Ross Scott

Guys. Ross knows what he's doing.

However when the scientist pointed a gun at Gordon Freeman, instead of standing and like, surrendering sorta thing which is what I suppose the normal reaction, Gordon goes to run and hide. Not sure if he made this decision because of temporary panic or... Gordon is just so used to running to save his life that this happens now.

It was definitely a survival thing, he sees the scientist cocking his shotgun, pointing it right at Freeman, my first instinct would be to get the hell out of his line of sight too!

 

 

Why would Freeman care about killing the alien and saving the world? He doesn't care, he just want to get the fuck out of Black Mesa, and he cant care about these stupid scientists mumbling around about portals and shit either.

 

I think you are overthinking this to much.

Oh I think Freeman would care about that, he just doesn't see that as HIS responsibility. I mean Freeman isn't TRAINED as a fighter, he's just paranoid, lucky, and in an impenetrable suit. I plan on talking a little more about this in 62.

"Follow the thoughts of Dr. Gordon Freeman, a 27 year old physicist and neurotic individual. In this episode, Freeman experiences his final moments on Earth."

 

Final moments on earth? What about Freeman coming back to fight the Combine in Half-Life 2?!

Well that goes back to the teleporter clone question again huh?

Gotta admit, this episode was pretty disappointing. I've been looking forward to this scene for a while, because I wanted to see how Freeman would react to being told that there's a single alien keeping the rift open, and that he has enough troops to threaten the whole Earth. More importantly, I wanted to see how he justified going to Xen given his personality so far. I'm not a fan of him just bumbling in there. It's bizarrely out of character, as it relies on Freeman completely trusting guys he called lemmings, and leaving Earth for the aliens.

 

One, Freeman does not seem to trust anyone, least of all the Black Mesa staff, and it makes no sense for him to assume they'll do exactly what he says when they never took back their earlier statement that they're sending him to Xen if he goes in the teleportation room. Two, Freeman is selfish, but he has a sense of self-preservation. The Xen expedition staff flat-out told him that there wouldn't be much to come back to if the portals remained open. Even if they can't conquer the whole Earth, the aliens could inflict enough damage to effectively collapse modern society, via both the military invasion and the wildlife infestation, and Freeman knows this. Why would he think that getting to New England would stop that?

 

As for the jokes themselves: I didn't laugh at Freeman's teleportation rant, which took up a good chunk of the episode. I did, on the other hand, find his interactions with the guard and scientist to be very funny. Especially his reaction to the Kleiner scientist packing a shotgun, and him insulting the Barney.

 

Also disappointed to here that there will be no more Freeman's Mind any time soon. Of course, that probably translates to a lot of them in November.

If I had allocated a little more time when recording I would have talked more about this (I may come back to it in the next episode), but the bottom line is they sort of thrust this information on you with no context at all. Besides for self preservation, who the hell says HE has to be the one to go in there and stop it? There are plenty more qualified people on Earth to handle it, plus it's assuming they know everything that's happening globally. The way I see it Freeman would rather take his chance on Earth than trust these clowns to teleport him to another part of the galaxy. This comes back down to Half-Life's story presentation, they give you the absolute bare minimum and you're just supposed to go along with it. I think a lot of people remember details that are plugged in later from HL2 or online supplements, when the game gives you almost nothing and you only have one option anyway. As for the teleportation rant, not every line is meant to be a laugh out loud event, there's always a bunch of space to fill and I try to mix it up with thoughts that might be interesting to follow.

Was hoping for, "Get back here you big orange fuck!" but I guess a river of blood will have to do. Great stuff as always Ross.

I never planned on doing that because I thought it was too predictable and didn't add to the humor too much. My original plan was to have him say something crazier like "gimme some tacos!" or "rubber jump pants!" But the timing for him ended up being too short because of everything going on in the scene. It got drowned out a bit by everything else going on, but there wasn't any good way to make it more audible without making it sound like he was standing right next to Freeman.

 

 

(Downloadable copy will be up later)

 

Here's the final Black Mesa episode of Freeman's Mind! This one has been about 98% done for a couple weeks, but there were some complications with some of the final aspects of it. Some things that people may find interesting: 1. The volume of the last scientist is as it sounded in-game. I was kind of amazed how quiet it was. Otto was going to increase the volume to it, but I decided it worked better with Freeman shouting that he couldn't hear him at the original volume. 2. The slipping wasn't planned, but I thought it was a great addition to the episode, plus I'm never in a rush to redo a gameplay sequence if I don't have to. 3. My thoughts reflect Freeman's regarding the teleporter in that I couldn't imagine any scenario where Freeman is still alive after being teleported if momentum isn't preserved.

 

The footage for the next episode is done, though I haven't made progress on the voicework yet. I doubt there will be another FM episode before Halloween, but we'll see. Expect more in November!

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

Hey, Ross, I'll bet you 1 dollar per video submission you can't put up a Patreon page.

I may or may not do Patreon. My main concern with it is what extras I can offer without it digging too much into time and sacrificing other things. Besides, I'm still stretching the donation from earlier this year as far as I can. I thought even considering Patreon before finishing FM people might seem as greedy, although I really am making the money count.

