Chase_Arcanum

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I have to say I was really hoping for "Quiver" to come out as a finalist.

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You and me both, Ex. You and me both.

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I was very impressed by Quiver too. Great job.

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Biggest disappointment yet. Cryptic, please if you are going to have a huge event be prepared to handle the load. The servers were not playable enough to even gain from the double xp. I gained less xp than I normally do because of the wasted time waiting on trying to even log in. After 30 minutes of failed attempts I gave up. 2 Thumbs down for not being prepared.

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So - which server? This doesn't help anything, you know.

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Agreed. Only saw one server hit red status Friday night, and even logged in out of curiosity. Didnt see any strange lag around the typical choke points.

Perhaps an ISP issue?

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Strength - great visual style, although the ending felt a little sudden.. like it should have had on more page or so. still.. a good read!
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You don't know how much I agree with you. I abandoned this story several times because I didn't think I could capture it adequately in 8 pages. There's a reason why it was an 11th-hour submission

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grats to all the winners!

Just wondering about the "honorable mentions" The e-mail I got said the top 14 would be shown as honorable mentions win or lose... Yeah, I got the e-mail a few days ago and have been on pins and needles since then waiting for the announcement Tough competition, but making the short list was a thrill none the less.

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My bet: they asked for the .cbcx file in the mail... then realized after the fact that the .cbcx file doesn't have all the necessary files to reproduce the comic like they wanted (and a .zip of the needed files is too large for email.) They're probably just working the kinks out of how to get the rest viewed.

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Congratulations to the winners as well.

So when does the next issue of STRENGTH come out? I love that black and white rendition.

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I suddenly got a bit more rushed. I have 4 tales now in some stage of production.

1) A dark astoria based tale that was to be more humor and tribute to zombie flicks. Story's about done, but I've had to experiment with how to capture some of the fog effects effectively in my character profile. I may need to recruit more liberty-ites as extras once I get that working, unless I plan quite a bit of photoshopping

2,3,4) If that "new rikti look" affects ALL rikti everywhere, then I have a rather limited window for my 3 stories that share the same backdrop (the original rikti invasion of PCU). I've got to move all three to the front burner to make sure I get the shots I need before I10 goes live.

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I also submitted my entry by PDF. I'm starting to get the feeling the people that submitted PDFs didn't get a receipt email. At least, that's what I'm hoping. I'd describe my feeling as HORRIFIED when I saw that some of you got receipt mails. I guess if I don't win I could always blame it on email problems.

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If you'd like to have space to share your .pdf submission online, I have some web space available. This offer goes out to anyone. I really like seeing what everyone put together.

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Wow.

Thanks for the congrats everyone, and thanks to the judges for the recognition.

There were some really incredible stories out there. Some awesome competition, and so many of the submissions have inspired so many more ideas than I care to imagine.

I encourage everyone to take the hypercomics link above and view some of the entries. Anyone that has the courage to put his or her work up for everyone else to see deserves some praise and recognition.

Give them a few minutes over the next week and let them know the effort was appreciated.

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...You sir know how to tell a 9 page story. ....

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Very true.

I was scanning through the hypercomics submissions, commenting where I could (until work suddenly went nuts). I forgot all about the off-site submissions.

Been reading neighborhood watch for a while now. You've got some serious talent.

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*rattles the cage*

*refreshes browser*

*rattles some more*



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By the way, great submission. The double-narrative really does work well.

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The crossword is relatively easier this time around.

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On a scale of 1-10, how difficult would you want the quiz to be?

1 would be something like "All the answers are in the rulebook or are references to the very core story".

10 would be something more like "References so obscure and brilliant that people will be making threads to compare notes, even then in trouble".

I'm a bit confused as to what the public desires more on this aspect. The first crossword that came up had people comparing notes all the way until the end. This one's easiness is such that it is our first hard point of observation for this edition. Which is preferable?

