Art and design resource consolidation

[nightmare975]

If CE gets the C&D, I'll make sure it's released to the public. Whether or not I get sued in the process.

Some sacrifices are worth it in my opinion.

[FaustWolf]

Wow, fantastic job on the reupload Ramsus! Changing to a 500kbit/s bitrate did that? My connection didn't have to stop to buffer at all. The quality's passable on the teaser site now, so I'll churn out the other two previews in a few weeks.

Seeing the teaser site animation after the movie was really awesome. One thing though -- I got this weird square on the site:




 

[Ramsus]

To celebrate the Crimson Echoes release here at the Compendium, I'm thinking we could do some interviews with the developers. However, rather than just have a normal interview article, we can do them as a series in a graphical style similar to last year's Dream Splash preview show. Only this time, the engine will be flash based rather than Javascript based, and the scenario scripts will be more straightforward and easy to use in format, so Z can fine tune every last bit of the presentation. If I have time, I could even try making a graphical drag-and-drop scenario builder to make it even easier. Using flash as the target platform also means we can have cutaways to video clips from the game, or screen recordings showing how specific tools were used, in addition to sound effects and some background music.

However, for this to work, I'll need to know what kinds of art resources people will want for their avatars or for backgrounds, so I can get those done over the next few months.

Wow, fantastic job on the reupload Ramsus! Changing to a 500kbit/s bitrate did that? My connection didn't have to stop to buffer at all. The quality's passable on the teaser site now, so I'll churn out the other two previews in a few weeks.

Seing the teaser site animation after the movie was really awesome. One thing though -- I got this weird square on the site:




 

Yeah, Firefox doesn't layer some things properly, so iframes and flash objects tend to appear on top of stuff they should be underneath. I'm converting the entire site to flash this weekend, which should take care of that problem. I might even add some interactive easter eggs and what not, if I can think of anything.



As a side note, I'm doing all the Flash stuff using haXe, but the documentation is kind of bare. However, today I got a 600+ page book on using haXe for web and desktop application development in the mail, and I'm already up to page 364. The remaining chapters after this one aren't even relevant to doing stuff with flash, so all that's left now is to write up some more code.

[Agent 12]

I'm slightly worried about the interviews being......more wall of texty.....than the dream splash was.  The dream splash worked well since it was showing off pictures and wasn't really focused on the text. 

What something like this might work well for is a feature I wanted for the "history of Crimson Echoes".  Where we could have me/zeality and 99 walk people through the projects history with screen grabs from the initial demo, Demo 2, the Real life taking over periods and the final sprint to the finish. 

That would actually work really well since really the project had distinct sections where it was led by different people:

Zeality => conception to demo 1,  Me=> demo 1, Demo 2, Chrono99=> Picking up the reins in my absence, Me=> Taking it to the end.


I definitely think it would be funny if we can pull out old patches and show the my original ugly chronopolis, or my original ugly singing mountain (i looked for this lately and couldn't find it though )  Maybe pull out the old drafts for some of the plots.

--JP

[Ramsus]

I've updated the trailer site to the all new all flash version. Feedback is welcome.

[FaustWolf]

Using the Zeal Palace background music was a superb choice. The Lavos screech made me jump out of my seat though; totally wasn't expecting that.

[Ramsus]

I'm currently bogged down at work, and at home I'm studying 3D modeling and animation in blender during what little free time I have left right now, so I won't have much to offer the beta testing for a few more weeks. After that, I should finally have time for a serious play through of the game.

I can definitely fit in some extra work on the site on the weekends though, so if you have any suggestions for things I can add (spec sheets on the game, hidden mini-games or interactive art  galleries, an updates mailing list form so people can sign up to be e-mailed when the game is released, etc.), feel free to let me know. Anything is possible at this point.

[FaustWolf]

Question: now that Human Glenn is in play once again, how do we want to handle the newer preview videos? My current inclination is to just capture with Frog (I'm doing some new tech captures this run-through), but I wanted to consult with you guys. If we show Frog during the previews and suddenly Human Glenn is in, it'll create a huge firestorm within the fan community, but after CE is released. If we show Human Glenn in the last preview video, it'll create a firestorm before CE is released.

However, if we just go with Frog in the previews, we're covered regardless of whether some huge problem crops up that prevents Human Glenn from making it in.

[Agent 12]

um definitely frog...it'll be awhile till glenn is in play.

--JP

[Ramsus]

If you save Human Glenn for the release, it helps cut down on the possibility of the game leaking, while giving people an incentive to get the final release even if the game does leak early and they already have the leaked version.

Also, I'd say firestorm after the release is more desirable.

[FaustWolf]

It's my intention to finally get another preview done by May 1, and a third preview done by May 15. While I'm planning the next one out, question: do we just flash the mysterious Kamon again, or do a full Peach Mountain Shoguns logo with jingle this time?

[FaustWolf]

A second preview appears...
The Dream of Zeal is Alive!

The logo unveiling halfway through is a bit repetitious considering the main CE site, but I figure it'll go over really well on Youtube. The original's a 256x224 frame size again (sorry sorry), but I'm going to try recapturing in 480x360. In any case, the only compression involved was in the very last step, so hopefully it'll look decent if you give this the same treatment as the first preview, Ramsus.

Next up is "Ladies and Gentlemen," which I hope to get done by May 15.

[FaustWolf]

Hold on, I just found a really good way of changing the frame size that I'll be using from now on. I should have a pretty high-quality 480x360 version up soon.

[FaustWolf]

 

The Dream of Zeal is Alive (High Quality)

Get stoked. People will flip when this goes on the CE site. And to think it only scratches the surface of what's actually in the game.


EDIT: I've got a cool little music piece on hand I could use if you guys happened to want to tag a "May 31" and some little explanatory notes (e.g., a "this is a fan project, not for profit" disclaimer) to the end of this preview.

EDIT: Oh! Forgot this, heh heh...

Audio Track:
Zyko, "The Queen With the Silver Eyes (Dream Extension)"
Magicbox Music, "Sauron's Grip"

[Ramsus]

I'm working on the release site right now, but I'll create an updated pre-release site right afterward. You can catch me on the IRC channel if you have some suggestions about it.