 

Btw, Ross, I am a programmer and I have done some work on getting older games to work on new hardware.

 

Here are some of the top things:

Upscaling: Textures that have transparency in them do not upscale correctly (likely the reason for the purple as another poster mentioned.

DirectX: The old versions of direct X were not well supported starting with DX9 so older versions of Direct3d and Direct sound have a ton of problems.

Redbook: CDs with redbook audio used special drivers that are not always fully compatible with newer hardware. You can get stuff to run, but it may not play all the time, or it may play several tracks at a time.

 

--techdude

As for the textures, it makes me wonder what they're upscaling from, since the game only ran at one resolution. As for DirectX, Microsoft essentially killed off Directsound3D support with Vista onward. As for Direct3D, I will say on older games I have seen a little bit better compatibility on Nvidia hardware than AMD; although who knows, maybe on AMD I would have had less bugs with Revenant. For redbook audio, I've never had any problems, although I've never gotten it to work in-game via emulation. If I don't have the original disc, I'll usually burn the audio tracks to a CD-RW in order to hear it in-game.

So at this point I am guessing that we can write off the promise you made in the fundraiser to get through Half-Life in Freeman's Mind before January 1 2015 because at the current pace that deadline is NOT going to be made. It's a shame that all of the people who gave a crapton of money to see that happen are going to be so let down by it not happening

It looks like you didn't read the previous comments. Either you bet a minimum of $20 against me that I won't make it, or you stop with further comments like this or else you'll get a ban. You have to put your money where your mouth is, essentially. You sound pretty confident I won't make it, so why not make some money off it?

 

Alright, you're on.

 

If you make it through HL1 in FM by 12:00 AM January 1 2015 GMT+8 then I'll donate AU$20 through the fundraiser page or any other method you care to name except physical means. If you don't then I will PM you my paypal address so you can put the $20 in, you are also welcome to use any other methods you like, just let me know beforehand so I can get the details ready

That's the spirit. I was thinking USD instead of AU, but that's close enough.

Yeah it's all true. The tongue was from falling down stairs and landing face first on a metal chest with a jagged metal corner.

Well I feel like GOG are one of the few people doing things right, I'm just happy of their DRM policy. As for sponsorship, I'd rather get more Game Dungeons done first, plus for the remainder of the year I'm going to be focusing more on FM anyway. Also I don't know if it's something they would want, because if I think a game sucks, I'm likely to be vocal about it.

I'm curious about the Halloween episode. I know Ross already picked something, but as a mental exercise, I'll throw some ideas. The game should be something scary, but somewhat obscure. That leaves out L4D, Alone in the Dark, Resident Evil, etc. Not sure if you have some requirements with licensing, reviewing mostly abandonware games or stuff that are hardly obtained through a legal way. That leaves out stuff like Hexen and Heretic.

 

The Revenant "original" story, besides Diablo, reminded me the original Blood. A game using the same Duke Nukem 3D engine, with a similar dose of dark humor, pop culture references, and there's a bloody carnival where, in order to uncover a secret area, you have to kick zombies head inside a huge clown mouth that's opening and closing repeatedly. Like minigolf, but with zombies head.

 

Besides, is there any better way to start Halloween than with the main character saying "I live again..." while stepping out a tomb. Any other ideas?

It's not especially obscure actually, but it likely won't be one people are thinking of. It's none of the ones you've mentioned.

So at this point I am guessing that we can write off the promise you made in the fundraiser to get through Half-Life in Freeman's Mind before January 1 2015 because at the current pace that deadline is NOT going to be made. It's a shame that all of the people who gave a crapton of money to see that happen are going to be so let down by it not happening

It looks like you didn't read the previous comments. Either you bet a minimum of $20 against me that I won't make it, or you stop with further comments like this or else you'll get a ban. You have to put your money where your mouth is, essentially. You sound pretty confident I won't make it, so why not make some money off it?

This (awesome) review + discussions about FM schedule + personal inclination towards sadism had me inspired.

 

I hereby challenge Ross to complete Dungeon Siege Pit of Despair level (google it I dare you!) should he fail to deliver Freeman's Mind ending episode this year.

 

Muuaahahahaaa!

I've already done it, I'll cover Dungeon Siege eventually.

I cringed at all of that stun locking that took place in the video. It reminds me of Dark Souls 2.

 

Have you also tried Fallout Tacitics? It has a real time mode which is super chatoic

and nearly unplayable. The moment you turn the game back to turn based it's fun again.

Turning on the real time mode in Fallout Tactics I find is better suited at trying to sneak your way through the game and getting the drop on enemies. It was really intense having to sneak through enemy filled bases knowing at any moment you could blow your cover and be completely overwhelmed.

 

It also has the added benefit of being really satisfying when you sneak your squad behind the enemy and deliberately set off the alarm once you've set up a kill zone for the incoming guards. The only problem is it makes the game really slow. Easily an hour or more each mission if you don't know where the enemies are.