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I heard that in the first draft of the crossword, 02 across was missing the "not".

We can all do our own "honorable mention" right now among peers- please go look at each others' work, give it some praise, or even use the "blog" tool right there to call attention to something you saw as neat.

I've been trying to leave comments as I read them... wish hypercomics had a way for me to easily backtrack through my commented pages, since some people have responded& I misss the remarks

Thanks Lighthouse, I was wondering how the judges could stay sane reading 2700 pages of comics in a month. I mean- just look what it's done to Statesman!

EDIT: Granted, he reads that much in a week...

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This is indeed something that I could get behind. I think ChaseArcanum has come up with a great idea of getting the missions into the game in a fairly simple and straight-forward manner. The difficult part, however, is actual implementation. I think by improving the features available to SG Bases, we can get to the point to where players can create their own missions.


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The more I think of it... the more polished I think our editors may already be.

I remember reading in an interview that the devs' "zone builder" is essentially integrated with the game engine... you can probably say that the base builder is a natural extension of it.

If that's accurate, then a "watered down" mob placement and scripting element might not be too-too difficult to port. Still an investment, mind you, but one with many pieces already in place.

The trick would be: would it offer enough to bring in more subscribers to make the investment worthwhile?

I'd say yes, but I love being GM/storyteller.

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Just ask the UO people about how that works. They used "Freely submitted" code and then got sued for it and lost.

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Cite?

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I think he's referring to the UO "volunteer" program. It wasn't code-based, but volunteer guides. A few years ago, there was a dept. of labor review that examined "volunteer programs" and employment law.

First I remember hearing of was the AOL volunteer forum moderators. While they were "volunteers" they started getting perks (like discounts) and even were scheduled by AOL like employees. In some instances, the line between "volunteer" was crossed and the people won class-action suits in some states claiming violations of "labor laws" (if they weren't volunteers, then child labor and even minimum wage compensation applied.)

This hit UO- where UO's volunteer guide system similarly crossed the line (to the point where the volunteer (unpaid) guides TRAINED the not-so-volunteer (paid) replacements (without their knowledge.) They sued. They won.

Games are much more careful with their organized "volunteer" programs as a result. When I "battlemastered" WizKids official tournaments, for example, I had to file as a private contractor and report my limited edition "thank you" mechs as compensation.

You're starting to see a return to volunteer-related stuff online, but with few of the old perks or organizational structure, as nobody wants to get burned again.

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My take on this:

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Potential drama off the top of my head: "why did you endorse his missions and not mine?" Also: "all my friends endorsed this, there's over a hundred names here, why did the devs veto it?"

I realize that this is trivial and petty, but a lot of drama is created via trivial and petty things.

Besides, I don't think it's really going to impact it that much. It's a well-thought idea.

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Agree on the potential drama, but it's not drama that causes much dev overhead. Much of it is akin to the level of "myspace friends" drama. The dev veto could easily identify concerns (spawn mix imbalancing, time to completion issues, writing content or simply "not consistent with the direction of the game.")

It was more of a "shoot from the hip" model inspired in part by the Pirates of the Burning Sea "vote" system for flags, in part social networking sites.

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This can't be anymore of a problem than creating the content yourself. In fact if anything it'd be much less manpower intensive.


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Just on this point, the big difference is that the devs can trust internal resources so don't have to pour over every molecule of such content. QA can catch the bugs before the players see them. The systems already exist internally to develop new content.

However, player submitted content, especially complex content such as a mission, needs a lot of scrutiny. I could easily be racist, sexist or any other of a whole lot of -ists without ever using an offensive word. I could do it so that my language only means something offensive to other Australians, because the US doesn't necessarily understand Australian slang.

Also, simply skimming for offensive language misses the issue of players creating / violating existing game canon. I can only imagine the fanfic that might be possible if players are allowed to write a mission that (for example) allows players to discover Numina's and Ghost Widow's 'special secret frienship'.


