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Update Time!

The project is getting along nicely, though we are still looking for artists. We had one artist leave due to family issues and one who dislocated her shoulder - so now we're quite low on artists once again.

We do have an artist who is doing the orldview sprites (which are 32x32), so that's no longer what I am looking for. What I am still looking for is people who can design nice "bots" mostly through concept art and artists to work on the battleview.
The spot of concept artist would be one that needs some artistic freedom as sometimes the descriptions would be quite complicated, but at other times, the descriptions can be no more than "a small instoid bot".
The combat will be gridbased with squares of 54x54 pixels, with sidefacing, frontfacing and backfacing sprites on it - meaning that where the bots "feet" will touch the ground will be within those 52x52 pixels, but their bodies would actually not stick to those limitations and usually get above the 52 vertical pixels.

Let me know if you are interested by filling out the form at www.projectcorebot.com/Apply-VisualArtis t

I have posted on this forum about Project CoreBot on this forum before. Then, I was looking for a team. Now, the team is getting together. However, I would like to have more visual artist(s) on the project. So, I am writing to you all once again.

Since I originally posted the game came a long way, so let's get started with a description of the game.
The world is populated not only by humans, but also by the mechanical creatures which are known as bots (this is but a working term, though). Bots are mechanical creatures consisting of a core and a shell. The shell is like a body into which the core is inserted. The core gives it properties like the element of the bot, while the shell decides things like the form of the bot and what material it is made of.
Starting in a peaceful town where bots don't exist, you get to travel out to the world where they do and you will find that you can control the bots and have them fight against bots in the wild and bots controlled by other people. The world out there turns out to be much grimmer than you would have guessed. You build your team of bots while you travel through the world, meet bots which are only fabled to exist and get in the path of those who want to use the bots in selfish manners for their own gain. Oh, and in order to be allowed to travel outside the protective fields which all center on the city you started in, you need to prove your strength in tests and battles.

We currently have a single artist on the team, but it seems that this may not be enough. A number of aspects still need to be covered. For one thing, we still need someone to work on the world where you walk through. This would be sprite work, though it might either be standard world overview type of sprites, but may also be isometric sprites. This also depends on who will be on the team.
The battle looks like they will be taking place on small grids, where usually you won't need to move, but for some attacks and in some situations, moving will be important. It will feature what will technically be sprites, but they will be from the side/back/front, be bigger than the usual sprites and the way they will be used won't be the same as is typically the case. Other styles of artist, like for example those working on bot designs are also welcome.

Singing up for the position of Visual Artist can be done here: www.projectcorebot.com/Apply-VisualArtis t
More information on the project can be found www.projectcorebot.com

Questions can be asked here or on the site - or through any other means of contacting me.

The current team consists of:

Me (programming, game design, writing)
orandze (sound)
Martijn Muijsers (sound)
peteypiranha128 (art, game design)
lordgrifith (programming)

-

Other roles are still open as well, even though that's not what I am here for. The audio team is getting big (I still have several applications), but even for that I am not closing the applications yet. On other position we could definitely still use your help. www.projectcorebot.com/Openings is the place to apply.

At 6/19/11 11:49 AM, Grent wrote: Pardon me if this sounds a bit rude, but it it sounds like your role in this project is purely managerial; your contribution is nothing but ideas and leadership.

Don't worry, criticism is a good thing, as it can lead to positive changes.

It's not actually that way. Basically, I am not doing the art or the visual art, but other than that, I am present everywhere in the game.

I am working on the game design right now, and believe me, game design is a whole position all by itself. I didn't want to make it "my precious" too much, so I noted suggestions and commentary would be welcome.
The same thing for writing, I will be doing a lot of the writing, but I didn't want it to be just my style alone, so I felt another writer would be welcome, but shouldn't be expecting to be doing the main part of the main storylines - other storylines and general character lines are still great, though.
Lastly, I expect to do a large part of the programming. In the end that's what I am - a programmer, so that's what I'll do. I will also be the technical lead for the programmers, which is not so much a managerial role, but involves knowing a lot about the code written , keeping it organized and discussing the pros and cons of certain interfaces to parts of your system. It's actually a rather technical role.

