Directions to Nowhere

This post needs to start with a blurb about flash. Flash has been the program I've always used for everything creative I do. I've toyed with Java and script editors, but nothing's ever came to fruition for RO stuff from it. All I've done (for visual things at least) has been in exclusively flash.
Woes of player vulnerabilities had me stop and think about how that monopoly has existed since I tried to bring back RO stuff in '08.
Before then I was using a program called pivot, which was super simplistic to put it simply. The most it could support was .gif if my memory serves me well. It was amazing when I was learning.
In fact, when I started flash stuff I hated it. I didn't understand the program at all. My friend PJ was the first to wrap his head around the program, and I caught up only once he moved on from animation. The timing was unfortunate but frankly he made a good call scrapping animation, it's a headache of a format.
I say that not because it's hard to animate (Which it is, Animation is time consuming and tedious work) but because the means to turn animating professional are very difficult. Youtube is far from a viable option due to its time-watched to revenue ratio. Patreon is an option but unless you're making consistent contributions to youtube, won't help much. Plus you need to make something interesting enough to captivate people to even see your work. Working at a studio requires years of schooling. (Outside my reach...) My ultimate problem is I'm an idiot as an animator because I'm self-taught, so it's hard to take it seriously, or as anything but a hobby.
That and I'm set on my ways, so my drawing methods don't really improve. That and finding time for animating is difficult. And when times not the problem, ideas are. Or scripting. Or writing. Or drive. Organization is hard for me as always...

I give myself a headache, haha.

With all that said, I've started messing around in Unity. It's even more difficult to learn (seemingly) but is a 3D game making engine. The possibilities are endless for game-making (Which I had before said I was stepping away from, but I really can't decide what creative thing I wanna focus on...I'm sure that's not helping my -1000000% productivity...lol)
The reason I have looked into unity, first and foremost, is I see it as the progressive step past flash. Secondly though, Making games with it gives me the potential to make something for Steam Greenlight.
It's not like NG, where it's free-to-upload, but the potential to succeed is much higher. First and foremost, if the game is 'greenlit', passes inspection and makes it to market, copies of the game become available for purchase. That means revenue, which is something that is very difficult to achieve with the way I've been approaching things on NG. I've learned from NG how to understand copyrights, which means if i did make something for greenlight I know I'd make something free of copyright infringements. (Actually Saint Riccy was free of copyright infringements too, hence why I make the claim. I was extremely careful to use public domain stuff and creative commons stuff when I couldn't do something myself.)
The hard part is actually making a game. Unity is new to me, and theoretically I could make a game in flash and find a way to make the swf an executible and use that, but part of me wants to try Unity. And part of me wants to leave the Jenny games for NG, for free, forever.

I'm the hardest to work with, no wonder I'm always alone in these projects lol.

Also I'm playing with the idea of moving away from just the "RO 6" (Ric, Amy, Jenny, Tino, Tim, Taylor)

Lots on the mind, but I've no time to do anything with that. So nothings happening, but I'm playing in Unity now. And I like steam. And Greenlight entices me.

That's this entire post. Should've just read the last 3 lines, rofl.

Survive the Development

Saint Riccy has been marked, and appears to have gone over pretty well. At this time I have no plans to further develop it, but may do so later.
I will likely showcase it in May to friends back home, to get feedback. That'll be its next step at the very least.
I will likely not be showcasing any survive the music remake however, as I've hit a predicament that I'm certain isn't new or unique.

When I made survive the music the first time, I was making it for the sake to prove I could. It had a plethora of issues, most stemming from lack of player cues and floaty controls. As well as being visually bland.

Now that I've started working on it again, I'm finding myself almost afraid to try again. I've done a bit of fixing to the controls, (Has a land animation, character is slowed down to not be a blur on screen) but I'm hesitant to start the actual remake.
I feel like once I've made it, it'll have the same issues as last time, or new issues.
It will probably be doomed to sort of...suck.

I'm finding my weakest skill is design. I can write alright, I can code passably, I can draw kinda and I can make a somewhat catchy set of tunes. But my design...well..
It took 3 years, but I see why I'm not meant for architecture.

So in summary, we're sorta back to the drawing board. So business as usual.

Project Complete!...??

I now have another project that joins the ranks of Survive the Music. Though this one doesn't require a redesign...!

Saint Riccy has finally been finished! Though I typically exaggerate the work time, It is without a doubt I've put in at least over 24 hours of work on this project.
It is a visual novel game, though plays through with only 1 arc (all I had time for). It has characters (outside of my usual 6, oh my!), sfx and music ("Being with her" as the main theme, couldnt get other music to work...sfx all credited and such though!), and backgrounds. (credited and photoshopped, beautiful. Also massive. seriously they contributed like 28MB of the project, its nuts. Shouldve done lower resolution. Hindsight.)

It's been handed in for the final project, the teacher asked me to present it in class. (Which I did! Public Speaking got me all over dat noise.I read it like a book, tried to do voices and such) He seemed really impressed with the writing at least. We shall see how it scored with other categories in time though.

