General Project Thread & Feedback

You know, I've been seeing more new members show up ever since this announcement.

Could this all be some sort of extremely convoluted Xanatos Gambit to generate controversy over the project, thereby bringing in more members and, by extension, more talent?

</wacky conspiracy theory>

 

If it is, it is a very upsetting one. People would distrust them more then...

</ kill wacky conspiracy theory>

 

We've had the meeting with the admins, got a lot of stuff sorted out for you guys. I think we've got the big stuff taken care of. We're drafting up the posts to explain what's going to be different now, expect them up later tonight. I will say this in the meantime, a more open community system has been agreed upon, somewhat different than has been done in the past. Details to follow!

 

Can't wait to learn more! I'd like to see how this new system develops and works out.

 

I'm interesting in hearing what has happened.

 

I wonder how this will resolve.... Should be interesting to say the least...

 

That is a complete snub in my opinion. I'm sure you didn't want to come off that way, so I'm telling you it very much did. L0st has a right to his code. It should not be questioned. That's like asking me why I don't open my house up to everyone so they can see everything. The way I see it, it's a privacy issue. It's his. This is not a community project in the traditional sense, I think that should be rather obvious at this point. And why is that a bad thing? It's lead by a team that would like some others to contribute or give suggestions and such. That doesn't mean they have to accept everything or let you see everything they're doing. It's not fair to expect that of them.

And this doesn't have to do with the issues of "how" people can contribute, or the lack of communication, or whatever. If you want to address that, that's fine. But I think you're expecting too much, and it would annoy me greatly if someone told me "unless you make everything you're doing open to the public, I'm not helping you." I'd just laugh at the person and go on. It's fine to disagree with things, but being perceived as "needy" or "demanding" makes everything you posted irrelevent.

 

Except you are wrong. This was once a community project in the traditional sense. Somewhere along the line that was lost and it's now considered a "closed" project. I don't need to repeat the argument for both of these as it's all over this thread.

Sure, Lost has the right to his code, but if he had a problem with privacy or sharing his code with the public, then it was something he should have considered in the first place rather than take the lead and hoard it to himself. I don't think it's far fetched to say that it's a bit too late for someone else to step in and do their own engine with the idea of open source in mind. Being the main programmer for 2 years, LoST pretty much created a little monopoly for himself leaving little to no chance for anyone else to prove themselves.

We've had plenty of artist and musicians join the forum for the purpose of contributing to the project. Yet we're turning programmers from really being involved in this because Lost doesn't want to share his toy castle.

 

If his engine was a private project of his, fine, but that's hardly acceptable in a community project. IIRC, L0st only got the "job" because nobody else was up to it, so everyone had to agree with his terms of keeping it all hidden. IMO that's unacceptable, but I guess everyone was desperate because no one else wanted to program the thing.

Yes, it is obvious, and the community is clearly not happy about it.

When the community works for free, it's only fair that they can see where the project they are contributing to is going, as a form of incentive. It's the least the "leading team" can do.

 

It doesn't help that we have no idea how the engine actually bloody works. So even if someone were to try to write a whole brand new engine, it might wind up being totally incompatible with the current workflow. But that's crazy and writing a whole new engine from scratch would take an incredibly long time. It would also set the project back by a huge milestone.

I think LOst's code was used because of the fact his accurately replicated Sonic physics and was actually semi-functional. Most people trying to do the same thing at the time weren't even off the ground, I think. Except maybe E02. They were desperate for the engine, and he had it. That's why we have it that way.

The engine is pretty good, but the "community project" should have "community access" to everything. As it is, everybody except programmers can contribute to the project, because those other contributions work entirely one-way. Programming is a two-way contribution, so it hasn't happened yet.

 

Canned Karma why are you putting up with this joke, seriously? Wow at the whiners running around this forum and acting like the 13 year old kids they probably are.
Why do you let kids tell you what to do about this mod's direction?
It's clear to me at this point that you guys have taken this to a professional level. Why do you allow that admin threaten you like he owns you or something? His levels of immaturity and lack of understanding professional work is amazing. You and your team are obviously mature guys with a shitload of background in gaming and art and the fact that you started here on this community should not keep you bound to it whatsoever!
You came here and you gathered a terrific team of pros and at this point you clearly evolved into a tight team professional which is beyond the standards and rules of this forum, therefore you need your own community for this project from now on.
If buying a domain for a new site is a problem for you, hey I am more than happy to buy a domain and let you host your own Sonic 2 HD site and forums for this project.
Don't play by anybody's rules, this is a serious project and your time needs to be focused towards that not towards kids with retarded avatars that like to boss you around.
Pm me for details if you are interested, I can help to get you guys out of this kindergarten where everybody treats you like they own you. It is so clear to anybody which is a bit mature, that you and your team have absolutely nothing to share with this community anymore as it's just keeping you back.
This is where the difference is made between the ones that can and the ones that can't. At the moment you are surrounded by those that cant and bash you because that's the best they can do.