I hope this convinces you that I am actually being productive here. It's not so much the way I want things to go, but how I put them down in this thread that made it seem I wasn't going to be.

There seems to have been a problem with the forms, where I didn't receive everything. As it stands now, I have replied to every application that I did receive. So, if you did apply, but did not receive a reaction, please let me know by posting here, sending me a personal message or sending an email to failedapplication [at] projectcorebot [dot] com

LunarHawk69: Yes, it will be in flash.

LunarHawk69, J-Rex: Could both of you fill out the appropriate from at my website? It's just that I would like to keep all applications together - and these forms also help me get an idea of who I am dealing with.
The forms can be reached from http://www.projectcorebot.com/Openings.

Thanks!

DrBoxFace, could you fill out the form at http://www.projectcorebot.com/Apply-Audi oArtist, then I'll get back to you as soon as possible.

I'll be the technical lead on the programming team, doing game design and storywriting. How much of each will depend on the other people on the project.

This game will be different through a number of mechanics and through the setting. It will play in a sort of post-apocalyptic world (basically, the world was overrun by these bots in the past, now there is one city where where there aren't any bots, with rings of fields around i, where each allows stronger bots. While it will still incorporate things like meetings with "legendaries" and perhaps even you being able to get them, it will also make you less of the "only thing that matters in the world".

As for the mechanics, the first major thing that separates it from Pokemon is the system in which a bot exists of two parts: a core and a body. Both define different properties of the bot. It can also create some interesting situations, as a shell "remembers" the moves, while the core "remembers" the level.
There are lots of semantic differences, like a rigid system where your character has a level which tells you what level of bots you can use, steeper experience bonuses when your bot's level is far below that of the enemy, a different system for things like when to start a battle with someone and more official tests to pass before making progress.
One thing I would like to feature extensively (which means that it'll also be important in the storyline) is the element system. It is quite different from that of Pokemon, as it is separate from the attack type system (the elements are but a subgroup of the attack types) and it will be heavily focused on no more than four elements. I am also thinking about making a "form" property defined by the shell which will also play a role in this system.

As for concept art - I'm no good at making such things, so I don't have anything yet. Once I have found an artist to work on the project, I think we can be able to work something out the both of us like.
The battle mechanics aren't fully developed yet, as I focused on other things like the core/shell system first. It will be one-on-one battles like in Pokemon, though. (Note that I am also considering the battles where you send out multiple bots at once.) It will feature a system where you choose you attack and then it is executed. However, I am thinking it won't be in neat turn order, but it will feature a system where your bot's speed stat and the move's time stat will together define how long you are taking for your move and then the first one done will be the next to move - I'm not sure if that explanation is very clear, but it's something I need to develop further to get it into better words.

I hope this answered your question - if not, feel free to ask more (if it did, feel free to ask more questions as well).

And I forgot to mention, we need testers too. There are some requirements on that, but they are all mentioned on the website I gave. There's also a form to sign up as a tester there.

We all know and love the Pokemon game series. They are just good games based on a really good premise.
There's just one thing wrong with them. Instead of making new games all the time, they are only making new games every once in a while, while the rest of the time they are just rehashing the games they made before. The problem is that they are the sole game in their genre - a genre I would like to call the "CTRPG".

No more.
This summer, Project CoreBot will set out to make its own CTRPG. Already is the design getting a long way, but we will need a team to make this work.
Here's what we are looking for:
Visual Artist - we need (a) visual artist(s) pretty badly. After all, what's a game without graphics?
Audio Artist - while places like the audio portal have quite a bit of freely available quality material, music made for the game is still just plainly better
Programmer - I will be the technical lead for the project, but a bigger team of programmers means getting more done (yeah, there's an overhead, but I am willing to work with that)
Writer - I'll be doing the writing for the main story. However, there will be a lot of writing outside the main story, and proofreading is an invaluable thing. It's not our first need, but (a) writer(s) are/is welcome as well
Game Design - I am doing the game design, but I do need a reality check from time to time. So, care to give feedback on the designs, or got suggestions, that's something we can really use!

