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zythyl posted:The only advice I remember receiving is no VOs, stray away from VLPs of text heavy games, and don't spend more than I normally would on a static screen going over stat distros for ~2mins. And that is all valid advice. If you want more advice, make a new test post, either for Planescape or for whatever you want to try next, because you've been given advice based on your previous effort, so your current tests aren't representative of what you know anymore.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:19 |
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# ? Jun 11, 2024 23:05 |
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unpronounceable posted:That looks like valid advice to me. It's all pertaining to formatting, which is a final touch I would have amended anyway. As for new LPs, I'm looking at Crusader Kings II for a SSLP and The Witcher 2 for a VLP (can't find it in the archives which is a start); might post a draft for both in the next few days.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:24 |
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zythyl posted:The only advice I remember receiving is no VOs, stray away from VLPs of text heavy games, and don't spend more than I normally would on a static screen going over stat distros for ~2mins. Welp, a lot of people gave you legitimate advice and criticism. How you chose to remember it is really up to you. Niggurath gave you pretty sound advice, which you quoted yourself in a post of yours. Yet you either didn't read anything he said except what you bolded in your post, or you're just being difficult. Niggurath posted:Hmmm, well your screenshots could be larger, you could definitely stand to use character portraits for dialogue rather than the character name italicized. Also you're are describing in words what could be shown in gifs or screenshots, like the skull circling or the room being occupied with other people. Also it's usually good to have a test post be something closer to a full update. Like you start by skipping over the intro cinematic and leaving the viewer without any idea of the setting. Actually looking at the screenshots now, it seems like you've cropped out most of the screenshot and I'm not sure why. There are just so many issues here, and I cringe at the idea of a narrative LP when there was already one done that might have drawn viewers away. Also Lizard Wizard has a very unique style that he has cultivated and I would say to stay away from trying to mimic it as it does have a very easy chance of going badly. Since your only response was to bold the part where he mentioned there had already been an lp done of it. zythyl posted:I didn't know someone's already done a narrative SSLP of P:T. I'm not going to bother going back to quote all the other advice that's been given to you. Put some god drat effort into something you do here for once and read it yourself, Jesus Christ. e: beaten like a dead horse, but my point is still valid!
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:24 |
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Hampooj posted:some god drat effort into something you do here Did you read my P:T thread? Here's a link for good measure.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:27 |
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zythyl posted:Did you read my P:T thread? You have a bunch of words, 2 character pictures and 3 cropped screenshots. I have no idea what point you're trying to make to me here. Regardless, this is silly and I'm just going to drop this issue until you have more content or another test post of a different game, or whatever the hell you're doing. vvvv: Yeah, that's just you. The apostrophes look fine to me. Hampooj fucked around with this message at 00:33 on Feb 18, 2013 |
# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:30 |
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zythyl posted:Did you read my P:T thread? Why do all the apostrophes in your test post come out as í? Is that just my computer? There are a lot of other problems there (OP is really long, post reads as fanfiction as opposed to a good LP that I'd follow), but typography seems like a really basic thing. EDIT: I got this fixed. It looks like it changed punctuation sets in the middle of the OP and my computer just didn't know what to do with that. Bizarre. Cool Ghost fucked around with this message at 00:48 on Feb 18, 2013 |
# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:31 |
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Cool Ghost posted:Why do all the apostrophes in your test post come out as í? Is that just my computer? I'm seeing them okay; might just be yours, though if it's only happening now, I'm stumped as to why. Change the encoding of the page to some variant of Unicode and see what it reads as.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:34 |
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Wrong thread. I'm dumb
djw175 fucked around with this message at 00:41 on Feb 18, 2013 |
# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:37 |
