Critical Reflection

Link to Prezi

Magazine

Diction

A very important element of this magazine is the diction and lingo used. Like in every other topic there is specific jargon that the target audience can relate and connect to. I plan on making specific word choices in my spread and maybe even on the other parts of the magazine that will digress from making the product "amateur". Word choice is one of the most important considerations that I think I've had to make. 

The Interviews

   Along with other research on statistics, charts, and information about the video game. I was able to contact gamer friends of Jessica's that stream this game on the online site "Twitch" (Jessica's topic). 
Jack Sampson and John Huber were able to answer a lot of my questions about  the game via Jessica's Skype chat (purpleghostkasper) 
Down below are the interviews... I think that I can even use some of the interview as quotes for my two page spread. This information is valid and coming from passionate, educated lovers of this game. It would be a great inclusion in the spread in my opinion to have them be portrayed as well. 

Jessica  (Purpleghostkasper) : -what is the biggest difference, in your opinion, between Super Smash Bros 4 Wii U and 3DS?

-which one is your favorite of the two and why?

-How would you compare it to the other smash brothers games of the past?

-What is your opinion of the amiibo feature?

 Those are the questions, I'm most likely going to have follow up questions though

John Huber: -The biggest transition between 3DS and Wii U is the frame rate. The 3DS runs Smash Bros at 30 frames per second while the Wii U runs it at 60 frames per second. The time you have to react for an input is double on the 3DS.

John Huber: -My personal favorite is 3DS because of Smash Run and being able to play anywhere is a bonus for the 3DS. What makes me want to pick the Wii U is the faster frame rate because I just like to press buttons fast.

John Huber: -I would say that Smash 4 is a great casual party game, but the way I look at Smash Bros is as a competitive game. The mechanics of Smash 4 make for a slow neutral game and a lack of a combo game. Melee, one of the best Smash Bros. of all time has been able to hold up for 13 years and able to pull the most attendence and viewership of all Smash games due to its natural fast pace and hype sets. The amount of technical skill in Smash 4 is next to none which in my opinion is one of the things that makes the game different. The removal of tripping has made it better than Brawl because they are both slow paced matches and the rng mechanic made competitive Brawl unappealing. Last on the Nintendo offical releases is Smash 64. Smash 64 is more interesting than Smash 4 due to 64 actually having combo strings and even though the speed of the game is slow the amount of tech skill in 64 still outpasses Smash 4.

John Huber: -The only thing I could say about amiibos is  if you are looking to get better at the game with a trained cpu, you most likely will. 

Jessica  (Purpleghostkasper) -what is the biggest difference, in your opinion, between Super Smash Bros 4 Wii U and 3DS?

-which one is your favorite of the two and why?

-How would you compare it to the other smash brothers games of the past?

-What is your opinion of the amiibo feature?

Thrice Nightly (Jack Sampson): -Smash bros for wii u and smash bros for 3ds are generally the same as they both possess all the same characters. While they have some differences between game modes the biggest difference is the stages. The stages are almost completely seperate between the two versions besides a few that carry over. When you play smash with your friends, you generally don't do any of the extra game modes but the stages are a very integral part of the gameplay.

Thrice Nightly (Jack Sampson): Thats question 1

Thrice Nightly (Jack Sampson): -My favorite of the two would for sure be the wii u version because it allows for up to 8 player multiplayer with only 1 console and copy of the game. The best part about smash bros is playing with your friends for hours at a time, its not nearly as fun when played alone.

Thrice Nightly (Jack Sampson): -Smash bros for wii u is the fourth game in the series and is quite different from the others. Smash 64 was very simple, smash melee was very fast and complex, smash brawl went back to its slower routes and simplified the movement while keeping the complex movesets. This game perfected what brawl was trying to achieve with its slower gameplay. It is still very technical when played well, but not as complicated as melee.

Thrice Nightly (Jack Sampson): -The amiibo feature is a cool addition to the game as it lets you train the computer player yourself. Normally all you could do to change the computer players was adjust their skill level but the amiibo are actually able to learn from how you play. I only wish you could do more with those players once you got them to the level you desired.

Practice Makes Perfect

Photography and Cropping has been an exciting challenge for this project. Jessica and I have a lot of controllers and devises that we have used in our favor to incorporate to our spreads and designs. Along with art work by hand and even from programs like Windows and Apple "Paint", these photographs have been a huge part of every section of the magazine. The difficult thing about these pictures is how we fit them in. Cropping and editing authentic images taken by ourselves have been a first time task for us that we have tried to excel at. 
We have watched tutorials online and studied the techniques to remove the background of pictures. 

I can simply say that with practice, editing has been something that my partner and I have been able to accomplish. 

Changes and Tweeking

This week my main goal has been to keep putting all the pieces of the magazine together. Now that we have the draft of each section complete, and the content of course, we must start the final assembling. For every project there are always finishing touches and changes. Some of the designs that we have created do need to get polished. 

Designing a print directed to a video-game/cyber fanatics requires a balance of cartoon and realism. Above, is the design of our table of contents without anything on it. The design exemplifies a simplistic essence of retro video gaming  with contrasting neutral and bright colors (in this case purple and grey), and geometric "boxy"-type backgrounds. I was inspired by the design and manufacturing of the gaming console the Game Cube. 

 The important thing now is to make sure that it gets that realistic aspect to it. Our audiences are obviously in the present. Now video games have better graphics and more complex eye catching designs. Thankfully, Adobe will help us get there and find that balance in color schemes and designs. 

Adobe Photoshop

To create a magazine, Jessica and I have used the Adobe Photoshop to polish our editions. This same program has been effective in allowing us to keep a cohesive style in the execution and decoration of our prints. For our title, we used a font generator that created the exact letter style that we wanted for the magazine. With Photoshop we are currently in the process of putting all the pieces together. This pertains to the pictures, texts, and other aspects of the design. 

The cover is probably the most important part of these magazines in my opinion. This is the "eye-catcher" of the whole print so we are working on making it display exactly what we want the magazine's message to say. 

Since we already have the sketches done of the other parts, now it will be easy to put the information down on the program.