Hey folks and welcome to Bel’s Blog Bonanza, a bi-weekly feature here on MMOGames where I attempt to highlight some of the more interesting topics currently cycling through the gaming blogosphere. One of my favorite aspects of writing about games, is the interactions I have with other bloggers. In this column, it is my goal to highlight some of the individuals in this community and present their interesting take on current issues. Let us dispense with the introduction and get to the awesome.
The awesome folks at MMOGames have been so gracious to let me lend the “bonanza” column over to the Newbie Blogger Initiative during the month of May. This means that I will be helping to track all of the activity that is happening in the community from the various participants and sponsors. There is still plenty of month left so if you have ever considered starting a blog, please check out the official website or some of the posts today. We need a regular infusion of new blood and with it new ideas to keep game blogging fresh.
Each year we ask for a crop of new recruits to sign up to be part of the Newbie Blogger Initiative and after the first year I started referring to this concept like you would a class in school. As such each year I create a special section of my blog roll that I label the “Class Of” where I try my best to track all of the new participants. The hope is that over the course of this month the list will grow, but for only being eight days in I am bolstered by the participation we have already. I highly suggest that you follow all fourteen of these “Newbies” and give them your support.
During the course of the Newbie Blogger Initiative we often have a series of challenges and writing prompts that the community is encouraged to participate in. The first Talkback Challenge is a rather controversial subject as submitted by Izlain asking folks to talk about how GamerGate has personally affected them. He says he drew inspiration for this challenge idea from a post on the blog Link Saves Zelda. I was both surprised and impressed with the turnout from the number of blogs that chose to take up this challenge. Some of them were deeply affected, and others simply did their best to ignore it waiting for it to blow over. In any case there are a number of interesting reads for this first challenge.
Another far more jovial event that is being run is the Screenshot Safari by the blog Murf Versus. The idea is to share the joy of blogging by posting some of your favorite screenshots from the games you play and writing about them. Screenshots are extremely important to blogging because they help to break up the huge blocks of text, giving the reader something to shift focus to momentary while resetting their train of thought. During this event there are a number of categories including Landscape, High Fantasy, Selfie, Epic Achievement, Heroes or Villains, and The Scariest Place. Over the course of this week a number of bloggers have started submitting their entries.
Another tenet of the Newbie Blogger Initiative is that many of the already established bloggers devote a good amount of their time to creating posts intended to guide new bloggers through some of the hurdles. When you sit down and decide to start a blog, there are a lot of technical concerns, but even more important there are the fundamental issues of what you are going to post and how often you are going to post it. In these articles the established bloggers share some of their experiences after doing this for a significant amount of time. In this section I am going to post some of the more interesting advice posts.
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The Nexus Times: Is WildStar Headed Towards Free-To-Play? .
The Nexus Times: Wildstar Capital Falls!