RM is not bad. A lot can be done with it. The point of the program was to make classic RPG's, which is what most people used it for. It was meant to be fun, although most people forget that games in RM are usually being made for the maker and not the GW audience. So the 12yr old kid who started using it for fun gets crapped on for making a shitty game that was only supposed to be for fun and suddenly the maker and the G&D community are bottom feeders?

Asocial bottom feeders? Not really. G&D is content specific. I don't come here for general discussion or to see peoples drawings. I come here because I enjoy amateur games. It's not asocial to visit the board that interests me or to not go on IRC because I don't have a lot of time for this stuff. (I'd rather be working on my game.) Perhaps some of these discussions were being rehashed because G&D attracted NEW members who hadn't seen those discussions before? Well, at least we shouldn't have to worry about that anymore.

Strive for actual innovation: Some people are making these games for fun and WANT to stick to the classic idea. They are not spending hours upon hours of their life for YOU to approve the game. It's for them. Meanwhile some people do come up with innovation, as much as the program can allow. In the past there were even contests that specifically aimed at going beyond the limits of the maker.

New concepts: I see these all the time. Again, this isn't really what the maker was designed for either but new concepts are constantly coming in even now when the site is dead.
Games without ripped content: Anyone that is TRULY striving for an original game and perhaps one to make others happy instead of themselves, or one to make money, won't be using RM. They will learn how to use a more sophisticated program and make all the graphics from scratch. I'm one of those people that works a full-time job and finds it difficult to spend the extra hours on original graphics that will eventually lead to the game never being complete because I simply won't have enough time. Not to mention not everyone is a pixel artist.


If you don't like the games then don't play them. If you don't like amateur games than stay out of G&D, because that's what it is. This isn't really a community of breath-taking games. Many of the users are young teens that have just discovered where to download RM2k3. Get over yourself and let these kids have some fun.

I don't really feel like spending time to make a full rebuttal to your post, but here's a quick response:

You claim that RM is not bad, then you say it can be used to make literally one thing with maybe a few customizations and a vast majority of stuff made with it is made entirely for the person making it and not at all with anybody else in mind. I don't know about you, but that doesn't even come close to clearing my bar for good.

On the subject of the RM community: If all you want to do with an internet forum is post a game you make entirely for yourself using ripped (illegal) resources and expect everybody else to love and adore unconditionally and actively avoid interaction with the other sections of the forum, you are definitionally an asocial bottom feeder. This is not even debatable.

Subject of innovation: Yes, I get that there are people that WANT to stick to the classic idea. The problem is that there were several instances where people would try to do something innovative and it would immediately get buried under all the other garbage, so eventually they just stopped trying. There's nothing wrong with embracing the classic idea, but you can't embrace it to the exclusion of nearly everything else. And, yeah, I remember the "exceed the limitations" contests. Those were great. Why didn't anybody go on to using game makers that don't HAVE those arbitrary limitations, though? Because every single time anybody did, it got buried. Your community was a self-destructive mess and nearly everybody that tried to change that got curbstomped by the circlejerk.

Subject of new concepts: If the maker isn't designed to accommodate for new concepts, it's a shitty maker. Plain and simple. New concepts are the lifeblood of game development, amateur or not. Hell, especially amateur game development.

Games without ripped content: I never said everybody should be pixel artists. I don't believe everybody should be pixel artists. Communities are formed by people with similar interests and differing talents. Leverage the pixel artists already in your community properly, foster an open community that helps include them and attracts more of them, and they WILL come, and they will create resources for you. Same with musicians, same with programmers, same with every single aspect of game development. If you make a community that's satisfied using ripped resources, only one very limited maker, and doesn't make an effort to recruit people who can change this, you aren't going to attract anybody but exactly the people who are already there, and you're never going to get the kind of people you should be looking for. Also: I would MUCH rather play somebody's shitty MS Paint RPG adventure that they made all of the resources for even if they aren't very good than a game built entirely on ripped resources. At least it shows they give enough of a shit about their game to try their hand at a new skill.

and yes I was refering more to amateur games in general. Like, I understand that RM should only be used as a starting point. You can make great games for sure that are fun, and with the newer engines you can make polished games in general if you put work into it to do custom work... However, like you admitted yourself there aren't many amateur developers (who don't use RM) on this site so I don't understand why there was such a huge push to create a community catering to said individuals. What majority? Are you refering to people from the general forums? If anything there was a huge disconnect between G&D and the rest of the forum. As for the changes, you admitted yourself they came way too late. Half the community left and the great amateur developers all moved on to better and bigger things.

