http://www.randomhouse.ca/catalog/au...authorid=51790
I don't know about the "choice" of the titles, but DAMN that's a lot of strategy guides.
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http://www.randomhouse.ca/catalog/au...authorid=51790
I don't know about the "choice" of the titles, but DAMN that's a lot of strategy guides.
I wonder how his "true friends" are doing.
He must not be able to stand looking at DBZ by now. At least I hope so.
Wait, didn't someone say that ECM was omfgninjas?
or did ninjas take that name after the real ECM?
*shakes head*Quote:
Originally Posted by Opaque
Wouldn't know, I'm not among that small circle.Quote:
Originally Posted by diffusionx
I would like to, at this time, shut up and leave the thread.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr-K
Well, I'm sure he was happy doing the Astro Boy guide...
Otherwise, criminy. He's in lisenced gaming-hell.
It's called karma.Quote:
Originally Posted by ChaoofNee
How in the hell did this topic come about?
I think I've done the screens for like 8 of those books, and 2 more upcoming.
Sane people call it $, chickenhead.Quote:
Originally Posted by diffusionx
How much do you get for a guide anyway, ace?
You mean how much does the author of one get paid?
Off Ignore. I am Teh Win.
god, reviewing bad games is one thing......i cant imagine ripping one apart enough to make a strategy guide for one.
Walkthrough for Pit-Fighter on the Genesis
Look at game
Shoot self
Who says writing a guide for a bad game can't be fun?
Meeeeeee.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeremy
Chickenhead? Let's consult the ol' ebonics primer...Quote:
Originally Posted by MVS
OMG!Quote:
chicken head
Definition: a woman who will suck your dick for drugs or money.
Synonyms: SKEEZER
Example: A chicken head is cheaper than a ho.
If my contribution to mankind was an amazing compilation of all the Pokemon ever, I could die a happy man.
It aint from that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dolemite
This it? - CHICKENHEAD® - towering pillar of intellectual bankruptcy
http://lookinside2-images.amazon.com...xLn2iAE8mwFI7o
Literacy is Teh Doomed.
I think I'm rapidly losing any idea of what this thread is about.
Anyway, GG bitterness aside, glad to see Mylonas is still able to put food on the table with game writing. If there's any justice, Halverson will be writing Mary Kate & Ashley gameboy box copy in a couple of years.
There's the old ECM.jpg. Been lookin' for that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tracer
the chapelle show disagrees.Quote:
Originally Posted by MVS
Prima guides are'nt what I'd call: ripping a game apart. They generally give you tips and a very brief overview of each level. Hardly the kind of detail you'll find in a strategy guide like those provided by Brady games.Quote:
Originally Posted by Dragonmaster Dyne
A good example is the strategy guide for Star Wars: KOTOR. The guide is practically useless.
From what I have heard...a fucking lot.Quote:
Originally Posted by diffusionx
I would've prefered my guides from versus, but they'd have nothing to do with DBZ. :evil:
Guide runs between 4,000 and 10,000 depending on size and time to do it.
Phillip K. Dick > the chappelle showQuote:
Originally Posted by frostwolf ex
Wow, he must really be running a mint then. I guess that guide business is hard work. Good for him really. Judgeing by that list he's made some decent scratch.
Man, that is a sweet deal.
I guess Casey Lowe's retired in a mansion somewhere.
Wow, that is some decent coin. Is he doing the entire layout/interviews/screenshots/editing, or is there a seperate production department?
Ah, yes.Quote:
Originally Posted by MVS
Agreed.Quote:
Worse still, he had failed to pass the minimum mental faculties test, which made him in popular parlance a chickenhead
Wouldn't suprise me if he was the other kind of chickenhead as well.
LOL.Quote:
Agreed.
Dolemite is calling me stupid.
Imagine that.
If you can't believe it, we can take a vote.
And I said you suck dick for drugs or money as well, don't forget that.Quote:
Originally Posted by diffusionx
Take your girlie slap-fights somewhere where I don't have to read them.
Like Penny Arcade forums, where mzo is banned.Quote:
Originally Posted by Mzo
Oh, is he now? What shenanigans were you pulling there, Mzo? :)
When i saw ECM's name on this little Pokemon pocket guide we gave away at work(target) i fuckin flipped.that was the last place i expected to see the brothas name.
Hope he is doin good.
JBNagis
He is my equal, but he works for the dark side!
http://www.bradygames.com/authors/bi...b-44dc5be6cae7
actually that's kinda cool, I'd like to thank you for prompting me to go check, my ego is pleased
(anyone want some free guides? :P)
Are you this Phillip Marcus?Quote:
Originally Posted by Victrix
If not, I want to know who you are and how you will give me free guides.
I am the famous Phillip Marcus!
and yeah, I still have a closet full, just about all of them I think (and some that aren't listed on there) - I don't really keep track
they are useful though, I have two boxes of them propping up my console/tv speakers (no lie!)
So, based on what I saw on that page, is it safe to assume that you are currently playing or already have played both GTA San Andreas and Neo Contra?
Edit: Ace Combat 5?
I can neither confirm nor deny these rumors
Seriously though, I can't talk about upcoming stuff ;) If you just want some guides and I've got extras around, I'll dig them out (no promises on speediness, given it requires going into The Closet, and I'm in the middle of a project right now). Or if you're just curious about something non-specific, I can answer.
