP WANTED

With Sam and Sean doing such a spectacular job of helping us out on Facebook and Twitter respectively, we hope that a few others of you might get involved with our social networking efforts as well. We don't want anyone to bite off more than they can chew, but there are 3 main areas where we could use assistance: Tumblr, Google+, and the Nerd Bacon Forums.

Tumblr is a fun place where our articles have seen a lot of activity despite a comparitively low following. If we had someone working with our Tumblr presence on a "full time" basis, who knows what sort of bump we might see in traffic. I don't know if it's owing to the nature of the service itself or what, but this is a platform where our articles are actually reaching people beyond perfunctory "likes." Better still, Tumblr is fully customizable from an appearance perspective, so if you have any knowledge of HTML and/or CSS you can put it to good use. I try to keep up with it the best that I can, but it would really benefit from having someone who could devote much more time and attention to it.

Google+ is a strange animal; it's hard to understand what sort of relevance this network has achieved. Sure it has millions of users, but is this just because Google and YouTube are integrated? Does anything really happen on Google+, or does everyone just turn to Facebook? We're not exactly sure, but we do feel it's worth a shot. Managing Nerd Bacon's Google+ presence would be a lot like managing Facebook: make sure our articles get out there and make an effort to gain followers!

The Forums are something we touch on every now and then as a way to promote group solidarity and hopefully foster discussion and participation from readers and casual visitors as well as the members themselves. It's not a difficult system to learn and tinker with, but it definitely needs full time attention to become the structured and active environment that we've envisioned.

We'd also like to expand in other ways, including an outlet on Instagram and perhaps a greater degree of social interactivity on Flickr. Although our Flickr page is teeming with photos (and we're always glad to accept more, just send 'em my way), we could use a hand when it comes to connecting with other individuals and groups. Between everyone who's submitted photos to our Flickr page there's some really great stuff that I'm sure would draw people to the site, we just need to put ourselves out there and make sure the material is seen. Assistance on either of these fronts would be appreciated as well.

If you're thinking of helping us out on social networks, please keep in mind that it is about more than simply posting links and replying to comments. We also expect you to take an active role in the social development of said platform. It's about more than putting links out there, it's about gaining followers, connecting with similar groups, and representing The Bacon as a social entity.

---

Interested in Making Videos?

It seems like we used to get tons of requests from members who wished to produce video reviews, but when we finally opened our doors wholeheartedly, we got very few takers. If you have more than 10 published reviews (which most of you do), why not try your hand at a video review or even a video Top 10? We don't want plain videos of you playing a game, though we would be happy to accept a video of you showing off a particular feat in the game - maybe a secret, or how to get through a rough patch, or something like that. Or if you wanted to take your gameplay and do something "artistic" with it that'd be great. Reviews are of course top priority, but we're definitely open to letting you flex your creativity muscles. If you're not sure about something, let us know!

Even if you're not a top-notch video producer, don't sweat it. We will definitely afford you some leniency, and after all, the only way to get better at making videos is to keep at it, and you've got to start somewhere. Your video will count as an article, so go ahead and give it a shot!

---

Site Developments

Site developments have been pretty slim lately aside from some tweaks to the Twitch menu. We do plan to go into a period of more extensive research for a mobile friendly version of Nerd Bacon, so maybe, finally, possibly, those of you who prefer surfing the web on your smartphones or tablets will have an easier time doing so when it comes to The Bacon in the not-so-distant future.

Right now we're a pretty well oiled machine, and our main focus is on production, recruiting, and sources of revenue. We need more members, more articles from our existing members, and a little bit of money coming in every month would be the icing on top, be it through adspace rentals, donations, or some other clever (but legal!) means of income. If you can bring us some big bucks, we'd be happy to cut you a commission!

---

Until Next Time...

Ok, so I know this wasn't a huge news-bomb for covering almost 4 weeks worth of material, but I think the important stuff is out there. I know a lot of you have been having fun with Twitch lately but please don't forget about priority #1 - the site and the reviews which populate the site! August starts in a little over 12 hours, so go ahead and start planning to review whatever "first sequels" you have!

---