Go to www.projectcorebot.com to learn more or to sign up. Or feel free to ask any questions you have here.

If I had a time machine right now? I'd probably sit around thinking what I would want to change about my own life, come to the conclusion that there's nothing about myself I would want to change really. Then, I would probably go to either the middle ages or ancient greece, just to get away from the here and now and because those are the time periods I like most (I'm an ICT student, I wouldn't fit in there, but still).

That's all only if I couldn't manage to wait till tomorrow to test it out, if I did wait till tomorrow, everything would probably be different.

If the person in question allows you to do something with it, it's basically okey to do that with it, no matter what it is.
When you don't have permission for just the thing you want to do, you have got to stick to the license under which the song is released - click on "commons deed" - creative commons has pretty good descriptions of what you can and can't do. Do note that usually licenses make zero difference between flash and anything else, what they care about is usually more along the terms of which license you have to use and that you need to properly credit the author of the song.

Note that the one exception to this all is when the artist wasn't allowed to make the song in the first place, in which case he can't legally grant you permission (explicitly or through a license) legally for anything.

Hope that clears some things up!

At 12/19/10 09:32 PM, Mukko wrote: Hm, i'd pm wade. Often people petend to be portal award winning artists.

I'm sorry, but as far as I know TheWeebl is not pretending to be a portal award winning artist - he just is...

Alright, so I PMed the artist and he states that there is no popup. This would mean that it would indeed be something on my pc and not the flash that is causing the popup. However... I am on a university pc right now, and I just watched the movie and got a "Firefox prevented this site from opening a pop-up windows.", because here newgrounds isn't on the pop=up whitelist.

So, now that I have seen the same the pop-up on two different computers (as well as on IE, FF and Chrome), I want someone else to confirm that I'm not just dreaming things up. So here's the link, perhaps someone can confirm it's spawning a pop-up:

• 
  Electro Gypsy by TheWeebl

  Click to view.

  Type

  Movie

  Rated

  Ages 13+

At 12/19/10 08:46 PM, Mukko wrote: You've been trolled. Whistle it.

There's no way to whistle something that's already passed judgement, is there?

At 12/19/10 08:05 PM, Sheizenhammer wrote: You sure this is actually the flash doing it and not something else on your computer? Most of the well-renowned flash artists on NG know about the no pop-ups rule (hell, a good number of them have been around since before the rule was implemented, and remember what a nuiscance they were). It just seems weird that someone who would win awards regularly could somehow miss such an obvious portal rule.

I don't have it on any other flashes, the popup consistently opens when the song is done and is related to the author and flash (it's the song it's a music video for on amazon) and I wouldn't know any software on my pc that would open it. I don't really feel like mentioning the flash or author over here (perhaps it's not all that rational, but I still don't feel like it), but I can send you a link so you can confirm that it's not just some strange software on my pc.

At 12/19/10 07:42 PM, Patcoola wrote: today's security makes pop-ups impossible unless you click or press a key to open the pop-up.

I don't know how he has done it, but this movie spawns a popup even if you never clicked your mouse or pressed a key since starting the movie. I don't know how it's done here, but your claim about it being impossible seems to be false.

At 12/19/10 07:20 PM, Sheizenhammer wrote: If you can get hold of the author (not always possible; they go inactive quite often with little or no notice)

When I said highly accredited, I really meant a guy that's still getting on frontpage regularly.

I sent a message to the author. It sure felt strange, sending a message to a guy whom I am somewhat of a fan of, calling him on how he broke the rules without being the one responsible for the execution of the rules...

I don't think flash movies should automatically spawn popups. It also seems the wistle-link on submissions still under judgement agrees with me. I may be misinterpreting this, but I don't think an animation to a song should automatically spawn a popup with an amazon page with the song on it, not even when the song is done.

