GAME REVIEWS WANTED!
If you do not want to make lengthy articles, play a game and make a half-page review! I’d love to read your thoughts.
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Maybe we should establish a standard rating system for consistency first? I know it doesn’t sound fun but it will help the potential reviewers and make it easie to manage for the people working on the magazine.
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That is an excellent idea. Maybe we can find a template from one of the older games mags?
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For programming articles I would really like to see a topic on pushing the limits of the hardware, most notably pushing raw 16-bit color to the LCD. I’m currently experimenting with an RPG system that would use 220x176x16bpp resolution and so far it’s really looking incredible (though I’m “borrowing” graphics from my old copy of RPG Maker 2003 for testing so can’t really demonstrate it yet, will dig through OpenGameArt once I have a bit more functional prototype).
Another possibility is an article centered around @spinal’s video player for streaming FMV sequences. Again this is another aspect I’m toying with for a concept RPG game.
A third one is a good rundown on simply abusing the hardware/compiler to do more then what it thinks it’s capable of. For example, how to compile function(s) to a separate bin file (ie. shared library) that can be loaded and executed at runtime, but stored on the SD card. One scenario this would come in handy is for state-based games they can load all the relevant code (either to RAM or flash) when switching states which would allow for each state to have far more complex code that takes a good chunk of flash since it would only load the code for the current state (possibly having one or two states always loaded if they are constantly used, but only briefly like a menu state).
None of these articles would really need to be fully detailed, in-depth tutorials, instead they could be a basic rundown of the core concept focusing more on how it’s possible to do X and what limitations/challenges would be involved. They could also have a very simple proof-of-concept code example that would allow others to take that concept and see what they can do with it.
I’ve been scouring over a bunch of my old Game Informer mags for examples and one thing that stood out was their reviews. They all had an overall X/Y score as well as a 1-2 sentence summary of Concept, Graphics, Sound, Playability, Entertainment, and Replay Value. My old Nintendo mags didn’t have a review section but they did have sections for brief walkthroughs of some games, which could also be great for a Hints ‘n’ Tips section that doesn’t focus on development, but rather on tips for playing certain games complete with screenshots.
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Or @spinal’s recent FM radio HW/SW project for Pokitto. That would make an excellent article!
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I might have to get my ghost writer (wife) involved again if there were to be something about that project. There’s almost nothing to say, I wanted a radio, looked online, found one 
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Adding a comment to get some more visibility.
Our tentative schedule for release of magazine 2 is around June. There is plenty of time for content to be added before then! We could still use some more ideas and such of what the community would like in a magazine 
So even if you have had your Pokitto since the beginning, just got I a week ago, or don’teven have one yet, the Pokitto community magazine is for and by the community. Whatever you want to see and be seen to represent the awesome projects going on here.
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In the first magazine we had a few Advertisement sections that are a single page and with a description and some pictures and artwork.
Anybody want to submit something like that for some free word on a project?
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If in doubt, add a fake advert for X-ray specs. :P
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With a cut out??
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Still hoping someone would take up making an article about FemtoIDE.
Maybe a list of quick items of interest:
- Where to download latest release.
- Building and Running sample projects.
- Starting new projects.
- Adding content (such as graphics and sounds)
- Finishing remarks and tips
Wouldn’t need to be super detailed. More factual and however one would imagine best put for onboarding new users as easily as possible.
More advanced topics could include how to use the pixel editor and working with the data viewers and such. Debugging etc…
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I will PM you with an idea.
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Been struggling to write more than “I did a thing” for FM Radio hat, the following has taken about 2 weeks now 
FM Radio Hat
In this hardware project, we will be using our Pokitto to control an I2C FM radio receiver chip and output the audio through the Pokitto speaker.
The idea for this project came about when I bought a new phone and discovered that I could not receive FM radio broadcasts on it. So I looked at alternatives. One of which was the RDA5807M, an all-in-one FM radio receiver that is controlled by I2C commands from avhost device.…I’m obviously not a writer 
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That is a good start Then just explain:
- how it works ?
- what were the toughest challenges ?
- what are the limitations ?
- possible future enhancements ?
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What sort of phone did you upgrade from? I haven’t seen an FM radio on a phone since the old Nokia days
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Apparently almost all smart phones have the ability to receive FM broadcasts built into the wifi/bluetooth chipsets, but I’ve only seen samsung let people actually use this ability. There are a couple of apps on the google play store that say they can unlock the feature for some phone models, but not all and the app isn’t even available in my country, nor does it work for my phone.
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You don’t need to be a “writer” to write a tech article just has to be readable.
Remember articles don’t have to be X number of pages long either! Even just a single page write up of your experience and some things you found really unique during that experience would be really insightful.
Would it be alright if I put you down on the list of WIP articles?
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sure…
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If you don’t want to you don’t have to! Definitely no pressure on this I just know that hardware articles are definitely interesting to me personally, since that is a unique feature of Pokitto that I don’t see get touched a lot.
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@manuelsagra was asking about this recently so it would be a good thing to include.
(I presume others are interested.)
Bluetooth chips pretty much are radios.
Bluetooth actually operates over a designated frequency band of radio waves (2.400 to 2.485 GHz).
(Unrelated: I have an old MP3 player that can receive radio transmissions for some reason.
No Bluetooth capability, but it can do radio.)
Also, unfortunately I still haven’t had much chance to continue work on the portraits.
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