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zythyl posted:It's all pertaining to formatting, which is a final touch I would have amended anyway. As for new LPs, I'm looking at Crusader Kings II for a SSLP and The Witcher 2 for a VLP (can't find it in the archives which is a start); might post a draft for both in the next few days. Look, let's cut to the chase. You've been given criticism of your style, writing, formatting, etc. You'll listen to it and try to improve, or you won't. If you won't listen to us, stop wasting our time. zythyl posted:Did you read my P:T thread? Just to avoid a misunderstanding, that's a test-post, not a thread. And we did read that, and that's what's being criticized. Since the other goons beat me to the punch, I didn't want to make redundant criticism, but I fully agree with what they've said. I suggest that you read a few LPs in the archive, learn a thing or two from them, and make a new, better test-post. Most people here want to help you, you just need stop complaining and start listening. edit: djw175 posted:Diana White's getting called a troll for saying someone shouldn't be mocked for the way they look. This is so great to watch. Err, it think you took a left turn at Albuquerque. my dad fucked around with this message at 00:41 on Feb 18, 2013 |
# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:38 |
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zythyl posted:Did you read my P:T thread? Your update's too short to really show off the game, the dialogue formatting is inconsistent as mentioned (and the preferred format is a small face picture next to the character's text, though it's not mandatory), and the biggest thing is that your update only has three screenshots. When people said video wouldn't work, they didn't mean not showing off the game. Feel free to break up dialogue trees with an occasional screenshot for dramatic effect. You could fit the entire starting dungeon in two updates (might be a bit too much content for one based on my hazy memory). It's good to show off lots of screenshots. And informative commentary might be a better approach if you want to go as in-depth as you said you wanted to go, though there's nothing wrong with doing narrative or even a hybrid of both if you prefer that route. Go with what you want to do there. The hardest part of a LP is starting it, getting everything right and so forth. Once you got something that people are satisfied with and have your process down, it gets much easier and starts becoming fun to do, so don't get discouraged by the criticism and so forth. The fact that you're taking criticism into account and adjusting your LP appropriately is a good sign, so keep it up!
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 00:43 |
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zythyl posted:Did you read my P:T thread? This is pretty much just the text version of your VLP test post to me, in that it consists of about three different parts that should not go in a single post. There is the introduction bit (what game it is, who made it, etc). There is the rules/statistics/mechanics discussion, which really should be a separate post, or spread out and discussed as we come to it. And at the very end, just as in the video, there is a brief dialogue scene between Hero and Skull. Only that last part should really be in your test post, and even so, it should show more game activity instead of just being a small addition with some roleplaying. Some exploration, meeting people, sneak/fight/spell your way ahead, or something. I'm childishly positive so I still hope you could salvage a good LP out of it, though I'm not interested in a fan fiction extravaganza. A pretty straight playthrough with discussion on what's going on, the factions as you meet them, background, etc would be good, but I guess you are already moving on to some different game.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 01:03 |
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zythyl posted:Did you read my P:T thread? Here's a thing that I skipped last night because I didn't feel like reading it, and I still don't feel like reading it. This is how that massive block of text appears on my monitor. The worst part is that you even use some line breaks, but only single ones that just make your block of text end early on a couple lines. Even the traditional wall of text, the typed essay, uses double spacing and indentation to avoid having it be a solid brick of text smeared all over a piece of paper. Books use a lot of indentation and sometimes increase the size of the gap between lines to make lines more individually distinct. What you've made is garbage that my eyes can't follow long enough to process without it feeling painful or difficult to focus. You do use line breaks to separate character dialogue, but it's nearly the only thing you use so it ends up really muddy and confusing as there's no easy to parse distinction between when different characters talk. You want your formatting to guide the reader through the text easily, and it's not even that difficult to do. If you need to learn more about formatting, there's plenty of materials out there to do so, including other screenshot LPs. Not all of them have amazing formatting, but some have very solid, easy to follow formatting. Hell, just looking at print media and thinking about what makes it pleasing to look at and easy to follow or even what makes it jarring to look at and difficult to follow can give you an idea of what you should and should not do. So, as hampooj said, put some