NekoJonez wins awards – Sunshine Blogger Award

Today on 2nd April 2018, World Autism Day, I want to present the newest award I got for my blog. It’s another community award, the Sunshine Blogger Award. I received this award from Aivanther over at TheDialyRager. Thank you so much for this! I’m flattered by the fact that I got another community award on top of all the flattering words that are being said about me. Like in this article by Sheikah Plate about “To Thine Own Self Be True.“. In any case, I think we should focus on the award too. So, it’s answering and asking questions time. 

The Rules of the award

• Thank the blogger who nominated you and link back to their blog.
• Answer the 10 questions the blogger asked you.
• Nominate 10 new blogs to receive the award and write them 10 new questions.
• List the rules and display the Sunshine Blogger Award logo in your post and/or on your blog.

Questions to answer

What is your name?

NekoJonez, that’s the easy answer. If you want my real name, it’s Pieterjan. But, if you can’t pronounce it, I prefer that you say “Jonez” to me.

The “n” is said like the “n” in pencil. It isn’t said like the “m” in mother. That’s one of the biggest mistakes. Also, the “a” is long. The “a” is spoken like in Halo. Longer A.

What is your quest?

My personal quest is to enjoy life as much as I can. To be amazed and to experience everything I want to experience. But mostly it’s to entertain and support people I care about.

My quest on my blog is to educate and tell my story in the vast world of video games. A story about a casual retro game collector who enjoys playing casual games and games forgotten by the masses. Also, it’s to have fun with my blogging friends from over the world.

What is the airspeed of an unladen swallow?

As fast as its body is allowing it to go!

Dysentery or Cholera?

For real? Talking about “pick your poison.” But, thanks to modern medicine, I don’t care that much since it can both be cured.

Why do you blog?

I don’t know where I told this story before, but let me start from the beginning. I’m part of a pretty small direct family. My parents, 2 uncles, 4 aunts, 2 cousins, my grandparents from my mother’s side and my sister. Oh, and my pet cat Sparta.

But since most of us work in education or in the social sector, our network of family friends is huge. Also, if you go look into my actual family, I have family living in the Netherlands.

So, at family parties, I have to explain the same question all over again. What I was up to and things like that. I was so tired of that question 8 years ago, I started to blog about my life in Dutch and share it with friends and family. Here and there I wrote gaming articles and they actually took off.

Due to certain circumstances, I decided to delete my Dutch blog and take 6 months off blogging. This all happened in 2013. Yet, in May of 2013; I started to really miss being able to write about games. Since it’s my passion after all.

So, in May of 2013, I published my first English review of Tomb Raider. Now, I started my 5th year on this blog but in reality, I have been writing blogs for 8 years. Nowadays, I mostly write about video games because I know most of that subject and I just enjoy writing about it.

It’s a great way to share experiences and stories. It’s an amazing way to talk about the games I played and to keep a sort of public diary about the games I have played and when.

What game made you wish you had brain bleach?

In terms of a good game, A Hat In Time. I wish I could experience that game all over again without any memories about it.

In terms of bad games, well, the games on this list say enough. In that article, I talk about the 10 worst games I have played since then.

Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?

That’s a trick question! In which game do you mean? I think you can find her in a bedroom with Waldo.

Bulbasaur, Charmander or Squirtle?

Well, for some reason I nearly always go with the grass types in Pokémon starters. Sometimes with the fire one and very rarely with the water one. And one random NPC dialogue from Pokémon Diamond and Pearl keeps sticking in my head.

In there, they say the people who choose grass Pokémon are calm and laid back people. I honestly think that I’m that kind of person.

Worst game you have actually completed?

I rarely complete games. I even have trouble beating games, to be honest. My collection spans over 2,000 titles and I keep expanding it. Each free moment of my time, I try to get a game or two closer to the beaten or completion status.

So, if I have to talk about the worst game I have actually beaten; I think I have to refer to the brain bleach question. I have beaten on some of the games on that list…

What’s your guilty pleasure game?

I don’t feel guilty at all playing games. There are some games not meant for my demographic, sure. Okay, there are some games in my collection I got from my sister like some Barbie, Winx Club, and other “girl” games.

But, I honestly enjoyed some of them. Heck, I have reviewed one of the games back in 2014; Barbie Secret Agent for the GBA. As long as a game is fun to play, why would it matter if I’m the target demographic or not?

Look, there isn’t a game I feel guilty playing. If a game interests me, I play it. If you limit yourself in “oh this game is about some girl/boy show and I’m of the opposite gender so it’s going to be boring…” – thoughts, you are missing out! As a boy, I have played games that I enjoyed quite a lot which are meant for girls. And I can say with 100% certainty, that my sister can say the same things about the games where the player base is more male. Like she enjoys playing Age of Empires.

