Blaugust

Mixtape Mondays: Aether Consumed Prayers Answered

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Good Morning Friends! It is time for another Mixtape Monday, and I am going to take a moment to sorta slide into this discussion. It is Blaugust and we are supposed to be giving some sage advice or some such as mentors. This friend is what you would call a series and it gives me some structure when it comes to planning around my blog. I know that in theory every Monday, which is one of the harder days to be motivated and post something is taken up by a fixed construct that I can count on. This also gives me the ability to plan ahead, knowing that each Monday I am going to need a Mixtape to write about. As such I tend to have these super productive days when I crank out a half dozen or so tapes and then keep them in the bank for when I need another Monday post.

The double-edged sword of having a series is that you are more or less expected to keep it going. While you have a predictable slot in your blog schedule, it also means that you have to more or less produce on a pattern. I have been super bad at actually keeping series going throughout the course of this blog, and so many of these have been abandoned by the wayside. For example, probably no one actually remembers Easing Into Eorzea, Media Consumption, Steampowered Sunday, or Storytime Saturdays but they were absolutely series that I attempted to make a thing and now looking back had a shocking number of posts under each of them. They are failed series because I didn’t plan ahead enough or work on trying to create a backlog of content to post under each of those categories. Essentially my advice to you is if you plan on doing a series, treat it as something that you are going to create content for ahead of time so that you can meet those weekly drops.

Aether Consumed Prayers Answered

It is shocking to no one who has read this blog for more than a few posts recently that I am back playing an awful lot of Final Fantasy XIV. The game itself is great, but one of the things that have always stood out is the music. I realize there are a number of you that do not listen to in-game soundtracks, and I would say at least for Final Fantasy XIV it is a critical flaw in your logic. This game spends so much effort devoted to making sure that the music is great and synchronizes down to the frame with animates. One of the places this is most clearly evidenced is the Primal fights and something like Titan for Leviathan would not be the same experience without the soundtrack and the changes that are made during the source of the fight. This morning I share with you some of my favorite big fight tracks, while not all are from Primal encounters they represent the vast majority. Unfortunately this means that the YouTube version of this playlist is going to be super spoilery and I will give it a very special warning below.

Track List

  • Fallen Angel – Masayoshi Soken
  • Spiral – Masayoshi Soken
  • Rise – Masayoshi Soken
  • Battle on the Big Bridge – Nobuo Uematsu
  • Amatsu Kaze – Masayoshi Soken
  • Unbreakable (Duality) – Masayoshi Soken
  • Under the Weight – Masayoshi Soken
  • Through the Maelstrom – Masayoshi Soken
  • Metal – Brute Justice Mode – Masayoshi Soken
  • Oblivion – Masayoshi Soken
  • Birds of Prey – Masayoshi Soken
  • Wayward Daughter – Masayoshi Soken
  • Unbending Steel – Masayoshi Soken

Listen On Spotify

Listen On YouTube

Normally I embed the YouTube Playlist here, but I feel like I need to give some very special warning with this one. Unlike is normally the case, the vast majority of these videos are actually fighting spoilers and show players fighting along to the primal encounter itself. This means watching the videos could spoil not only fight mechanics but significant story beats. Please watch at your own peril and I realize this is frustrating given that up until this point I have tried to give both Spotify and YouTube equal treatment. So I will link to the playlist, but if you have not experienced these fights then I highly suggest minimizing it and letting it play in the background without actually watching the fights themselves.

Well folks that were the Fourteenth mixtape in this series, and as a result, it is clearly aligned to being music from Final Fantasy XIV. I am going, to be honest, this is entirely a happy synergy that I did not plan in the least. I have been playing a lot of the games and loving the music, and this sorta happened spontaneously. Again if you are not listening to the music while you play this game, you really should remedy that. As always if you are so inclined, you can listen to the entire Mixtape Mondays Archive:

Happy First of Blaugust 2021

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Hey Friends! Happy Blaugust! I feel like since I am the instigator of this nonsense I am obligated to make a day one post, even though this year it lands on a Sunday when I am already making a Podcast post. For those who are completely oblivious to this thing called Blaugust, you should check out the 2021 kick-off information post here. If you just want a high-level overview, since August of 2014 I have been running an event where I challenge folks to write 31 posts during the month of August. This has morphed and changed slightly over the years, but essentially the core of the initiative is to spur active blogging in the community. Even if you don’t want to post every day, it is a time to dust off that blog and be more active in the blogosphere.

