Tag: video games

Childhood Video Games: You Can Never Go Home

Well, we all made it to Friday. And for those of us here in the States, our bank holiday weekend starts at some point this afternoon. Consequently, here is a post from xkcd that basically describes my childhood and when I would draw the layouts to linear scrolling video game landscapes for Mario.

Admittedly, it really has nothing to do with data visualisation or design, but we can make a tenuous connection to video game design.

What about Luigi?
What about Luigi?

But everything is now a standardised and bland national chainstore. And before anyone asks, yes, my favourite game was SimCity. Unfortunately there I only had the power to lay out public transit systems. Strangely, it and later variations avoided the concept of multi-use zoning.

So whenever your weekend begins today, enjoy your holiday.

Credit for the piece goes to Randall Munroe.

American Football Videogames

This week we have been looking at baseball (and Leonard Nimoy’s Star Trek). Today, we are going to turn to a sport I know nothing about: American football video games. Okay, so video games are not really a sport, but they are based on a sport. The reason I bring it up? FiveThirtyEIght has a really nice two-article story on how the Madden game franchise uses ratings to build characters for the game.

Rate yourself
Rate yourself

The above graphic is an interactive part of the story that lets you compare yourself to the real sports people, as estimated by the video game company. The second article in the story then builds upon that by using a reporter as a basis to test/understand the ratings.

And pay attention to the sidebar content. It’s actually worth heeding for once.

Credit for the piece goes to Reuben Fischer-Baum.