Oh, hey, I wonder why there was such a huge disconnect between G&D and the rest of the forum? Maybe it was because every goddamn time something unique or interesting came out of G&D (Lazrael's games, cactus squid games, et cetera), they got buried by the RPG Maker circlejerkbot 5000 and eventually every single person creating things that were more than just LOL SECRET OF MANA SPRITES CUSTOM BATTLE SYSTEM left G&D and just started hanging out with the rest of the forum members on the rest of the forum and IRC, leaving G&D to get progressively more and more inbred and terrible. Did you ever think that maybe the disconnect happened because G&D saw the forums progressing and just decided to hole up in a corner and become a quivering mess?

I wasn't dissing Barkley either btw. I just noticed the whole amateur game movement came shortly after the release of that game. As for the resource engine? The staff should lead by example and submit things. Games, resources, and much more. Think of it as a stimilus. You can talk all you want but if you don't lead by example then why should anyone feel the need to upload things that would probably just be taken for granted? There is no community if the staffs aren't involved. Barkley was something new and the game was actually polished, it also promoted stepping outside RM for a moment which is a good thing by all means. But I don't think that was really enough.

The staff uploaded FIVE HUNDRED DIFFERENT RESOURCES at the beginning and nobody in G&D used it because they DIDN'T WANT ANYTHING TO CHANGE. The entire problem with the G&D community here has been that every time anybody holds out an olive branch to them they retreat further into the cesspool.

I just didn't like RM being called "Bad" when it really isn't. It's a starter tool for sure and many have actually gone further on into high levels of development after initially using RM. So hearing a whole bunch of General Forum Mods talk crap about a subforum (G&D) they had NOTHING to do with was retarded. That's a huge reason why everyone left.

No, RM really is bad. Or was bad. Maybe it's better now. Even if it isn't, the community surrounding it has, by and large, historically been asocial bottom feeders who would rather rehash the same discussions over and over and promote mediocre games than strive for actual innovation, new concepts, or even just GAMES WITHOUT RIPPED CONTENT. The fact that they don't aspire for anything more than maybe a custom battle system and custom menu system is EXACTLY why every single member of it fights against the claims that it is bad, because for a vast majority of the "golden days," there was a pretty solid ceiling for RM games. And it was pretty low.

Yeah that sucks. I appreciate custom games really. As for adverts, there was literally NO FEEDBACK system in place. No one got any real feedback on anything they posted unless they stuffed their topics with a million polished pictures, videos, etc. This got out of hand and people literally just started competing for epeen with no real games actually being in development. This is the fault of the community but also the negative image RM had. Anyone could just post an MS paint doodle of AMATEUR CUSTOM GAME and get 5 pages of feedback instantly. You are asking a lot from normal people to create completely custom games, some people just can not do that. That's where RM comes into place and it was a hobby/starting point for many. There's nothing wrong with RM, the forum staffs just had too high of an expectation. They wanted to see flashy custom games but this community does nothing to promote it, just all talk and rhetoric (aside from a few really good guys out there).

Whoa, we agree here. Sort of. You just completely admitted that G&D sucks and the vast majority of the site doesn't care about it any more because G&D has a shitty community.

EDIT: I guess Laz might not be a good example because somehow he still manages to put up with you guys.

I find it kind of amazing that apparently nearly half of the downloads/purchases have gone to Mac or Linux users at this point, if I'm to believe the pie chart.  The times, they are a-changin'!

thats dumb
i agree with that


going to school to be a game designer seems like the worst idea ever, i cant really see a market for it! Like i suppose it's the same things as writers for a sketch comedy show or whatever but companies going out and seeking guys who only have the skill GAME DESIGN seems  to me
maybe its cause im a programmer and i do all the "real work" of game stuff whatever

No, they seriously do that. I know, I've interacted with dozens of people in the industry. They go out and hire plenty of people who have literally no programming skill to work with Unreal Editor (or Hammer Editor, or whatever generic editor they're working with because very few companies make their own engines any more) and make maps and do Kismet scripting (if you're in Unreal Editor, obviously).  The teams that design the levels are pretty separate from the teams that program up the mechanics, and that's how a majority of the industry works these days.