However, this is exactly what I've come across - a music video that spawns a popup when the song is done. The thing is, it's an awesome song with awesome animation by an accredited animator and has long since passed judgement. I love the song and don't want it to be taken off the site - however, I don't think the spawning of popups should be tolerated and I would like to get rid of the inconvenience the popups are causing.

What am I to do? Should I just write the animator and hope that will move him to take the popup out of the equation? Should I report to the site staff somehow? Should I just take my losses and make peace with the fact that these popups are here to stay?

I was just playing Mecharon (http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/5 24968) when it hung during the cutscene between episode 3 and 4, but when I restarted and loaded the savegame, I was at episode 4...

I would like to know what happens in the cutscene - especially as you appear to have allies now. Has anybody played it recently by any chance, knows what the cutscene is about and has the time to tell me?

Alright, thanks for telling me how such a thing happens.

But if we do assume that it was "blammed" correctly, it should be removed the collection. In that case this message is an attempt to tell those who do remove that it needs to be done. Not because I want it to be done, but because it will save them the work of having to find it first.

So I was browsing the Music Videos page today, and I saw that the first video had no name...
This sparked my interest and I clicked through to its page and got here. Now that page is a strange one. I may just be wrong, but it seems to me that a flash with such reviews should not have been blammed. Also, it strange it lived for three years before being blammed. I guess it would be good to look if this entry was actually blammed or accidentally marked by the system as such.

And even in the case that it was blammed (say due to a copyright claim), there is still something wrong: In that case it should be removed from the Music Videos page.

At 5/27/09 01:29 PM, Glaiel-Gamer wrote: Sorry but like, I don't see how yours could possibly be "better", then making it an account option accomplishes the same effect, but adds more flexibility and at the same time encourages people to register an account.

I seriously hope I am still entitled to have a different opinion without trying to convince you.

At 5/27/09 01:19 PM, SuperAppendixMan wrote: No, a better solution would be to autoplay by default (possible to turn off by ?autoplay=false), and have it be an account option to change default autoplay to false.

I simply do not agree with that, better is quite the subjective term here.

Also, yes I did come up with that, please stop denying that.
(I'm sorry, your blunt claim about the better solution just asked for a nitpicky reply)

I actually liked the old way of embedding the flash a lot, but I am not against a new layout. However, this layout does have its problems, a bit too many of them if you ask me.

First off, the current layout just does not work at 600x800 and looks really crammed in 1024x768. I don't see what can be done about this without completely redoing the design again and that's probably not considered. Maybe it's possible to steal a few pixels here and there and add to the sides, it would probably make it feel better at 1024x768. Being able to choose a different layout (not necessarily the old one) might resolve this problem all together, but I would not want such an option for my site, I guess, so I can't advise you to do that.

Then there's widescreen. It has been mentioned a hundred times in this thread, but I think it is important enough to mention again: Authors should have the option to disable widescreen for their flashes.

Next I want to talk about autoloading and a closely related concept: the close button.
I think that a lot of thought went into the decision to make flashes load automatically, as you don't strike me as the kind of people to make such a decision hastily. However, autoloading everywhere and all the time is not the right solution I think. This has been mentioned a lot of times, but what I consider the biggest problem with it, has only been said properly a very limited number of times. I can't "save" flashes for later now. Say I am looking for a tower defense game and see a number of promising flashes, now I can no longer open all of them in tabs and try them out one by one. The disappearance of the close button looks like it was just an oversight to me.
I'll come with a proposal for solving this in a moment, but first I will keep on "whining" for a little longer.

Someone put it quite nicely earlier in this thread (sorry, I don't feel like going through it all again to find out who it was): The author deserves more than just a footnote. I don't think putting the flash info below the flash was a correct choice. Putting the author comments and reviews all the way down is not something I would have done either, but the flash info is obviously in the wrong place, I think.

The back button does not function correctly. When dimming a flash, one needs to press back once extra in order to go back one page from where he or she started. I'll get technical on this one right away.
Seeing that the ads are in iframes, they disappear and the url of the main page does not change, I blame the changing of the ads. I haven't looked into it, but I suppose you are changing the src attribute of the iframe, which causes it to be a new entry in the history of your browser. Even if this is not the case, you are modifying something of the iframe that causes it to be a new history entry. One could instead access the content of the iframe directly and change it using innerHTML (or the W3C html-changing functions) and not leave a history entry.