The Participants

It is by no means too late to sign up, and you can do so through the official sign-up form here. Currently, at the time of writing this, there are thirty-eight folks who have signed up to participate in this nonsense. I would greatly appreciate you going out there and show these blogs some love.

The Information

If you want to participate, it is pretty simple. Either start a new blog or dust off an old blog and start writing. Sign up using the official sign-up link just to make sure you are going to get credit. Tag your posts with #Blaugust2021 just to make it a bit easier to track them for participants. Join the Discord so that you can mingle with your fellow Blaugustans and chat about “bloggery” things. Finally, get out there and comment on other blogs as you hopefully collect enough inspiration to keep going for all thirty-one days of the initiative. If you want images or information, it is all collected on the Blaugust Media Kit page. If you work better with bullet point lists, I have you covered as well.

As always if you have any questions feel free to reach out here or on the discord. Happy Blaugust and welcome to this initiative!

AggroChat #353 – Games We Forgot About

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Featuring: Ammo, Ashgar, Belghast, Grace, Kodra, Tamrielo and Thalen

Tonight we had the whole gang back and start the show talking about how Bel was apparently replaced by a totally different person as he both healed a few dungeons and ran raid content in FFXIV as a mage class.  From there we talk a bit about Blaugust which is starting the day this show releases.  The rest of the show is sort of a rapid-fire remembering of games that had dropped off our radar over the years or that we just plain forgot about.  We talk about MMORPGs gone by, games that had DLC releases, or just games that we started but never actually got back around to playing.  We dive a bit into Genshin Impact and the most recent content release as well as apparently the ability to play your pc/mobile account on the PlayStation 5.  Lastly we finish the show with a discussion of Ghostrunner, a movement puzzle platformer game featuring a deep cyberpunk aesthetic.

Topics Discussed

  • Bel Heals and Does Castery Things in FFXIV
  • Blaugust 2021 is Here
  • Great Games that dropped off our radar
    • Games we forgot about
    • Games we have returned to
    • Games that got good when we weren’t looking
  • Genshin Impact
  • Ghostrunner

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Blaugust 2021 On the Horizon

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Good Morning Friends! It is that time again, time to begin talking about Blaugust and as is our way around here I am officially announcing the rules of the upcoming event. For those who might not know what Blaugust is, the idea is pretty simple. Several years ago I started challenging my blogging friends to post something new each day during the month of August. Over the years the concept has morphed and bent, but this time around we are returning to the original concept of limiting the posts and event just to the month of August.

Why We Do BlaugusT

The why is pretty simple. The blogging community is nowhere near as large as it once was. Many of us have aged out of blogging with real-world responsibilities or just moved on to other time-consuming hobbies. Blaugust gives us a chance to infuse the community with a fresh lease on life as we court new bloggers to join the fray. Those of us who have been carrying the torch of blogging for decades now, can sometimes lose hope as our blogroll loses a few voices each year. I’ve come to learn that getting out and mingling and mentoring a new crop of fresh bloggers can give us the perspective to stay engaged and hopefully make this community thrive. The thing is… it has over the last several years as we migrated from “just blogs” to a bustling Discord community that takes place year round instead of just during this one month.

The Schedule

In past years we have had the concept of “themed” weeks and we are continuing that forward for 2021. However I have pruned back things a bit because the entire “month” had started to spill out over the course of six weeks. These themes are not mandatory by any means and serve as a guide post to give you some ideas if you falter on trying to come up with a topic.