 

The thing is, Mr. Deviance, the problem is that this project was started as a Community Project. It was started with the idea that the community could work together to get it done fast and well. It was supposed to be collaborative.

Over time, the project became more and more closed. With the announcement by Canned Karma, people felt somewhat betrayed, or maybe they felt that their feelings were validated. In any case, as a Community Project, this kind of direction should have never happened....

 

See that avatar of mine? That guy is happy. I want to be happy. I want you guys to be happy. I want the team to be happy. So why have you gone and made me unhappy?

I'm going to be blunt about this: sometimes the public is full of a bunch of whining children who expect everything to be done for them. That's certainly not the best way to convince people I'm right, but I'm saying it because I don't believe I'll convince anyone of that. At this point, I'm just venting.

Now people want to see everything in return for their contributions. I've contributed to the project in what they're telling me is an important way, and I expect nothing in return for it. They give me the resources I need to do my part, and that's good enough for me. I don't need to see the damn source code, or the entire library of art, or anything like that. Really, some of these demands are rediculously over the top. You could ask to see if your contribution is being used or not, or things like that, but instead, you guys want to see it ALL.

I'll probably catch a bit of flack for being stern, but some of you are way overly demanding. It needed to be said, and so I said it. And now I'm tired of discussing it, so say whatever you want in response to this post, but don't forget what I've said, is that the project is run by "leaders" -- those are people who make the final calls on things. If you had made these complaints a long time ago, I wouldn't be making this post right now. But you didn't. You guys have known this (unless you're oblivious to everything around you) for years now, and only now are you complaining about it. I'm sorry, but I just don't have much respect for that.

 

Except you have no fucking clue what you're talking about, and a lot of media has been submitted from the community. And the only reason that they've had this success so far is because they've had the support of the Retro Administration.

You should know damn well that the issue isn't about this project having "Leaders."

The problem is that this is supposed to be a community project with a huge amount of effort and art coming in from the community, and until now, everybody has been left in the dark. Their big "Update" just solidified that.

 

You act as if we didn't do that.

 

Goddamnit you people. This project isn't closed, we simply picked a bad way to word what we wanted to say. If it wasn't going to be a community project we would've said fuck off and picked up our stuff and left. Want to know what we see this as? Alright.

See this? Of course you do. This is more or less what we've been planning to do (showing things off and updating you). We're going to work with SS and Tweaker and get some things organized to better promote a good work flow for the forum-goers and people that want to submit things. We also plan on giving more guidance for target goals and we're going to provide feedback and work with people should they need it. We'll also probably update submissions for consistency if it's deemed necessary (this was actually done during the actual creation of Sonic 2 so that's pretty cool if you ask me).

Oh, and the reason for the silence on our end for so long is because of a few factors, but most of it is because we wanted to have a solid direction for the art before we go showing things off. We also figured we could work on Emerald Hill faster if we just keep to ourselves and work on it, and so far we have done well in that department. We'll still need to iron out exactly what we're doing, but you should know more soon.

 

Trust me, I might be a trial member here but I know much more about how this community is being ran and what and who is working at what than you would expect.
I have been an unregistered member here since this project started and I know all of it's history.
The thing that you don't seem to understand is that this project got to a point where none of the projects ever get and that's PROFESSIONALISM.
This game can't follow the community rules anymore because it's goals are too big and the quality level does not permit it anymore.
Instead of being happy that the project is going to be much better when it's done, people are bitching and threatening that they will remove this project from the forum because it's x and y.
This is the best project that could ever come to fruition out of this miserable community and all the admin does here is to give ultimatums. I would love to see the admin ever do something half as good as any of the people in this sonic 2 hd team are doing, before he gives out ultimatums. I am disgusted to see this project associated with a forum that's administered by somebody that gives out ultimatums instead of trying to provide as much help as possible to the most talented sonic remake team out there.
Instead of giving them full support and chancing the forum rules just to better suite this project everybody in the staff is so quick to act like they are the coolest people on the internet running everything. That tweaker guy gets his kicks out of feeling omnipotent when he says that he will close this project. It makes him feel like he owns this project and that he is responsible for this project ever existing or not. The way I see it this project has reached a point where it can self sustain itself it doesn't need the support this community anymore!

 

I think this community has reached a point where it doesn't need the support of you anymore. Have a nice life.

