Personal

Fresh Games for My European Travels

JettLeave a comment

With London, Paris, figuring out how to watch the rest of the NBA Finals while in Europe, and a date with the Spice Girls at Wembley Stadium ahead of me, the last thing I should be concerned about is what games I’ll be playing for the next few weeks. Odds are, I won’t have much of any time to play stuff. And that’s for the best! I’m excited to explore new parts of London and England that I didn’t get to last time, while immersing myself in a whole new world in Paris.

And yet, here I am, making preparations to ensure that I have something fresh to play during the flights, trains, and whatever little down time we have. Partially cause those moments of down time could be great for trying something new while giving me more things to write about. But mostly because I have the attention span of a peanut and require constant mental stimulation.

In light of the circumstances, this list is comprised entirely of Nintendo Switch titles. It’s also a little price-conscious, as this adventure has already proven to be a pricey one before we’ve even stepped on a plane.

Continue reading →

Establishing a Foothold on YouTube

Jett3 Comments

Over the past year or so, I’ve spent a lot of time trying to establish the In Third Person footprint across different online platforms. The blog is home base and should continue to be for the foreseeable future. Twitch has been a major focus of late, having spent hundreds of hours streaming, tinkering with my equipment, building episodes of Boss Rush, and repurposing content for other platforms. Much of that content goes into my Instagram, where it’s used as a space for stream highlights, screenshots, conversation starters, and sneak peeks into my life outside of gaming.

I’ve achieved some success, but there’s also been a lot of failure. The most notable of those is my presence on YouTube.

Continue reading →

10 Years of In Third Person: Moments in the Sun

Jett1 Comment

Late last year, I was playing Tetris Effect when I stumbled on a cool secret level with visuals and music inspired by the 1989 Game Boy version of Tetris. Not thinking much of it, I recorded some video of it and put it on my channel. To my surprise, the video built a head of steam until it was prominently featured on Kotaku.

Whether they chose my video to feature at the top because it was the best one or only one available at the time, it was cool to get at least a subtle nod from one of the biggest gaming publications around. Here’s a few more times my work reached beyond the bounds of this site!

Continue reading →

A Time to Play

JettLeave a comment

Before every episode of Boss Rush, I ask everyone on the show what they’ve been playing. From there, I gather B-roll footage of every game we’re talking about so that we have that visual companion to our discussion. As I was putting together the latest episode of the show, it dawned on me that I haven’t been playing much at all of late.

Continue reading →

Decorating My Video Game Streaming Space

Jett4 Comments

Steff and I have big dreams for this basement of ours. We want to rip out the carpet, update the walls to anything other than wood paneling, and knock down the dividing wall so that the basement is one large space. Someday, we envision it being a larger entertaining space.

In light of these plans, I’ve been reluctant to decorate down here. Didn’t want to go through the trouble of putting things up, only to have to duplicate the effort after the room has been renovated. As such, the only real decor you’ve seen of my streaming room until recently was a large Snorlax bean bag chair.

However, a couple of things have happened since we came up with our future vision for the basement. One, our priorities around the house have shifted to other projects. Two, I started taking streaming seriously. Part of taking streaming seriously is ensuring that everything you see adds to the overall experience. Snorlax is cute, but I’m no longer content with using an empty wall and an oddly-placed divider curtain as my backdrop. Recently, I finally decided to spruce the place up a bit.

Continue reading →

We’re Going Across the Pond to London and Paris!

JettLeave a comment

Though Steff and I have been plotting this in the background for quite some time, we’re finally at a place where we can talk about it without jinxing anything [knocks on wood]! During the middle of June, we’ll be spending a few days in London and Paris!

Continue reading →

Exploring Combo Systems in Fighting Games

Jett1 Comment

Earlier this year, I was enjoying the indie fighting game Blade Strangers. Despite having put a number of hours into it, I hadn’t been playing it in the traditional sense ever since I wrapped up the review. The online community is virtually dead, making it extremely difficult to play with another human. I haven’t even been fighting against the computer much.

Instead, my primary focus was to explore the game’s combo system through training mode. One by one, I’ve been training with each character as a means of understanding the game’s combo mechanics. Will be the first to admit that this is an odd way to consume a fighting game, but let me explain. Continue reading →

New School Cool: How an old man learned that the kids of today will be alright

JettLeave a comment

When I graduated from middle school many moons ago, I didn’t put much thought into the world I was leaving behind. All I could think about was the summer ahead and the anxiety that came with high school looming. Meanwhile, the school carried on, grooming the kids of today into the adults of tomorrow. It never dawned on me what that meant until I found myself returning to the scene of my awkward adolescence.

Continue reading →

Opening My Eyes to Roguelikes and Rogue-lites

Jett1 Comment

Despite being a life-long gamer, the Roguelike and Rogue-lite sub-genres of games have largely been left untouched until relatively recently. Didn’t even know what the genre was until I heard about it on a podcast well into my adult years. The sound of grinding through randomly-generated dungeons in an RPG where all your progress is lost when you die didn’t sound like my cup of tea.

In recent years, elements of the Roguelike experience have permeated to other genres while also toning down the punishment. For example, games of the Rogue-lite variety often give players some means of permanently improving their situation in order to make future runs a bit easier. As for me, I have little interest in playing a dungeon crawl in any genre, but I was willing to give Rogue-lite games like Into the Breach and 20XX a chance due to being rooted in games I love like Advance Wars and Mega Man.

Continue reading →

The Evolution of My Dream Gaming Space

Jett7 Comments

As a kid, I had this vision for what my dream gaming setup would look like. On one end, a large screen with all of my gaming consoles hooked up to it. On the other end, a nice comfy couch for me and my friends to sit on and enjoy the action. Lined along the walls would be all of my games and gaming memorabilia. Even as an adult, I had it in my mind that I would work towards creating a setup like that someday.

These days, my wife and I are pretty settled into our house. I have the basement as a space to create this gaming den of my dreams. Money is still an issue, but that’s not what’s ultimately stopping me from assembling some version of that dream setup.

Continue reading →