  • Welcome to Blaugust Week – (August 1st-August 7th): The idea behind this week is to give folks time to spread their wings and get used to that daily blogging idea. For the Veteran bloggers, it is a great time to make a few posts related to helping New bloggers get started. These could be tips or tricks or just discussions about what helps you get started. Additionally it is a great time to get connected to the Blaugust Discord and meet the community as a whole.
  • Getting to Know You Week – (August 8th-August 14th): The idea behind this week is to let t he community know who you are and what some of your interests are. This is a great time to dip into that well of stories and tell us something interesting that has either happened to you or something about your specific spin on blogging.
  • Developer Appreciation Week – (August 15th-August 21st): The D.A.W. or Developer Appreciation Week is an event that used to happen in our blogging community but fell by the wayside. The idea behind it was it was a week to show our appreciation to the people that make all of those games that we love. The thing is over the years we have grown past just being a “gaming” thing, so for other communities it might be a time to reflect on your favorite Authors, Musicians or just Creatives in general.
  • Staying Motivated Week – (August 22nd-August 28th): You are getting close to the final stretch. The idea here is to share some of your secrets on how you have stayed motivated while blogging on a regular basis. You might share some tips or ideas you have for making topics happen when you are feeling uninspired. If you are fresh to the initiative you could talk about some of the ways you have managed to keep yourself engaged this year.
  • Lessons Learned Week – (August 29th-September 4th): This week is a reminder that the goal of Blaugust is to refresh the content creators out there for the coming year, and not necessarily to grind them so hard that they burn out in the process. Some folks are going to cross the finish line and immediately go dormant for awhile, and others are going to want to talk about the experience. This is a space reserved to have that cooldown lap as you process your thoughts about what just took place. Please note this year any posts in July or September will not count towards the Blaugust Awards (some wiggle room granted for timezones of course).

The Awards

It has become a tradition to hand out awards at the end of this process. The truth is for me these have become far less important than the interaction that happens within the community. That said I do see them adorning the sidebars of many blogs out there, so I am going to keep the tradition alive and well this year. For this more “classic” edition Blaugust, we are going to be limiting the contest aspect to only posts made within the month of August 2021. I will of course be adjusting slightly to account for the wild variety of timezones we will have participating in the event. For me the fact that you have signed up and you are joining this initiative is enough, but some folks are going to want to push for higher recognition.

  • Newbie Blogger Award – You did it! You created a new blog and we are extremely happy to welcome you into this raucous community. As a result we are going to recognize your efforts just for signing up.
  • Bronze Award – You made at least 5 posts during the Month of August 2021.
  • Silver Award – You made at least 15 posts during the Month of August 2021.
  • Gold Award – You made at least 25 posts during the Month of August 2021.
  • Rainbow Diamond Award – You did it, you posted 31 or more posts during the month of August 2021.

Mentorship

One of the benefits of having done this at least once before more or less in this same style… is that we have existing infrastructure! We already have a batch of mentors ready to help the process, but if you feel like you would be best served in that role we are always open to more. Ultimately mentors should have at least two years of blogging experience under their belt in order to gauge the ebbs and flow of content creation in front of a live studio audience. We aren’t expecting perfection, just a willingness to share the lessons you have learned along the way with fledgling participants. If this sounds like you, please reach out to me on Discord and we can talk about your desire to become a Mentor.

The Details

  • The Sign-Up form for Blaugust 2021 can be found here. Only those who have signed up will be given credit towards the awards or included on any of the blogger lists.
  • The invite link to the Blaugust Discord can be found here. Participation in the Discord is entirely optional but also a great way to bounce ideas off the existing community.
  • When you share your content please use the hashtag #Blaugust2021 for tracking purpose and to make it easier for those watching along to see the new content.
  • Mingle with the participants of Blaugust 2021. Get out and see the blogs, read the posts, and comment frequently! These folks represent a social structure that you can lean on for advice in the coming years. I deeply value the ties I have made with other bloggers and started this process as an attempt to cement those and build new ones.
  • If you are so inclined there is a “Gaming Together” channel on Discord for those impromptu grouping activities. I believe last year there were a few games of Among Us that sprunt out of that channel for example.
  • Welcome to Blaugust 2021. As always if you have any questions please feel free to ask.
  • If you want an archive of all of the various logos and such from this year and past years of Blaugust, please check out the Blaugust Media Kit page.