Now, if you're going into developing your own studio or working at a small indie (or satellite) studio, yeah, you're probably going to need to have more programming experience. But it's not like going for a major in Game Design doesn't give you ANY EXPERIENCE WHATSOEVER in programming or animation or whatever, it just doesn't give you enough for those things to be considered your major.

EDIT:

Here's the Grim Fandango Design doc if anyone wants to save the trouble from searching google:
http://cache.kotaku.com/assets/resources/2008/GrimPuzzleDoc_small.pdf.zip

Just kind of skimmed through it and actualy enjoyed bits of it. It's not very formal, but it's clean and well organized, obviously refined so the process of redesigning it is not shown. Some bit f art and dialogue to describe the flow of the game. Charcters, maps, etc..
Personally, I think the document is meant to be inspirational.

There's also the pitch for Planescape Torment, which is pretty wonderful to read as well (it's basically a casual distillation of the design document), which you can find here:
http://www.rpgwatch.com/files/Files/00-0208/Torment_Vision_Statement_1997.pdf

I can't remember if the design document is out there, but I know that the pitch for Planescape Torment (which more or less just worked as a distillation of the design document) is out there and can be found pretty easily, but since I'm at work right now I can't be arsed to do it. Maybe I'll edit this post later.

I guess I should clarify something: I switched out of the Game Design major into Interactive Media and have never looked back. Most technical majors, at least at my school, are almost entirely what you make out of them.  EDC is right in saying that, with game design, it's mostly going to be stuff you learn on your own.  If you end up liking Computer Science, go for Computer Science, but if you are more into the design aspects... well, Computer Science is probably not going to be your best bet.

If you want to jump right in, you should really honestly try out Game Maker; there are several great tutorials that can get you running with the drag and drop interface, then you can start learning to replace the drag and drop stuff with GML (the built-in programming language that makes it all work).  If programming in GML just doesn't feel right to you, then you may not want to go into Computer Science.

That being said, the absolute best way to see if Computer Science is best for you is to take a programming course or two in high school; it's all really basic stuff, and you'll have to keep in mind that they may not teach you the absolute best practices for certain things, but it will definitely give you a taste of what programming is like.

NINJA EDIT: If you want to actually get into the *design* part of video games, though, Computer Science isn't the best major to go into.  There are a few schools with Game Design majors (I should know; it's what I started college majoring in), and those are the places you want to look at when looking for a college.  In the meantime, grab a copy of Unreal Editor (it comes with most Unreal games; I'd recommend buying the PC version of Gears of War, as the Gears of War editor is a nice version of the Unreal Editor), find some friends, and start making maps.  This is exactly how my roommate (who worked at Midway, worked on the IGF game Devil's Tuning Fork, and is now working at Wideload Games) and I did things (we made a few Game Maker things together and a Gears of War campaign mission and those are what he used to get his job at Midway), and it works out very well.

TL;DR: If you want to go into design, grab Unreal Editor and dick around in the map editor. If you want to go into programming, take a class or look up Game Maker tutorials.

Huh, I can see the resemblance. Weird.

do you mean you started cutting it a year and a half ago

because if you got THAT haircut a year and a half ago

your hair grows retardedly slow

and that is sorta scary

Nah, I cut it again around the beginning of last summer, and its been growing since then.  I'm planning on cutting it again sometime soon.

Whoa, that got a lot more responses than I thought it would. Uh...

heeyyy iaman looking good bro

Thanks!

iaman you look very harry potter. are you making a pizza or warping it? harry potter warps pizza.

I get that a lot, actually...  Well, rather, I'm mistaken for Harry Potter (who I'm not) or an English schoolboy (which I am also not).

woah iaman did you cut your hair, i am pretty sure it was a lot longer than that last time i saw a pic of you!

Iaman, nice haircut! (IDK when you got it cut, though,but I definitely remember it being longish.) It looks good on you.

Yeah, I cut it... about a year, year and a half ago.  Figured it was about time.

Iaman you look like that guy off malcolm in the middle.

yeah b i gotta agree.


Here be me all up on the streets you know how we do when the feds drivin through

I actually never watched Malcolm in the Middle so I have no idea who I supposedly look like.

I'm living with three other people in a 3 bedroom place where we pay $2100 a month for rent; I pay $450 a month because I share a room with another guy.  The gas bill ends up being about $200 this time of year, with the rest of the utilities adding up to about $200 as well.