Mmm. It occurs to me that I've rarely talked about guide writing in any forum I frequent, which is kind of funny. I don't think about it much though honestly. Work is separate from play, even though for me, they're rather closely related :P I certainly have a lot to rant about, but some of it wouldn't be particularly professional to discuss, so I tend to just keep quiet. And anything else is just attention whoring (as I'm doing now :P)
I understand.Quote:
Originally Posted by Victrix
But I still hate you for it.
That's ok :D
Another thing; can I have a Tales of Symphonia guide?
Pretty please with suger on top?
That's an awesome gig, man. And here I thought you just spent your days trying to dig out from under your pile of shame and arguing with that one androgenous dude who used to post here. So, to repeat an earlier question:Quote:
Originally Posted by Victrix
Are you doing the entire layout/interviews/screenshots/editing, or is there a seperate production department?
I wanna know when my boy Nick Rox is steppin' back on the scene?
Paging E. Storm...Quote:
Originally Posted by isamu
Anyhoo, glad to see ECM's doing well for himself, always thought he sold his soul to Blowmeister or something and was forced to play Superman 64 forever as punishment. :lol:
arrrrgh
stupid forum deleted my responses
Opaque: Yap, PM me an address
Strider: Brady (and the other big guide publishers) all have an internal design staff. Basically the way it works is that I take the screenshots and mark up the text with callouts for design (eg, this screenshot goes here, this art goes there, this table goes here, that hint box goes there, etcetc), and then they make a customized layout for that specific game (eg, more techy and futuristic for Steel Batallion, more lighthearted for Pokemon, and so on). They keep getting better at it as time goes by, some of the guides look really nice now. Pretty cool stuff.
So if the screenshots or text sucks, blame me (or my editor :D), if the content sucks... don't blame me ;) There are uh... interesting working conditions that make doing guides the way I would want them to be in a perfect world essentially impossible, so I just sort of muddle along doing the best that I can with the restrictions I have.
The question is, how did you score such a job? what background led you to this path? I have teh professional writing background, but can't make any headway into strat guides...
ssb
ignored my mother, played a lot of video games, worked with friends on a 'game company', won a daikatana championship (but lost in the final match), talked to lots of people online, got lucky
I think thats even in chronological order
Really though, just mail them (brady/prima/sybex/blahblah) your resume/samples of writing/blah blah. They do go through them (eventually). Otherwise, its basically blind luck and who you know - lots of recruiting 'in the family'. eg, I've given projects to friends I know, or had them help me with work in some cases, others did the same, eventually they get asked to work on a project solo. The other route is straight in, and lots of persistence, same as anything else really.
Honestly, I don't think the writing background matters but so much (well... ok, I've seen some pretty godawful examples in some cases :P), as long as you can write a sentence without causing your editor to go mad. It's mostly just about being able to meet insane deadlines, finish incomplete buggy beta builds under said insane deadlines, and write a full manuscript and take all the screenshots under said insane deadlines. Cake!
can i ask a practical question - how do you take screens? What kind of equipment do you need to hook that up to your pc? Or do you just have a monitor with a tv out?
You can get a screen capture card for your PC, then hook the system up to it.
I've been thinking about doing that myself, they're not that expensive.
Yup. There are also some external USB capture boxes, and digital camcorders work quite well. Honestly, vid capping is a huge pain in the ass on pcs, something I really detest. Digital camera is probably the easiest method, doing screencaps via firewire after you've taped the game (the right program will let you go back and forth from the software, without ever touching the camcorder controls, which is nice). They all have ups and downs, ease of use, quality of picture, etcetcetc.
I often wonder how worthwhile the effort was (I've wasted a lot of time trying to get 'perfect' shots for some games), and they wind up getting shrunk down to postage stamp size for the guide anyway
Tangental note: For people with typical PCs using a consumer-level video capture card, you might want to try the HuffYUV codec. Lossless codec for AVIs (~3:1 compression ratio) and relatively CPU inexpensive, its main use is to cut down the MB/s write rate requirements for recording. I can record videos at 320x240x30fps with this thing on some random TV tuner, which is good enough to use as streamable media online. I do not know if that is suitable for print, though (the really low resolution does not look good, but most of these shots get shrunk to nothing anyway).
Victrix: Is writing a FAQ for a game at all comparable to writing these strategy guides? Just curious, since I wrote a few when I was younger and I wonder how comparable the experience is.
-Dippy
At the heart of it, pretty similar - you're just organizing and presenting information. On a practical level, not similar at all. Writing a faq means you can take your time, fiddle around with it, add bits, verify information with outside sources, discuss it with other people, add more information, hack around with the game, and basically make it as perfect as you want it to be, on no particular schedule, any time before or after the game comes out.
Writing a guide means you're operating under a brutal deadline (frequently with an early build of the game), and you've got one shot to get your text set for release. If you've ever wondered 'omg how could they miss something so obvious' chances are, they didn't ;)
any interest in selling me a tales of symphonia guide drop me a PM
Apart from what Mzo said, professionaly they use Adobe Premiere to record huge amounts of video to select good screenshots from afterwards.Quote:
Originally Posted by station82o
I know Eric uses a box to go from XB/PS2/GC to the PC. No clue what it is, but apparently it costs 600 bucks. Video card is the new ATI one, the one that's a step up from the 800XT, whatever that is.
Taking screens is pretty easy. Just record movies from the games in Premire, then use the scroll wheel to cycle through them, get the frames, and save individual shots.