effort into what you're doing. Just churning out a bunch of hard to read blocks of text does not constitute effort. I can even help you with one of the biggest issues: remove your mechanics section entirely. Address the mechanics as they come up and focus on how they apply to the game at that time, don't put a loving infodump on us that has zero context outside of "these are AD&D rules", because that doesn't matter yet. EDIT: Hell, now that I think about it, why are you telling us the Nameless One is immortal right from the start? Morte doesn't say anything about it in the small snippet you've presented us. I assume it comes up pretty quickly, but as someone who hasn't played or seen anything about this game I don't know if this is a thing you find out during the tutorial or if it comes up a little later. sentrygun fucked around with this message at 01:13 on Feb 18, 2013 |
# ? Feb 18, 2013 01:07 |
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So this isn't really a huge issue, but as far as the layout for commentary goes, which of these three is the best? Someone brought up that the commentator portraits look too much like the character portraits, and I'm wondering if just having them a different size would be preferable/easier to recognize as opposed to bolded initials or same-size portraits. (basically which of these three look best/most comprehensible) quote:M: fuckin rad quote:fuckin rad quote:fuckin rad
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 02:53 |
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I like the second best, it makes the commentaries most easily distinguishable both from each other and from the actual in-game text.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 02:59 |
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I like the third one. Making them all the same size makes it much more organized looking. I strongly recommend not doing the first one unless you want it to look like AOL messenger.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 03:10 |
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So close to being done with my test post! I have the intro to the game recorded, should I also add screenshots for people that don't want to watch the video? It's a screenshot LP, so it'll be the only movie, but I'm not sure what's preferred.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 03:17 |
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Mondlicht posted:So close to being done with my test post! If you don't mind putting in the effort, adding in the screenshots for your post works best. He didn't do it for cutscenes, as there really aren't any, but in many of ddegenha's SSLPs, he had commentary-less videos for boss fights, and also went over them in typical SSLP format. Do a ctrl-F for Boss Battle to see an example of what he did.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 03:26 |
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Mondlicht posted:So close to being done with my test post! Yes, definitely take screenshots of in-game movies and such. I find that when I'm reading through a screenshot LP, it's frustrating to have to watch a video link just to see what happens.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 03:33 |
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Where it all began. Let's play and learn with Call of Duty 1! Back in 2003, a totally unknown little game company called Infinity Ward came to Activision and pitched them a very pretty vision. This vision, put simply, was 'Medal of Honor, perfected'. All 22 of the Infinity Ward team had come from that game, you see, and they had big ideas on how to make the next game one of the biggest, most spine-busting games in history. Activision, in a fit of patronage rarely witnessed, decided that these 22 upstarts had a good idea, and put their money where their mouth was. They bought 30% of this wild card company, and told them to make the best goddamn game they could. 14 months later, Call of Duty was born. And the FPS market hasn't quite been the same since. The LP I will be doing post-commentary on the main campaign of this game, covering all the levels. Unlike the more recent Call of Duty incarnations, Call of Duty 1 puts you in World War 2 as an American paratrooper, a British SAS commando, and a Soviet sniper. As always, my true blue homie TheLastRoboKy will be joining me. This game is an extremely tense, but extremely linear manshoot - there are no secrets or easter eggs to explore, and the game itself is polished to a near-metallic sheen that means bugs are extremely minimal. This includes amusing ones, sadly. You can expect the normal passion and zest for gaming that Roboky and I try so hard to bring to you, but there will be fewer what the gently caress moments in this game than in our previous LPs. To add a new dimension to the one that's being lessened, this LP will also encompass all sorts of history porn for those of you that are as enamored with mankind's finest and darkest hour as much as Roboky and I are. We are huge history buffs, and we intend to fill the thread with as many cool stories and discussions as we can manage. Each update will have an update on the general condition of the war, and as many individual, relevant stories as we can find. Commentary in the videos will be a little bit lighter on history notes just