Cyberganked trailer!

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Ice Cream Jonsey
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Cyberganked trailer!

Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

Here ya go, enjoy. I sure aren't. Amn't. In making it, I mean:

[youtube][/youtube]
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RealNC
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Post by RealNC »

Hmm, yes, 'tis quite regal. The British accent me likes :-)

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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

Ah yes! That would be Alexander Gray, who played Duffy in Necrotic Drift, and Lebbeus in Cryptozookeeper. I don't know if we'll get a chance to have him be a selectable character in Cyberganked, but he was kind enough to provide the voice over.

(The other three people speaking are me, Flack and Jizaboz.)
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Post by Flack »

Huzzah! It looks great!
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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

Thanks to everyone who commented and retweeted it. You are the real stars.

I have been trying ever since I release the fucking file to change the goddamn "preview" image, but because Youtube is a Google product, of course it doesn't fucking work.

Next up is to get the game on Steam Greenlight.
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Post by RealNC »

You can also "bribe" people to view the trailer, and later vote for it on Greenlight, by doing one or several game giveaways on http://www.steamgifts.com.

Obviously this will cost you money. What people do, is give away some popular game (like Skyrim, or GTA 4, stuff like that) and then simply urge people to visit their youtube channel or vote on their greenlight page.

There's also the "scumbag" way of doing greenlight, by promising a steam key for everyone who votes "yes" (this is possible since, if the game passes greenlight, Valve gives developers as many keys as they want, for free, no questions asked.) But note that more often than not, this destroys the reputation of the developers trying to get their games into steam that way.

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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

Everyone in the game is kind of a scumbag, so that would be keeping in the spirit of things.

Is there any way to prove that someone voted Yes on Greenlight, though?

I don't think I'll do it that way. I want to make some money of this, this time out.

I read at one point that a game needs 80,000 yes votes to pass Greenlight. There is no way that can still be the case, with all the niche titles I see. I think that advertising the game on CRPG forums (which I haven't done yet) as well as getting the word out to text game enthusiasts is as far as I'll be able to reach. Anyone who spends five minutes with it will find it funny if they have a sense of humor, the rest of it will be whether or not people like the gameplay in general.
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Post by RealNC »

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:Everyone in the game is kind of a scumbag, so that would be keeping in the spirit of things.
Next time you decide to do a greenlight again, people would immediately go "oh, that Robb Sherwin asshole again, no thanks" (downvoted out of principle.)
Is there any way to prove that someone voted Yes on Greenlight, though?
You need to ask the people who sometimes organize these things:

http://whosgamingnow.net/

They seem to have an automated system for that. No idea how it works, since I don't think Steam has an API for that. If interested, get in contact when the guy running that site.
I don't think I'll do it that way. I want to make some money of this, this time out.
On the other hand, you won't see a penny if you don't get in to begin with...

Basically you need to decide between higher chances of getting in and having your name translate to "that asshole is back" if you later try greenlight again.
I read at one point that a game needs 80,000 yes votes to pass Greenlight. There is no way that can still be the case, with all the niche titles I see.
Many of these crap games that get in all the time, are all Russian. Russians vote for everything in Steam that's made by Russians. No, I am not joking.

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Post by RealNC »

One other thing:

Currently, Hugor uses a third-party sound engine (SDL_mixer). That engine has a technical problem, and a license problem.

The technical problem is that it sucks at resampling. In CZK for example, some MP3s are not 44.1KHz but are either 32KHz or 48KHz. Ben's "Motherplucker" for example can either play at the wrong speed (because the sound engine is not resampling it) or it can produce audio garbage (because it resamples it wrong.) Some other sampling rates seem to be converted correctly, but with an atrocious audio quality.

The license problem is that in order to get MP3 support with that sound engine, I have to use the MAD library (it does MPEG audio decoding.) That library is GPL. Even though Hugor is GPL too, the Hugo Engine base code (meaning the code written by Kent) is not. That's a legal problem. Normally this can be ignored (you can put it under a "gray area" cap since Hugor itself, which constitutes the part of the software that actually makes use of MAD, is GPL.) But since you intend to now sell the thing on Steam, ignoring it is most probably not an option.