Since I guess it's been like a bazillion years since I posted here:

So, there's this crazy-cool local band that has been getting pretty big in Chicago (where I live), and I figured some of you guys might be interested (or, possibly, already are fans) in them.  They're called I Fight Dragons, and their music is some kind of hybrid of alt-rock and chiptunes.  Their lineup consists of a lead guitar player, a guitar player/singer, a bassist, a drummer, a backup vocalist, and a keyboard player/vocalist.  That's an oversimplification, though, because at any point in their show, any one of them could be playing one of a dozen or so different peripherals (NES controllers, SNES controller, an NES Power Pad, the NES Lightgun, Guitar Hero controller, et cetera) and actually making music with them!  They've got a really energetic and fun live performance, but their music is upbeat and catchy in its own right.

Plus, you can get their EP, called Cool Is Just a Number, for free by signing up to their mailing list, and the guy who runs their fansite recently put up a torrent that contains both their EP and the bonus songs they release on their mailing list every few weeks. (another good reason to sign up for their mailing list)

If you want to check their music out first, you can listen to at either their Myspace page, or on the preview page on their website.


And, if you are interested in seeing them live, here's their schedule of upcoming concerts.  They'll be embarking upon a tour of the US this fall, and they have yet to release any of the venues they'll be at, but those should be coming pretty soon.

EDIT: Links should work now, dunno why they copied with slashes on the end : |

Lemmy plays a character in it, but the point of the game is that your main character is a roadie at the start, a complete nobody, and he rises up to the top.

Also Jack Black is a bit more of an accomplished actor than Lemmy.

Actually, Double Fine was making this game before GH, but no one wanted to pick it up, until GH made Heavy Metal popular or something.

Tim Schafer had been pitching this game since the early 90s or something, but nobody wanted to touch it until Guitar Hero came out and revived popular interest in Hard Rock and Heavy Metal.

At least, that's the story Tim Schafer tells.

FUCK YES.

Also I totally figured something was up when I tried to go on the mainsite earlier and it told me I didn't have permission to access it :P

Man, I freaking played through Mega Man 1-8 a month or so ago, on the GCN Anniversary collection.  I gotta say: 1, 2, and 3 are easily the hardest of the series, though 5 has the worst Wily attack pattern for me (the 2nd part of the battle, where he appears in random places and shoots the four different balls out), which was even more aggravating in 7, when I had to deal with it AGAIN (it took so long for me to get used to it I was seriously stuck there for like two days).

But, yeah, I love Mega Man.  Maybe I just hate myself, but I honestly think that the overall style and feel of the game, especially the difficulty, make it and its other incarnations (especially including the Mega Man Zero series) some of the most fun games for me.  It all just breaks down to getting used to the game mechanics and attack patterns and then just adapting to whatever the game throws at you, until you get to a point where you just have to start memorizing things because those patterns you learn break down.  For some reason, the design of them just absolutely fascinates me, and I think they actually have a really nice, albeit frustratingly hard and soul-crushing, balance to them.

I dunno, my big concern with this is that, as far as I can tell, the mutation makes it so that the white blood cells don't grow these CCR5 things.  I don't know how well science understands what exactly they do, though, and I feel like there is a lot of potential for a lot of other things to go wrong if they don't extensively test this to make sure it isn't potentially worse.

i sincerely hope you're kidding

Hidden content (Click to reveal)

...

Flukeman?

Original Zelda is my favorite of those selections, mostly because I love how ballsy it was.  Like, they just dropped you in a 2/3-view adventure game world with pretty much no direction.  And barely any story.  No real NPCs to direct you on your way.  Just plain old FIND YOUR FUCKING WAY AROUND.  It was beautiful.  I guess Final Fantasy was kind of like that, but not really, because there were people to sort of direct you at some points.

But of all the classic game series?  My favorite first was Mega Man.  Freaking great ass series that kept getting better, and has always been, to me at least, up near the pinnacle of classic level design.  Frustrating?  Hell yes.  Rewarding?  Oh fuck yeah.  You prove to your friends that you can beat Mega Man, that shows skill.  Final Fantasy?  Naw.  Just means you can sit through hours of wandering around partaking in random battles and occasional boss fights.  Oh, and the occasional SHIT I RAN INTO AN AREA I'M NOT SUPPOSED TO BE IN YET AND I'M BEING RAPED UP THE BUM WHAT DO I DO?