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I think I read that fanfic.

While this IS a serious issue, it's simply an upscaled version of what we experience at the individual character level. We have obscene bio's, lewd or suggestive character names, and enough attempts at the naked toons, creative animation use, and selective screenshotting. What do we do? Hold the players accountable.

More than a rating system, a reporting system needs generated. The mission-creator's name must be tied to his project so he knows he'll be held accountable for improper content. Removing "publishing rights" should be a very early response.

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And then there is the whole management of testing. Players can rate player missions, but who is going to do it? If it's up on Test, over time fewer and fewer players are going to be interested in testing another cruddy player mission, or such testing will stop when new dev content is launched. But if it is on the live servers where player submitted missions are tested, Cryptic runs the risk of offensive material and / or buggy material (and I mean really buggy, holes in the mission maps, completely uncompletable mission buggy) being seen by their customer base.

It's not necessarily developing the content that is the time intensive bit. It's QA, it's continuity, it's management of the process that takes up the time.

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My take on this:

No test server. Everything's in-game from the start. No XP, no "signature characters" no reward. This is simply a "fun experience." At every stage, an anonymous reporting system will allow for dev intervention, if needed. Most common intervention is the suspension of the mission's availability and/or removal of all authoring rights.

Every mission has a title, a description, an author name and endorsement names. Endorsement names may be supergroup or individual. They may be listed via special channels in the police band radio or newspaper classifieds (even multipart pseudo task-forces).

1. Player creates content. Invitation-only.

This allows the player a first tier of peer review and since he's letting people in that he knows, he's unlikey to risk his reputation on stuff they'd find offensive. (Note:this still allows for stuff that others may find offensive. A mission that parodizes Living Hellfire might be met with glee by the Hellfire haters, but be quite insulting and offensive should Hellfire himself discover it.

This serves as a bit of an alpha test and a peer review. Many will never go farther than this, and that might be all the original author wants.

2. Supergroup/Coalition and Friends Availability
At this tier, the author opens the game up to everyone on his friends (or global friends) list. His supergroup leader (or leaders of any supergroup in his coalition) with sufficient rights can opt to make it available to his group. This adds the group as a "endorser" -tying their reputation to the content.

You still have a rather small network of players viewing it, and they likely do know the author, so he can't hide between anonymity too long. Not only that, but supergroup reputation can be tarnished (as it's name is attached) giving them an incentive as well. Changes can still be made at this level.

Again, if everyone absolutely loves to make fun of Miss_Kitty in a custom mission, then a parody mission at her expense may last for some time, but it will at least have a very small community accessing it.

3. Viral Growth
From here, individuals with access to the mission may choose to personally endorse the mission. Now, their name is attached to the endorsement (maybe even a small star-rating system saying HOW MUCH they endorse it, and all THEIR friends may see the mission in the search menu.

This way, a friend of Chase_Arcanum could filter for all missions I endorse. if you like what I like, you may find the mission entertaining. We'd strat to see reviewers serve as a "nexus" rating systems that are or are not up to their personal preferences. Others discovering the mission can add their own endorsement, spidering access out to all their friends.

Once enough people endorse a mission, it becomes available to the entire server. Only active accounts count in this tally. If edits are made to the mission at this stage, everyone endorsing it is notified, and they may revoke their endorsement. This prevents a really innocent mission to be modded into something offensive after a reviewer has endorsed it.

4. Ultimate Recognition
The ultimate recognition is rare and never guaranteed. It's used by the devs to identify the truly awesome creations. The devs release a style guide that includes the "do's and dont's" for applicants (including spawn sizes, language, etc.) Once a mission is server-wide accessible, the author can initiate a petition to the devs to "make it official."

When that petition is started, every endorser may opt to add his name to it. Some stories can be really great, but not right for "official" status- maybe it's a uberhardcore way-too-imbalancing map that's fun to play but everyone knows it wouldn't balance if it was made official. Once enough people sign the petition (maybe offset by a "no vote"), it's flagged for a dev review. Devs always have the right to veto.

