I was loosely planning to do something special for my 500th post. Something that would have embodied everything that I’ve tried to do with this blog over the past 22 months…
Then I looked at my post count and realized I was at 515. I missed it. I like that I missed it too. Life shouldn’t be so carefully planned out.
That’s why I’d like to announce my retirement effective immediately…ok, just kidding, I’m not done here, not until it ceases to be fun and we’re nowhere near that point yet.
Thanks for coming along with me on however many of the 515 you have. Maybe I’ll see you again at 1030.
-Dan
Oh! Last minute housekeeping:
You probably didn’t notice the stealth launch of my Features page. Right there on the sidebar you can easily access any entry to the features that live on my blog, so fret no more about getting from post to post in order. I also plan on adding a page that will be a resource for access to all of the reviews on the site, but that won’t be launched until I get a chance to figure out precisely how I want to lay it all out.
Sorry to keep delaying posts, but the rest of this week is super busy thanks to the recent blizzard, so I probably won’t have anything until next week. Don’t worry, the ME2 review should be about as epic as the Brütal Legend one to make up for the lack of posts.
Blame Joker. It's totally not my fault.
I’m a little behind on my Mass Effect 2 review thanks to travel and having to finish that second playthrough. It’ll be up later tonight or Thursday and I might have something for WMQ tomorrow.
WHY?!
Not quite the Pikachu cosplay most people come to the site for.
Page Views
The Villains of Final Fantasy Week 10 [Game Overview] – 51 hits (Pink) Masks [Game Overview] – 37 hits Game Overview: The Villains of Final Fantasy Week 6 – 30 hits The Villains of Final Fantasy Week 11 [Game Overview] – 29 hits Game Overview: The Villains of Final Fantasy Week 1 – 27 hits
The Heroes of Final Fantasy series comes directly from the success of my Villains series in attracting so many visitors to my blog. Four of the top five are from that series while the second highest comes from a long comments discussion with readers that I had in the post.
Search Terms
final fantasy concept art – 29 hits jecht – 28 hits cosplay cleavage – 16 hits pokemon cosplay – 15 hits ffx – 13 hits
The concept art, Jecht, and FFX searches can find what they’re looking for with the links above. The other two, cosplay cleavage and pokemon cosplay, are probably a result of me posting that picture of a blonde at San Diego Comic-Con cosplaying as Pikachu in a mini-skirt and corset.
It’s interesting that my Villains of series is so popular and attracts so many views. I really wasn’t expecting that much attention for them, but that shows what I know. Welcome to any newcomers seeing this page. Maybe I’ll do a search terms post like I did once before to try and answer questions that people coming to the site are asking sometime soon.
Another year closes on IBNttT and while this blog is still less than two years old, I feel like it’s been steadily improving since its inception.
When I first started it up, I wanted to keep an editorial voice and keep my personal life out of the mix. I strove to develop a unique, editorial voice, but I stopped short of personal anecdotes and opinions beyond critical expression. I can’t say that this blog has morphed into a forum for me to talk about my feelings or anything, but I do know that a combination of reading a lot of tim rogers and coming across Gamers With Jobs and attempting to get a writing gig with them opened me up to a more personal writing style that integrated my life experiences into my work. It’s a style I’m still experimenting with, but it’s nice to see that it’s generally well-received among my readers.
Speaking of the readers, 2009 was also the year that I almost quit blogging. Until Eric installed traffic plugins to the backend, I was feeling like I was screaming into the void and only he was reading. Granted, 2009 was also the year that I actually told some of my friends that I did regularly write on a blog. I still keep this site on the down low for most, but I’m glad that those of you who do frequent the blog continue to read, despite its rather narrow focus on the things I’m interested in (baseball and video games). Knowing that people do occasionally stop by to see the nonsense that I put up here helps me keep on keeping on, so thanks for reading in 2009 and I hope to continue to improve the site in 2010.
Happy New Year,
Dan
You guys like Best of the decade lists? I know I do, but I also don’t have the depth of knowledge to really examine what the true bests were nor do I have the desire to rank them. Instead, I’ll probably write about the things that made the most impact on me over this past ten years (a wildly long span of time in which my tastes have all shifted, changed, or matured).
Expect me to look at the books, music, games, movies, and maybe tech/tech trends/websites over these past years that have had a major impact on me, possibly starting tomorrow, but maybe Thursday instead.
Thanksgiving approaches this week and my posting will get sporadic. Go hang out with your family too!
Taking this weekend off. Be back whenever you see some posts from me!
You may have noticed a new feature on the sidebar of the blog today: Pages!
While the About page is fairly boring, the more important page is my new Amazon Store (or aStore)!
You don’t have to buy the stuff I feature on the blog through my store, but if you do, it benefits me with a little extra scratch. My plan is to fill the store with the stuff that I find cool and that I would personally recommend, so it’s all top-notch, at least in my humble opinion.
