Gamasutra Expert Blogs: From Persuasiveness To That Games Art Question

In highlights from Gamasutra's Expert Blogs, industry notables talk about persuasive games, the clash of ARPU and design, and GAMES AS ART ARE GAMES ART YES NO ART ART ART. In our weekly Best of Expert Blogs column, we showcase notable pieces of writing from members of the game development community who maintain Expert Blogs on Gamasutra. Member Blogs -- also highlighted weekly -- can be maintained by any registered Gamasutra user, while the invitation-only Expert Blogs are written by development professionals with a wealth of experience to share. We hope that both sections can provide useful and interesting viewpoints on our industry. For more information about the blogs, check out the official posting guidelines. Here are the top blogs for the week: This Week's Standout Expert Blogs - Social Network Games: ARPU Over Design (Greg Costikyan) ARPU: Surprisingly, it's an abbreviation of "average revenue per user," and not "txt speak" referring to collective feces. Greg Costikyan reflects on why this increasingly-dominant social game statistic may be at odds with the nature of game design. - The Explodemon Saga: Party Six (Jonathan Biddle) Explodemon keeps on exploding, and Curve Studios keeps on developing Explodemon, and Jonathan Biddle keeps on pre-postmorteming Curve Studios' developments. - Ian Bogost Is Persuasive (But First, Rambling) (Jason VandenBerghe) Jason VandenBerghe just got his mind blown by Ian Bogost, man. - Fighting the Good Fight; Why Fighting Games Need Their Arses Kicked [Part 3] (Daniel Boutros) This week, Daniel Boutros brings us the thrilling conclusion of his epic trilogy, Fighting the Good Fight; Why Fighting Games Need Their Arses Kicked. Wait a second, he says there's a part four coming too. - A Critical Retort to Roger Ebert on Games as Art (Nick Halme) Haven't gotten your fill of the "games as art" debate? Following Roger Ebert's reboot of the whole meme, Nick Halme weighs in.