Should the devs agree not to veto, the mission becomes "official." Rewards are enabled and the mission may even be moved into the regular mission cycle. Credits are given to the author(s) but it's otherwise just like any other adventure in-game.

Just for reference: there are plenty of ways to offer player created content. After apparently realizing that they drove away everyone BUT roleplayers, the SWG devs have introduced "storyteller" tokens that allow players to drop items & spawns on the map to create their own events.

Hundreds of things, from parked starships, wreckages, and containers to critter spawns of any level to starship battles flying overhead- everything in the event coordinator's toolbox save the ability to actually take control of one of these NPC's (to reduce griefing issues, only the people "participating in the story" aggro the dropped combat mobs.

With all that flexibility, the STILL haven't given players the ability to create NPC character dialogue. (They used too... but had too many obscene-spewing slavegirl NPC's, I guess). I find that funny, as it would probably be VERY easy to identify the author and sanction him (remove storyteller rights, for example... or banning) enough to prevent repeat offenders.

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the best player generated content is better than the dev generated content. Because players spend a ton more time on the content and because 1,000 monkeys banging away by chance will produce something more interesting than 2.


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The devs over at Pirates of the Burning Sea will agree with you (game isn't out yet, IIRC). They set up a system for players to submit art: sails & flags, for example, but with more on the way (ships, jewelry, hilts, etc). They're community reviewed, voted on, and then brought to the devs when they've reached so many votes. The devs always have veto power.

I didn't see boats, but one dev remarked that some player-made ship submissions were far superior to their own because players weren't constrained to dev time economies. Unfortunately, player-developers are also frequently less concerned with things like system performance- I've seen such polygon-rich player-made hairstyles that three avatars together crash even powerful gaming systems.

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Players are good at filtering content for both bugs and balance. The key is it isn't a democracy. Players in CoH tend to play the overpowered sets. So devs can look at the most played sets on that basis. The players see that sets are overpowered, they don't necessarily ask the devs to fix it.


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Disagree here. Players may find bugs, but you'd be amazed how few go reported, and they can have very odd views on balance... particularly in a multiplayer game.

Err... sorry for the threadjack.

Back on-topic: anyone get a chance to try setting this up yet?

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I already have and that's what I'm expecting to do in the future, if the issues appear to be promising based on their website presentation. Thats how several of my friends are interacting with the game now (one in seven of them chose to give i9 a hands on after quitting 7 months ago. two of themare not able to because of finacial concerns, the other four asked what there was in the way of new villian misison content and laughed it off when I told them).

However, from that prespective, anything the issue blurbs say about "New inventable items" will not be going in the "I should sign on again" side of the balances, since I won't be on long enough to see the benefit. I'm too casual for the game I guess. If that means the costume system has become 94% stagnant for me (which has been the case in i9), that will increase the odds I'm not gonna bother. I realize that makes me a marginal customer that Cryptic is even less interested in serving. Its a negative reinforment loop for both parties (a.k.a. a death spiral) but that's where we're at.

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You shrug off the praise of Faultline by citing hours. It's true that the story can be completed in 4-5 hours. That's an "accomplishment" style of play: play it, beat it, forget it. There are still hours of explorer-ranged experiences and even "puzzle" discoveries of appreciating the hidden references in character stories & NPC dialogue. There's also the ability to street-hunt in a new area with new experiences. The game also introduced safeguard missions the same issue, IIRC, and many of the "throw away" stories have their own little discoveries that can make them last much longer before seeming too "repetative."


The greatest MMO's have never been about passively consuming someone else's story, but giving you a playground to create your own. You choose not to- others get a great deal of value out of their $15 and would be disappointed had the devs taken your direction.

Your contempt for the game is common, but usually misplaced: $15 doesn't get you very much nowadays, as far as entertainment goes.