 

People may be only voicing their opinions now, but if you have been following the project you probably noticed that it has been constantly losing the interest of the community. I for one was very excited, and tried to contribute to it a few times, but ended up losing interest for some reason. Now I rarely check this sub-forum. It might have been because I just didn't see the game moving forward (the last demo, which didn't have much, was released over a year ago). When we don't see results we lose interest, and if we don't see it, it's because the staff is not showing it to us, because they guarantee progress is being made. Apparently all we can do is take their word for it, which is not much of an incentive.

 

Alright guys, here you are:

As we stated earlier, Sonic 2 HD's EHZ is now locked up to final adjustments and polishing. We will be showing off relevant assets to aid in production soon, more on that below.

Onto the heart of the issue. You want to be part of Sonic 2 HD's development as an open community project? Good. Let's clean the slate and do things differently this time around.

If your intentions toward helping S2HD are mature and you want to see it developed faster, then we're happy to rethink the whole community interaction.

We'll provide you the art style & guidelines for how things should look, along with a complete overhaul of the Database to streamline things. This does not mean we'll show off all of our WIP art, some of which is now being finalized and will only slow down the alpha release. However, we'll show both the interested current and new artists the needed sources to understand S2HD's set art style and the quality level we're after. Some of this you've seen recently, and there's more to come.

By sharing our working methods, we're also sharing goals and a deadline. We'll be giving out our best, to direct artists and help them to improve (given that they'll be cooperative and motivated enough to do the hard work) towards a S2HD community goal.

By this weekend all the topics will be adjusted for this purpose, getting members into S2HD development as protagonists. What's this mean? In a nutshell:

New topics across the board. New thread for music, new threads for each zone's level art to reduce clutter and focus tasking, a new thread for characters, new thread for badniks/bosses, and a general thread for people who come up with ideas that don't fit into a specific thread. This new general thread will not be a dumping ground for everyone. We're going to set goals, and we're looking for a focus around them if you're wanting to contribute.

The first goal is to work with the staff to create Hill Top Zone. That includes concepts, actual level assets (at least two screens composed of 64x64 tiles), badniks and the zone boss. There's a set way the tilesets are constructed, and we'd like nothing better than for you to be constantly asking Gambit for advice on this since he basically created the workflow for it single-handedly. This doesn't mean the tedium of making endless grass and ground tiles, since those are covered in the EHZ tileset.
You'll be given 3 months to rough this out. We're committing ourselves to helping you out with this, but rest assured—this is where the community section of the community project comes in. There's no better way to achieve the transparency so many have talked about.

Why Hill Top Zone? It's practical, from an asset creation standpoint, and the vast majority of EHZ has been completed. As you're well aware, the two share many pieces in common, and since EHZ's art is what we're basing expectations on, this will form a good base to get things rolling on. We're still lacking a really solid, jaw-dropping music track for the level. Also, I doubt any of you would complain at having two zones available in the alpha. Currently that's EHZ and EHZ only because that's what exists and what's polished. If you want HTZ in there, work together to make this happen.

Once the needed assets for Hill Top have been done, we'll be directing you to a new area to focus on.

To prevent confusion from clogging down this process, there are a few strict rules to follow:

-The S2HD staff will regularly interact with the community to approve your works. Needless to say we've got our lives and the alpha release on our priority list, so don't expect a reply after 5 minutes from your post. We'll get back to you as soon as we can.
-We encourage everyone to take part in it, even if some of you won't have your first shot at a given asset approved; until the deadline you can continue to improve them if you want them to be included.
-We will not tolerate useless bickering over tiny details, so be prepared to contribute in a useful way. The artstyle is set and kicking. Do not propose different artstyles and complain over it.
-What's developed for S2HD is for S2HD-use only. While we do not hold any legal property over it, it's a basic form of respect for the artists who have put hours of passion and hard work into it. Stealing / leaking will prevent us from sharing any sources.
-All artists must have complete access to the Database, so PM myself or Vincent your username and desired password in order to start submitting your own revisions.
-Upon hitting the deadline, the S2HD Staff will review all of your work and where it is needed update it to be further tweaked before final import to the engine.

If you've got any further questions related to a particular area, these are the guys you need to reach through PM:


Character Art: Vincent
Level Art: Gambit
Badnik & Bosses: Cerulean Nights
Backgrounds: Cornet Theory
Visuals & Animations: Scanline99
Music: ScubaSteve
General Q&A: Canned Karma

Database overhaul and topic cleanups will begin shortly. If you have pieces you're working on for HTZ currently, don't post them just yet. The new thread will be up soon as well.