Digital Overcast

IBM 499 | Website Deconstruction #2

Kien Lai | IBM 499 | 4/22/02 | California State Polytechnic University, Pomona

The website I decided to deconstruct was www.happypuppy.com. This website carters to the avid gamer who wants the latest news on current and future games.

The Good

The outline of the site looked pretty decent. The navigation system the site uses, although primitive, is very easy to use. This site covers a wide range of games that include the PC, Nintendo 64, GameCube, Playstation, Playstation 2, X Box, and many others. The site also provides tips and tricks for various games that come in handy when you encounter a roadblock. One of the attributes that I thought was a nice touch was its game review section. Browsing through several PC game reviews, I found the content informative the rating system fairly accurate in terms of what I felt the game should have received. Moreover, the games that I was interested in could be found easily because everything was listed alphabetically. The highlight of this site was the demos of PC games that you could download for free (the site also had a hyperlink for the top 10 downloaded demos). I have downloaded several games that have helped me decide whether or not to go out and spend $40 on the retail version.

The Bad

The negative attributes that I observed was the color of the text throughout the website. Some text was bright green while others displayed various pastel colors. Another complaint that I had with the site was the amount of time it took to actually display everything. I think the website should cut back on the number of pictures that flood the screen. It would definitely help reduce the loading time. What contributed to the long load times was the number of advertisements. Although annoying, it is tolerable because this is what pays for their expenses.