The last thing I want to complain about is pop-up blockers blocking the "play in pop-up" button. While I was looking for the reason of the last problem (it would need a reason, usually you'll have to do difficult things to do the exact opposite), I found that the three buttons at the top where actually a flash file. Now I know that this is a flash portal, but there are correct and incorrect uses of flash. Most things other than what could be submitted to the portal are incorrect use of flash (barring some exceptions such as using flash to play a sound). Besides, I don't see any reason at all to make these buttons a flash file. And as it happens, once these buttons are done in html rather than flash, it's a piece of cake to make a pop-up blocker not consider it something that needs to be blocked.

So, that's enough complaining. Before I continue to my suggestion, I would like to highlight something another user said:
Adding the author's name to the title bar of a flash would be nice.

Alright, as to how I would do it. It sounds like swapping the suggestions and the flash info box would do a lot of good in terms of solving the author not getting due credit. However, I think I can do better than that and leave them as they are and solve a couple of problems at the same time.
Personally I think it would be best to collapse the area that is taken up by the flash and the suggestions to - say - a 100 pixel height area. This area would feature a very large play button and possibly some other nice stuff. This way all the things that were pushed down, aren't pushed down so much. When clicking the button the flash and the suggestions would fold into the page much like the write a review-box does now. A close button would remove the flash again, but probably it should leave the suggestions, as this would be the moment at which the suggestions would be most relevant. Possibly it would be good to move things around a bit so parts can move up even though the suggestions are staying in their place, but I am not sure whether I would go with that or with simply leaving the area where the flash was open.

What I have not addressed yet is the idea that outsiders will like the autoplay. Somewhere in the thread the option of using a GET variable for this (?autoplay=true). This sounds alright, but is not, as people will copy the url of a game they like when digging it and not add that variable. So I came up with the following: autoplay unless the HTTP_REFERER is newgrounds. This way incoming links will have the benefit of autoplay, while if you start out at newgrounds, you won't have flashes autoplaying.
With this system in place, I think it would still be good to implement an overriding GET variable, so links in weekly mails can be done such that autoplay is off.
One could argue whether the flash info and the suggestions should be swapped when autoplaying. In the end I think it would be best not to. These incoming users are the ones that the suggestions box is most important for, and I think that authors can stand not being in the spotlight in this case. However, it is easy to argue in favor of swapping them as well.

Well, that's my eight thousand words (or two cents) on the new view. I hope you can do something with my suggestions, and if not... too bad.

For those who can't get past lvl 7 (I can't with alt either, but had found a different way before consulting the guide), you can also just hold you mouse button all the way, then you can cross the walls or just hold the mouse button and take the cursor out of the screen, to drag it in again when the end is nearing. Be sure to release the mouse over the finish!

I was figured a way out of each lvl but 10 (oh yeah and 5, had the idea but mistimed or so), but I did not read anything new here as I had figured out the ctr-mouse thingie already. Even with the ctrl-thing I was unable to finish the lvl, though and I did not feel it would be the cheating enough for this game. I did figure a way - moving out of the window really fast (yes, it's possible in 10) and then alt-tabbing with the mouse in place already. However, there was a check where such large jumps were not allowed. What I did then was use x-master-nl's comment and stretched it a bit as I also use task manager on always on top, but I dragged Task Manager around, so I would never make big jumps, just small ones.

A couple of days ago I cam along the following ad, and it really made me wonder what was up with it - but at the I saw it me home network happened to be down. For that reason I just made a screenshot and saved it, so I post it now.

I really wonder how comes such an advertisement is displayed and whether NewGrounds wants this to happen...

Image was included, but cut (you can only read the ad partly ), but I am not sure if am allowed to post an image from another source that is larger than the designated size... so here's a link to the [url=http://allyoucanupload.webshots.com /v/2000571961172088134]full image[/url] (I guess that is allowed)