idea
My digital artefact as it currently stands is a three part series, ScapeVScape, analysing the appeal of Old School RuneScape over RuneScape 3 using reddit opinions. This series lives on my portfolio website which I also created for myself and this particular project. This concept is not where my DA originally started, but this was the most useful and streamlined end result for the work I put in.
methodology
I constructed my website on WordPress, and it has my home page, my projects tab, a marketing portfolio, an about me section and a contact section. I wanted this site to home and showcase things I am working on at University and general life, but be separate from my University blog. I drew the header which set the theme and the colour palette I wanted to follow. I wanted this site to be a personal reflection of myself, which led to small customisations to highlight that.
My ScapeVScape series lives on my blog, and consists of three blog posts discussing the player appeal of Old School RuneScape over RuneScape 3. The posts are multimedia posts, with many diagrams, embedded links and a digital illustration done by myself. I very heavily feature Reddit posts as my key source of player opinions, as I found these be the most authentic. Due to the structure and little aesthetic expectations of forums, this allowed for the truest form of what players thought of the games – acting as a pivotal point of my analysis.
utility
This digital artefact has 2 very different utilities for each component. ScapeVScape is a great source to reference when looking at the impact of forum sites on game popularity, sales, upgrades, customisations and anything else in between. There is a very clear link with the opinions in reddit and future consumer demand – a lot of trends and ideas are born in these sites.
My portfolio site is a medium for which I can personally explore site construction and display my university career so far for future employers. I will continue to upgrade and remodel my portfolio site as I work on more projects, deepen my knowledge, define my aesthetic and evolve as a student.
learning moments
As mentioned, my end digital artefact is not representative of any of the points in my initial pitch. My BCM206 DA was going to be “This X Does Not Exist”, which was where I recreated AI generated sites and put them to Reddit for constructive feedback. My work on this still exists on my site, but I found the process to be very time consuming and I wasn’t getting the engagement I wanted.
Another issue I hit was that I didn’t have a clear idea of the end result, there was mention of a magazine or guide, but this just added time to an already long process with no real utility.
Reddit engagement is not as pre-planned or formulated as Instagram – it truly does just depend on what they find interesting and is niche enough to reach the right audience. I still found a way to incorporate my interest in improving on my digital art and forum feedback, just not in the way that I found the least effective.
PAIGE SUTTON 
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