I adore when I can play a game in a genre or style I haven’t experienced a lot since that way I get introduced to a new style of games and more types of games to look out for to add to my collection. 🙂

My ten winners

1. Sheikah Plate – I really need to try one of your recipes!
2. Triform Trinity – My dude, my man! You deserve this one.
3. Games With Coffee  – I drink mine with milk and sometimes sugar!
4. Aluna – We should do another stream one day, brother!
5. Reaper Interactive –  Love your stuff mate!
6. Power Bomb Attack – I want to be on the podcast as a guest one day? May I?
7. AdventureRules – When will be the 2018 Blogger Blitz event?
8. LightingEllen – Let’s snow punch those blogging thieves together!
9. Falcon Game Reviews – I wish I had more time to read your awesome stuff
10. Anjim Plays & KillerRobotics – For your continued support my man.

Okay, I kinda cheated and put 11 on my list. In addition to that, I took 10 other people I really enjoy that weren’t on the list from Aivanther. A few of good blogging friends are on there!

So, now you need my ten questions I guess. Here we go:

1. Explain as poorly as you can how either Minecraft or Pokémon works.
2. Explain a game cryptically and let your readers guess which game or game series it is.
3. Do you sell games you have completed/beaten or do you keep them in a collection?
4. Which game/genre does interest you quite a lot but you are unable to get into the actual game/genre?
5. Do you think it’s possible that there will be every an amazing video game movie?
6. Would you ever consider blogging full time as a job?
7. I haven’t gotten a Switch yet! Quickly, recommend me a game.
8. If you had to choose between Sony, PC or Nintendo platforms and emulation DIDN’T exist, which platform would you choose and why?
9. What is the platform you grew up on and tell us some fond memories?
10. Tell here a random story you want to share with your readers.

Anyways, that’s everything for today! Thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it. Thanks again to Aivanther to give me this award! It means a lot to me to get my work recognized. I hope that the upcoming articles are going to entertain everybody! I hope to be able to welcome you in another blog but until then, take care and have a great rest of your day!

This post has been published on Arpegi. WordPress. com at 9PM On Sunday 2/4. This is bot copy protection. Ignore this text if you aren’t a bot.

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NekoJonez’s December 2017 Update

It’s almost the end of the year, so it’s almost time to wrap up 2017 here in my blog. Quite an eventful year it has been, from getting a price for best gaming blog of 2017 to the Zelda project. Those are just two of the big things that happened to my blog. But, in today’s article, I want to let you know what’s going to happen for the rest of December and what I’m planning for 2018. So, it’s update time! 

Quick reflection on 2017

This past year was an eventful year for me. 2016 was an amazing year for me personally, a year that won’t be easily topped. But 2017 brought only more interesting things to my life and my blog, I can say that this was quite a successful year.

Thanks to the retrospective Zelda project and winning the prize for best gaming blog of 2017, according to MarketInspector; I can even prove the claim I made in my latest sentence.

Besides those two things, I wonder, what do you guys think were my best moments in 2017? I loved the collaborations I did with other bloggers and the games that the devs asked me to play. I’m not going to write a reflection post on 2017, apart from one article I’ll talk about later. Since I think that the picks for “my best moments of 2017” aren’t always what the people think what “my best moments of 2017” are. So, I’m asking you guys. What did you like the most about me and my blog in 2017? I’m curious about the answers already.

I got, even more, traffic to my blog this year when I compare it to 2016. But, I’m inching closer to beating my biggest traffic record so far. I got 13,000 views in 2015. This year, so far, I got 12,000 views. So, what am I planning to get the previous record broken; well, here are my plans for the remainder of 2017.

What can you expect from me?

If you aren’t following me on Twitter, @NekoJonez, then this is going to be news for you. If you are following me, some of these things might be familiar to you.

First of all, I’m going to write an article about my favorite 10 games I played in 2017. Remember, these are the games I played in 2017 and not perse the games that were released in 2017. The only big rule I have on my list is that I have to start playing the game in 2017. If I started to play the game in 2016, the game isn’t going to get on my list.

Unlike the previous times, I wrote this article, I’m currently thinking about making them one article instead of a two-parter. Believe me, I had a difficult time putting this list together. Since I played so many great games, I honestly lost count.

Apart from that, I have 6 requests planned for December 2017. What do I mean by this? Well, as some of you know, I do take requests from developers to test out their game and write an article about it.

There are also a few games I wanted to talk about before the year ends. Those are another 6 on my list.