because this game moves so extremely fast, and is so tension-soaked. I sometimes worry about recording 40 minutes of video, only to get done and realize it was actually 15-20. That's how 'on' I am playing this game. As far as the game itself, I will be playing on the second hardest difficulty, Hardened. The hardest difficulty removes health packs from the game entirely. While realistic in that one cannot just absorb red crosses into their body to regenerate bullet wounds, this also makes the game extremely annoying to play. The objectives you receive often send you directly into the line of fire. Without any way to recover your health, you really just have to pray the AI is dumb enough to miss you. Expansions Call of Duty 1 got an extremely badass expansion in United Offensive. It added three more campaigns of brutal difficulty. I do not have any plans to do that at this time, but I could be easily persuaded to do so if people are enjoying the thread. Basically, around the time we're around 1/2 to 2/3rds the way through the game, I'll take stock of the situation and make the call. Multiplayer Call of Duty 1 had an amazing multiplayer mode that directly challenged CounterStrike's domination of serious FPS play for a long time. My introduction to clan play was with CoD1. I would be delighted to put some work into putting up a server if people are interested in filling it for a few games. But again, this is completely dependent on the response from the thread. Just yell about it in the thread if you're interested and I'm sure to see it. The updates Note: Remember that this is a 'realistic' game. A lot of darker colors are used in the landscape, enemy uniforms, etc. This means the game does not show up very well against Youtube's white background. The recommended way to view these videos is 720/1080p, full screen. Polsy's mirror makes it quite a bit better, but if you are having trouble seeing the action just go full screen/fill the browser window. The game is really not that dark, it just looks that way when it's contrasted against a huge white border. Sandcastle note: In the main thread, this will link to the posts I make when I update, which will have all the stories and such. For now, I'm just linking the video. Episode 1: St. Mere Eglise (night): Youtube, Polsy
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 04:21 |
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melodicwaffle posted:So this isn't really a huge issue, but as far as the layout for commentary goes, which of these three is the best? Someone brought up that the commentator portraits look too much like the character portraits, and I'm wondering if just having them a different size would be preferable/easier to recognize as opposed to bolded initials or same-size portraits. The third one. Stay consistent with italics denoting your commentary and only the biggest retards will have any confusion.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 04:50 |
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Coolguye posted:Where it all began. Let's play and learn with Call of Duty 1! Personally, I really don't like WWII games at this point, and the Call of Duty series leaves a bad taste in my mouth now. But you've shown here that it didn't start out that way, and the original game plays out much different from its later incarnations, terrible German accents or no. Good historical information here, as well. My only issues with it are technical, and minor. The title image is a bit too big, for one. Secondly, your commentary has some nasty bounce on it, like you're recording in a bare-walled room. Nothing terrible, but I wonder if having something soft between the microphone and the walls might help you to reduce that.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 06:44 |
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Goggle Fox posted:Secondly, your commentary has some nasty bounce on it, like you're recording in a bare-walled room. Nothing terrible, but I wonder if having something soft between the microphone and the walls might help you to reduce that. I've tried multiple different mics, but they all have variations of the same problem. Positioning the mic doesn't seem to help much either. I would be absolutely delighted to try any suggestions people might have for giving me a clearer tone, because until I can figure out something to do about it I'm going to continue to sound like I'm recording from a cave. Coolguye fucked around with this message at 07:41 on Feb 18, 2013 |
# ? Feb 18, 2013 07:31 |
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melodicwaffle posted:So this isn't really a huge issue, but as far as the layout for commentary goes, which of these three is the best? Someone brought up that the commentator portraits look too much like the character portraits, and I'm wondering if just having them a different size would be preferable/easier to recognize as opposed to bolded initials or same-size portraits. Oh, and the bigger screenshots definitely look better.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 07:45 |