Your $15 won't even get you a 4 hours of entertainment at the movies... even excluding popcorn. Most $60 games are gearing for under 20 hours of playability- in fact, many game reviewers now cut on a game if the story drags on for too long. Many games that do claim more than that have gameplay that makes that "hunt for the last darn glowie" tedium seem rich in comparison.

I know this won't convince you not to leave- you're not satisfied here... just don't be surprised if you're not satisfied elsewhere either.

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Jack Emmert has stated in the past that he feels player-created content is a red herring because most players don't have the talent for creating good content. He wasn't slamming players; just acknowledging the fact that most of us don't have great plotting/writing skills.

In theory, the idea is wonderful. In practice, you have to assume that every player who builds custom content is doing so in order to benefit himself. "If my supergroup does this content 100 times, we'll all be level 50 with a full compelement of IOs!"

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Jack's not alone in that sentiment, either. Many developers don't want player made content until they figure out a system to easily sort the crap from the good stuff for the players.

"Story builders" can range in complexity, of course- SWG's recent "storyteller" system allows users to stage their own events- even drop combat NPC's of any level range for those in their "story" to beat (no loot, no XP). In that case, they "polished" the tools the event coordinators had.

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Ryzom's move made some sense for the company. They're small, have a limited player-base, and allowing the player-designed content cuts some of their development expenses. Even so, the biggest problem I heard about was simply that people would design their instances and then hardly anyone would find and use them. (In Ryzom, your custom instance is only active while you're logged in and playing. At least that's how it worked at the time the feature was introduced.)

Ryzom also built their development tools to be tightly integrated into the game. Most of the work (aside from the instancing) was just a matter of telling the game engine that players were allowed to use a subset of the dev tools. If Cryptic's development tools are primarily accessed outside of the game then you're unlikely to see them taking the time and trouble to develop new tools that ARE tightly integrated with the game engine.

I'd love to be able to design my own missions, but I don't see that ever happening in CoX.

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I don't see it as likely either, but we might be a decent bit down that path tech-wise already, the more I think of it. One of the devs commented that the engine actually did house many of their world-editing tools, and they already seem to have refined one of them for us (base editor)

Bases are essentially custom maps for PvP / RP. Building off that engine:
- add the ability to place "spawn markers" on those maps. Those would allow for selection of villain group, default animation sets, and possibly customizing some random statements by the bad guys. (no reward)
- add "intro text" on load and completion text
- add droppable "clickies"
- define prefab rule sets for completion (defeat all... click all... etc)

That would be a rather basic level editor... not awesome, and still a GREAT DEAL of work, but you can see how it could progress. From here, we could give the level builder the ability to give mastermind-level commands to spawns (akin to the arena matches).

Then

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Bah. Lighthouse pokes his head in and I STILL get no closure on the proper pronunciation of "Talos."

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The video pronounces it right. I had to have Statesman (Jack) confirm it himself specifically for this vid.

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o_O

Wow. I feel like Stan Lee just told me the big green guy is really called "The Helk."

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No... That's Hoolk

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*Kisses Positron's Boots of Glory*

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Careful. Doing that has a 20% chance of causing lethal damage to the kisser.

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Darn procs need a toggle-off.

Nice video- hope to see more...

... though I'm now wondering if my comic-book-based guide is worth taking beyond the script stage.

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The wait to find out who the winners are, is killing me.

Although, after seeing a lot of the submissions in HyperComics, I probably have little chance of winning.

Makes me wish that there'll be Honorable Mentions, maybe 5 or 10, and give them a consolation prize like.... um.... just a yellow title.... yeah. No monetary value right?

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Personally, I agree- I've only made it through maybe a fifth of what's up there, but many more need recognition than what the prizes will offer. I've commented on the few I've seen, but at the least, after judging is over, it would be neat if judges, community managers, and community members added a few comments of praise.

Maybe the "city scoop" can hilight a different comic a week....