In order to fix both these issues, I wrote my own audio engine a while back (https://github.com/realnc/SDL_audiolib). It resamples everything perfectly and uses an MP3 decoder that's not GPL (mpg123). The reason I don't ship Hugor with that audio engine yet is that it doesn't use the system APIs for playing back MIDI files. It comes with its own MIDI renderer, which *is* of a higher quality then the system ones, *but* it needs a sound font (SF2 format.) That would be too much hassle for users, hunting down MIDI soundfont files.

However, I assume that Cyberganked doesn't use MIDI. So I think it would be a good idea if you shipped the game with a Hugor build that uses the new sound engine.

TLDR:
If you finish Cyberganked before I finish Hugor 2.0 and SDL_audiolib, drop me a note so that I can send the custom builds your way.

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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

RealNC wrote:Next time you decide to do a greenlight again, people would immediately go "oh, that Robb Sherwin asshole again, no thanks" (downvoted out of principle.)
I'm going to be the one person in the Steam Community that stays more positive on Steam than he does on the rest of the Internet.

Mostly because it's not worth it to engage, and 50% of the cretins that will bad mouth my stuff would be turned into sugar snaps if I come off as self-effacing and humble. The other are reprehensible lizards whose asses I've kicked for 40 years but don't have time to do so any more.

They seem to have an automated system for that. No idea how it works, since I don't think Steam has an API for that. If interested, get in contact when the guy running that site.
I dunno. I'm happy to have it ON Greenlight. I'm still going to sell it digitally through other means, so trading votes for keys that I have to go talk to a dude somewhere to verify d-- actually, I wouldn't have time to do that, so I guess that's the answer.

Many of these crap games that get in all the time, are all Russian. Russians vote for everything in Steam that's made by Russians. No, I am not joking.
You can BE Russian in the game, so that's a start. You can make all six characters Russian. I will actually mention that in the game's description. See, this exchange is already benefiting all of us, and the Russian people.
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Post by Ice Cream Jonsey »

RealNC wrote:The license problem is that in order to get MP3 support with that sound engine, I have to use the MAD library (it does MPEG audio decoding.) That library is GPL. Even though Hugor is GPL too, the Hugo Engine base code (meaning the code written by Kent) is not. That's a legal problem. Normally this can be ignored (you can put it under a "gray area" cap since Hugor itself, which constitutes the part of the software that actually makes use of MAD, is GPL.) But since you intend to now sell the thing on Steam, ignoring it is most probably not an option.
I haven't read the entirety of the GPL, but my understanding is that it applies to derived works, with Cyberganked wouldn't be, because, as you note, it's interpreted.

That said, I'm already going to put the source code up on Github for Cyberganked when the game is finished because I am using CC 3.0 audio, so I pretty much have to. I selected works that allow commercial distribution, but Cyberganked will still be a Creative Commons-licensed game.

In fact, I don't care if the game is copied and passed around (which is awesome of me, since I wouldn't be able to stop it anyway) and the license I'm using will reflect that. I just think it will be cool if people could start it through Steam, and it would get more exposure through Steam, and I'd be able to include it in bundles if I am charging for it. (No bundle wants Cryptozookeeper.)

It's kind of a shotgun approach, but a game that is free to copy with its source code available to download on a repo should have me a ways down in the "getting yelled at" list.

In order to fix both these issues, I wrote my own audio engine a while back (https://github.com/realnc/SDL_audiolib). It resamples everything perfectly and uses an MP3 decoder that's not GPL
Jesus Christ! You're the coding version of Superman!

However, I assume that Cyberganked doesn't use MIDI. So I think it would be a good idea if you shipped the game with a Hugor build that uses the new sound engine.
True. It doesn't and it won't. Not because I don't like MIDI, but it's impossible to find a CC license for most MIDI that I like.

If you finish Cyberganked before I finish Hugor 2.0 and SDL_audiolib, drop me a note so that I can send the custom builds your way.
No prob. Because of the house renovation I got involved with, I'll be working on Cyberganked well into 2016, unfortunately.
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Post by RealNC »

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:I haven't read the entirety of the GPL, but my understanding is that it applies to derived works, with Cyberganked wouldn't be, because, as you note, it's interpreted.
I'm referring to Hugor, since you'll be bundling it together with the game. I still doubt that this might get you in trouble with Valve, but it is a (remote) possibility and thus I had to bring it up.

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