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Cool Ghost posted:Why do all the apostrophes in your test post come out as í? Is that just my computer? There are a lot of other problems there (OP is really long, post reads as fanfiction as opposed to a good LP that I'd follow), but typography seems like a really basic thing. I was wondering what the hell was going on with that. He wrote it: “It’s called the ‘Mortuary'… If I retype it, the punctuation looks like: "It's called the 'Mortuary'... I figure it has to do with how he wrote it in Word or something.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 08:57 |
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So, suppose I'm recording a video with absolutely no commentary, edits, or anything of the sort, just sheer raw footage with game audio, and that's it. Aside from using a lossless codec to encode it in VirtualDub, how do I post it on Youtube while making sure it's audio and visual quality are as high as possible without shelling out money for programs? The Workflow Diagram, as far as I know, doesn't account for such a scenario, and my recording device didn't separate audio and video, so am I basically done? Or would I do as the Workflow Diagram does and put it into MeGui to do stuff with it? I'm not really sure what part of the Workflow Diagram, if any of it, applies to a video without commentary or edits, so that's why I want to know.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 11:36 |
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Fionordequester posted:So, suppose I'm recording a video with absolutely no commentary, edits, or anything of the sort, just sheer raw footage with game audio, and that's it. Aside from using a lossless codec to encode it in VirtualDub, how do I post it on Youtube while making sure it's audio and visual quality are as high as possible without shelling out money for programs? The Workflow Diagram, as far as I know, doesn't account for such a scenario, and my recording device didn't separate audio and video, so am I basically done? Or would I do as the Workflow Diagram does and put it into MeGui to do stuff with it? I'm not really sure what part of the Workflow Diagram, if any of it, applies to a video without commentary or edits, so that's why I want to know.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 12:20 |
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He's posted a few times in the past weeks so I know he's not dead, is The Dark Id going to continue Final Fantasy X? Of course, I suffer from major burn-out myself from time to time, so I wouldn't begrudge him taking a break from it...
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 12:28 |
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The Dark Id posted:The third one. Stay consistent with italics denoting your commentary and only the biggest retards will have any confusion. I guess you're done with the FFX LP. Stabbey_the_Clown fucked around with this message at 15:06 on Feb 19, 2013 |
# ? Feb 18, 2013 15:02 |
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Let's Play Learn About Theatre!: Return of the Phantom [SSLP] What is this game, exactly? Return of the Phantom is a point-and-click adventure game developed and published by MicroProse in 1993. It's the middle child of their 3 adventure games, the other two being Rex Nebular and Dragonsphere. It's written and designed by Raymond Benson, who was the official author of the adult James Bond novels as well as many novelizations of video games like Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Hitman. He also went on to write a little game called Dark Seed II, you may have heard of it. In Return of the Phantom, you control the actions of Raoul Montand, a detective with Paris'Surete (the French FBI) and patron of the Opera. After the famed chandelier at the Paris Opera House mysteriously comes crashing down into the audience, you begin your investigation to find the culprit of this senseless crime against antiquity. However, things take a turn for the weird, and Raoul eventually finds himself in places he never thought he'd be. DUN DUN DUN Why are you playing this game for us? I played it when I was probably around 12 or 13, and never finished it. I thought the game was super scary at the time, mostly because I played it at night and was a giant wuss. I'm curious to experience it all over again, and hope that it's something other people can enjoy as well. It's not a game I hear a lot about, it didn't sell well, and it's always cool to see games that fell through the cracks of time. The other two adventure games that Microprose did have already been LP'd, so I will complete the trifecta. Isn't this game kind of short? It is, as are the other two adventure games that Microprose made. I'm going to try and make it a bit more interesting by expanding on some of the history this game touches on. I'm not a history expert or anything, but in playing the game it's made me curious to research various things, and I'd like to share them with the thread! What about spoilers? If you were one of the few people that played this game, by all means keep your mouth shut! Although so many people are familiar with the actual story of Phantom of the Opera, it's not clear how that plot will present itself in the game, so just use your best judgement. I think that's fair. Part One: Test Post! Okay, there we go! I'm a bit unsure about a few things, especially the insertion of history facts. If people find that boring or unnecessary I'll cut it out. This is my first LP, so feel free to throw all your super awesome knowledge at me. Thanks!