In addition to the usual two articles at the end of the year, I think I can say that if everything goes right, I might be able to publish an article each and every day. Apart from when there are delays.

But wait, there is more! I’m doing a collaboration with LaterLevels for Christmas. In this collab, I will also publish an article daily starting from the 19th of December.

Yes, this means that you will get a double article each and every day of December apart from the 25th and the 26th where it will be only one article. Thank the lord that I have two weeks off from work otherwise I might not be able to pull this off.

If anything changes or when I get too busy in my personal life, I’ll post a tweet for sure. So, if you don’t see the articles appear on a day, check my twitter, I’ll say why I wasn’t able too.

That said, December will be quite busy and get a lot of content on my blog. But, what will have 2018 in store? Let me tell you.

Looking forward to 2018

In 2018, I’ll start a project where I “clean up my blog”. And what I do mean with this? First of all, from time to time, I’ll clean up broken images & links from my articles. In addition to that, I’ll take out typo’s in older articles too.

Secondly, I’m planning to merge a few of my categories and archiving categories I’m not going to use anymore. Like articles, I don’t enjoy writing anymore. This means that my overview pages will get an overhaul as well.

This will happen during my usual weekly article schedule. Speaking about that, it’s possible that I publish more press kits in 2018. Articles that I haven’t written myself have the word publishing in the title. I’ll try and do my best that these articles will never replace the article I write at the end of every week.

Besides that, I’m planning to do more collabs in 2018. I’ll always tweet out when a collab on another blog happens, so that will be another reason why you should follow me on Twitter. In addition to that, I’ll be working on an overview page where all content is displayed I wrote on other blogs.

I have a few special things planned for my blog and my personal life in 2018; so I can’t wait to talk about them. Buuuuut; I don’t want to reveal too much, so stay tuned for my update articles and my Twitter for that.

It’s possible that I take a week or two off from writing in the first week(s) of January since December is going to be so hectic.

Wrapping up

Thank you so much for visiting my blog in 2017. I hope you had a great time here and I can’t thank you and my other blogger friends enough for the support and experiences you all gave me in 2017.

I know it’s quite cliché to talk about this, but the recent growth I got and all the interaction with you guys is the reason why I keep doing this and I enjoy it an awful lot. If you ever have an idea/suggestion for my blog, just talk to me. I open to suggestions.

This article is going on for long enough. Thank you so much for reading and I hope to be able to welcome you in another article on my blog. Have a great rest of your day and until then, take care!

(Oh, and before I forget; HAPPY HOLIDAYS!)

Publishing: $10,000 cash prize to celebrate launch of new game Days of Crime‏.

Personal note: I haven’t written this article. This article has been written by the guys over at HappyLatte. Since they are so supportive to me, I thought it would be fitting to publish their press release. Thanks again guys! I only edited the lay-out a bit to fit on my blog. If you want to read more about the game, look at the bottom! 

Win $10.000 in cash in gangster photo contest

WANTED: 1 photo – REWARD: $10,000 dollars

 $10.000 dollars in cash, that’s what mobile game developer Happylatte is putting on the table to celebrate the release of their new free to play game Days of Crime. Sending in a photograph in which you or one of your friends resembles a character from one of the five gangs in the game is sufficient to participate, but in order to take home the cash, creativity and originality are highly recommended.

“The game is a first person, real-time player versus player shooter on mobile,” says Oliver Bulloss, Senior Product Manager for Days of Crime. “Players take on opponents from around the world in short one on one duels and battle their way up to become the world’s most feared gangster.” He adds that fights take place in different locations around the world and characters can be customised to represent one of five main gangs: Triads, Bikers, Mercenaries, Streetz, and Mafia.

Bulloss continues with details on the $10,000 contest: “We wanted to do something different than an average advertising campaign to celebrate the worldwide release of the game. At the same time, we like people to be creative and make cool stuff around Days of Crime, so what better way than to just give out a pile of cash? And, even more importantly,” he adds with a smile, “a briefcase with ten thousand dollars is pretty gangster if you ask me.”

In order to participate in the competition, participants need to register their entry and Days of Crime player number through the contest website, which can be found on www.daysofcrime.com/photocontest. They then take and post one or more pictures publicly to Twitter and/or Facebook using the hashtag #DaysofCrime . Submissions will be closed on June 8th 2014 and a jury from Happylatte will then select the best 50 pictures based on the most creative and “gangster” pictures. These will be put up for public vote from June 13th till June 22nd through the Days of Crime Facebook page and the winner with most public votes will take home the $10,000 in cash.

More info on the contest can be found here: www.daysofcrime.com/photocontest

More info on Days of Crime can be found here: www.happylatte.com/game/days-of-crime/