I learned lots from SR. First thing I learned: Writing takes time. My original schedule for the project alloted 24 hours to write the story. I ended up taking around 15 days. (Inspiration was tough, giving this project the time of day when I had like 6 others to do was what was the killer.)
Second thing: Flash doesn't do so hot with memory. My backgrounds were high res, which ate memory for breakfast. While trying to add music, the compiler crashed, making it so I couldn't actually export the game, meaning no game...almost led to no Saint Riccy.
I ended up undoing and scrapping the music, for again, lack of time.
Third thing: Time is the biggest thing. I knew from the get-go that SR would be a time sink, but because of how I'd procrastinate (Which was caused because I'd do many other projects, then want to relax, which would suck time away from SR...was a vicious cycle. They assign more little project crap, I do em and want break. Lose more SR time.) I ended up having a really bad sleep cycle this past week for attempting to rush production.
On that note: I've now had experience on rushing production of a RO game. Not exactly a good thing, but learning what that's like is good.
I did find that the due date actually really helped. I crushingly wished to have it bumped back, so I could make SR better, but because of it being in stone, it made me have to prioritize things like crazy and really focus on what I could get done at minimum without sacrificing quality.
I think I'll play with due dates for RO games in the future, see if that translates into more content.

Now, as for the project itself...It's too big for publishing to Newgrounds. (50Mb/20Mb)
Depending on the mark, I may rework the backgrounds, maybe try to add decision routes (aka pick a or b and a goes to main line, b goes to different side route that could connect or end its own way)
and maybe add music (haha) so that it would pass for a publishable work. (Technically it already is, but I'd prefer to publish it in its 'best-I-can-get-it' form)
Else, I may upload it online somewhere else and link it here or on PTE. Haven't decided.

As for RO projects coming up now...still thinking. So come back soon!

Saint Progress

I gotta admit, having the due date has really helped put fire under me and get things rolling.
That said, quality-wise I worry if I'm skimping due to time constrictions.

The biggest issues I'm finding is writing and image inconsistancies, and accuracy errors.
Though figuring I'm writing about a situation I've never been in with information that is vague at best, the clarity is a bit doomed. I can't exactly find a person who's been in it either, and am not really sure I'd want to. I'd feel weird just prying someones experiences for my game.

Problems aside, Saint Riccy is making strong progress. It's still behind schedule as of this post, but It's approximately 30% done. And that progress was made in 3 days at about ~26 hours, so I'm doing not too bad.

Of course with 10 days left and a rather rocky final week ahead of me, things will get interesting.
I should probably go work on it now...haha...

Also if you're here from PTE, know that I plan to work on the remake of Survive the music after schools end. I doubt it's going to get any recognition ever, but at this point I think I can  comfortably admit Ric Olzow Stuff is a hobby.

I gotta get a real job. Maaaaaan.
#DreamsDashed

Idiot Genius

Saint Riccy has been greenlit, with full marks! ....and has made absolutely zero progress.

It's officially 10 days behind schedule as of tomorrow. The one thing I forgot was how every other course BOMBARDS during the semesters end, so Saint Riccy has been getting the backseat treatment.

It's going to be interesting to see what I can pull off. I might have to quit watching youtube, quit Minecraft, quit all reprieve time essentially.


 Or maybe I'm just over-thinking again.

All I know is, the idea is sound, but man, making RO stuff into legit schoolwork...just adds one more stress to the pile. And it's a big one, cuz I truly passionately care about how this turns out.

More updates when I actually delve into working on it. Hopefully before April.

Balls to the wall

Remember Saint Riccy? A proposed Visual Novel game about relationships and cheating and getting hit by trains that got trapped in dev hell due to school?

Well have I got news for you! I'm attempting to make it into a school project, so that I'll actually make the damn thing. The class it's for is about harm reduction, so instead of having moral messages about not cheating it'll be focused around helping drug users improve their lives. It has a fleshed out storyline (Something Saint Riccy was missing), and even has a full-out release date! (Coincidentally also a due date...)
This seems all good and dandy, eh? There's a few catches.
1. The project has to be accepted and greenlit by my professor.
2. This will not be under the RO name, just under my name, as last time I did a RO/school project and used 'Riccy' in my name the teacher had to be convinced that I didn't steal my own project and that I could indeed do flash.
(Which led to a full mark but MAN I hate being accused of stealing. IT WASNT EVEN THAT GOOD YES I GET IT WAS A TECHNICAL COMPLIMENT BUT I CARE MORE ABOUT NOT GETTING BANNED THAN COMPLIMENT)
 3. The development time is 26 days. The last thing I made was 4 months. So I'm gonna have to hustle as soon as it's greenlit. Figuring I'm already hustling with 1000 other things, this is gonna be interesting.. no more fun for me.
4. This will likely be presented in class. I always get anxious when my work gets shown in front of people with me around. So the longer I make it, the longer I suffer.

But catches aside, the benefits (potential kick-ass mark, something I know how to do, no essay writing, Actually making something RO related) outweigh the catches, hence the decision to put my balls to the wall.

I'm a terrible boss. MAN

Tino's Sunglasses

Since forever and a day ago, Tino Jackson dude has been a 'character' of mine. So long that this was the first character I created after my 'imaginary friends' phase. (I was 3 cmon stop making fun)
One thing thats remained constant for him has been his sunglasses. He wears them (theoretically) 24/7/365.

In light of a certain something , I began thinking about the lore behind why he always wears sunglasses. For a long time I've been looking into eye disorders and what eye disorder could possibly require needing constant sunglass usage.

The answer? None. That's a really good thing.
But it also means that Tino's sun-glass use is either due to:
-Stylistic reasons (Where it's just a thing he does)
-Sensitivity to light, which implies more migraines as something he suffers.

I've also looked into cones and their relationship with sun-glass use, if he was to have an eye disorder due to cones it would likely be dystrophy. However sunglasses would do nothing to aid that disease.

I realize that as he is a made-up character, I could just as easily make up an eye disorder that he has if I really wanted his sunglasses to have a medical reasoning for existing. However, I more just want him to have an accurate reason to constantly wear sunglasses.

Long story short, Tino's sunglasses make me learn about eyes. Maybe it has taught you too?