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 18:48 |
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Yay, another Microprose game I missed as a kid! The only things I'd suggest changing is to try and move the cursor as far out of the way as possible when you take screenshots. Since the scenery is dark it really jumps out and is distracting. All the LOOK bits are interesting (to me, anyway), but you may want to save the bulk of them for bonus updates between story updates, as having so many of them breaks up the narrative and makes it hard to follow what's going on. Other than that, it looks like a pretty good start. I'm at work, so I can't look at or speak of the quality of the video.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 21:37 |
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Mondlicht posted:Let's Play Learn About Theatre!: Return of the Phantom [SSLP] A couple of small technical things. First, please try to put a blank line between successive images, it will make it easier to read. Second, your images are probably in wrong resolution. This game runs in 320x200 pixels, which at first glance seems to have a 16:10 aspect ratio; however this is not really the case, because back in the day, this was intended to be played on a 4:3 non-widescreen CRT screen. This transformation is accomplished by the screen not having square pixels (they are 1:1.2 ratio). In short, what you need to do is once you have the 640x400 images, to resize them once more from there into 640x480. You need to do this second resize with resampling (and NOT nearest neighbour like the step from 320x200 to 640x00). To minimise blurriness, it is important to do it like this in two steps, first 2x resize nearest neighbour and then resample to 640x480. To illustrate the issue better, here is one of your images: and here is the same image after resized to 640x480: The second image clearly looks better (look at the circular lamps for example and in general people have more realistic proportions). You may also have to consider JPG for this game as it might be too colourful for PNG to be of decent size (esp. after the above process).
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 21:50 |
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Thanks guys! I was worried that a few of the rooms might have too many things to look at. Splitting them off into seperate updates is an idea. At least in places like the Orchestra Pit where it's really out of hand. I also might do the history bits seperately as well, but I wanted to include them this way so people could see them in the test post. I can definately see the difference in the images, so I'll get that sorted out as well.
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# ? Feb 18, 2013 22:26 |
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Is there a moratorium on Dragon Age 2 LPs? This isn't an interest check but I dimly recall a previous LP causing a few problems and I have a neat idea for doing the game (not bashing it, the opposite in fact) but I'd rather not put together a test post if it's verboten or something, can't find anything in the rules thread for it specifically.
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 12:25 |
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JohnnyBigPotatoes posted:Is there a moratorium on Dragon Age 2 LPs? This isn't an interest check but I dimly recall a previous LP causing a few problems and I have a neat idea for doing the game (not bashing it, the opposite in fact) but I'd rather not put together a test post if it's verboten or something, can't find anything in the rules thread for it specifically.
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 12:42 |
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JohnnyBigPotatoes posted:Is there a moratorium on Dragon Age 2 LPs? This isn't an interest check but I dimly recall a previous LP causing a few problems and I have a neat idea for doing the game (not bashing it, the opposite in fact) but I'd rather not put together a test post if it's verboten or something, can't find anything in the rules thread for it specifically. In addition to what the above poster said, you'd also have to watch the thread like a hawk and probably make liberal use of the "lock" button, because threads about Bioware games tend to devolve quickly into Bioware hate-fests. Just be aware of what you're getting into. Good luck!
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 12:55 |
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Son of a bitch. So you know how my last audio for my Tokyo Jungle LP was too loud? Well, now I've gone and I think recorded it much too low. The game audio drowns me out in a lot of places, which would be fine if it was just a couple times, but I talked much too softly it seems through a good chunk of the commentary. Is there any way to increase the volume of my recorded commentary in either Audacity or Premiere, or am I going to have to record new commentary AGAIN?
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 15:17 |
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See that Gain meter at the very left of a track, the one with the minus and plus? Use that to adjust volume. Also, in most cases it's a much smarter idea to lower the game audio than it is to up the commentary audio, but just tinker with it a bit.
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 15:20 |
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Let's Play "Replying to batshit crazy emails" Update 1: You receive a nonsensical email from a stranger Montana Hoffman posted:Subject: Let's Play What's your response, goons? Doesn't seem like just spam since there are no links and "Let's Play" is too hard to autoscrape out in this kind of context, but maybe I'm wrong.
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 16:37 |
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It's a pseudohobby at best.
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 16:42 |
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# ? Jun 11, 2024 23:05 |
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quote:Dear Montana Hoffman. It really does seem like generic "insert keyword here" spam though.
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# ? Feb 19, 2013 16:44 |