It's been a while since I played it, but I remember equipping all my guys with accurate single shot guns (except whoever was in front) so they wouldn't shoot each other, fanning out in a small cluster to further minimize it, trying to take people down at a distance as much as possible. Often the noise would draw out a lot of enemies. My memory is fuzzy on it though, but I definitely used the realtime mode. It does make some tactics unusable then, but hey, it's still beatable.

Would you be willing to release the GUI for download, or sell it in the shop when it's opened back up?

Well I didn't code it or anything as I'm not a programmer. I use a combination of Litestep, Nexus Dock, Autohotkey, and Directory Opus. I use Nexus Dock to replace the taskbar pretty much, Directory Opus to replace Windows explorer, and Litestep replaces the rest of windows, like the start menu, my most commonly run programs are integrated into it, etc. I could release it, but honestly Litestep is such a customization process, you would kind of have to learn how to configure it to make it work for you. I recommend just trying to run a vanilla theme of it first. Plus, I have no idea how it works on Windows 8.

 

This will be part of my gaming music collection from now on. What an absolute gem. Thanks again.

Yeah, some of the tracks are just incredible. I kind of butchered the intro music a bit to shorten the length of the intro, but the full thing is on the MP3 tracks.

Have you also tried Fallout Tacitics? It has a real time mode which is super chatoic

and nearly unplayable. The moment you turn the game back to turn based it's fun again.

Yeah, and I beat it using that "unplayable" mode. That's the only reason I didn't include it on the list. Don't get me wrong, I appreciate that some people appreciate the tactics behind it, but for me, it's like a wall between me and enjoying the rest of the game. Besides, only some games really use tactics. Are you really using tactics on random enounters from old Final Fantasy games or is that just pure grind?

 

Related, can we have a behind the scenes special of you making your videos Ross?

Maybe, if enough people want it I could have that, but I'm going to be moving soon plus I don't have much of a video camera at the moment besides a cheap webcam. Some people might find my setup interesting since I actually use a custom GUI I made for Windows. People who have seen it confuse it with Linux sometimes.

 

Ross, i dont have money, but do you accept games as Stronghold: Crusader (original one) and Dead island: epidemic beta gift as bet? (total value of what i have offer is about 8 euros+??? euros)

I have so many games already I haven't been in a hurry for more. Maybe in the future I'll start accepting game gifts. So far I've moved so much that my total amount of possessions tends to decrease. Hell, before I moved to Poland, I converted about 98% of my discs to CD or DVD images, since they drastically cut down on weight and left giant boxes of discs with a friend of mine.

[*] No oversteering issues until I took the clocks very high. I suspect the game was designed to run comfortably at a low framerate, something we are not used to thinking is

At lower speeds, there's clear lag between when you try to steer v. when the car actually starts moving. It's really a "pick your poison" situation between low and high framerate.

So what you're saying is, if you don't deliver, you owe him 20 bucks?

But the reverse if you do?

That's exactly what I'm saying. This offer extends to everyone and it's not limited to $20.

I'll take that! I'll donate $20 now, and if you lose, you have to donate another $20... Hows that sound?

Sure, you're on.

 

What could possibly top CarnEvil? Looking forward to it.

Well I want to warn people ahead of time, I don't see this game TOPPING CarnEvil, CarnEvil is just amazing. I'm having to scale down on games to choose from due to time constraints, but I'll give you the best presentation I can for the game I'm picking.

Unrelated to the video itself, but is there a reason that the Game Dungeon is still listed under "Other Videos" in the forums, and none of the episodes are listed under the "Movies" section?

It's me being behind on making its own section (along with other site updates). I'll fix that when I can, I've been making videos the priority lately.

 

So what you're saying is, if you don't deliver, you owe him 20 bucks?

But the reverse if you do?

That's exactly what I'm saying. This offer extends to everyone and it's not limited to $20.

 

Take this message as an invitation to ban me without argument; in the event that you don't ban me, I'll shut up anyway.

You don't have to shut up, you just have to bet at least $20 if you want to keep making comments along those lines. I feel like if I'm going to get a bunch of naysaying about it in my own forums, people can put their money where their mouth is. I will!

 

I really enjoyed this, as usual! And though I'm happy there's a confirmed Halloween Game Dungeon coming, I'm still kinda sad there won't be a 1 Year Anniversary episode on the 15th.

RGD has barely hit its potential anyway, I'd say expect a LOT more for 2015.

I think Ross specifically said he didnt want to see this unless you wanted to bet actually money on him.

Yes, I DID say that.

The only reason I'm scared Ross might wind up in a bind is because I'm worried he's underestimating how much of the game's left. There're four whole chapters after Gordon teleports to Xen; the first one's strangely short, and the second and fourth are just boss battles, but the third one's pretty long.

I'm honestly kinda worried about Ross and Freeman's Mind. I think he might have seriously underestimated how many episodes are left - and I'd hate to see him start skipping areas, or even rushing them, to make his deadline.

More Game Dungeons? I love RGD, but you do realize how much of Half-Life is left, right? If you failed to complete Half-Life by the end of the year, I would take it as an honest mistake and wouldn't hold it against you, but I'm not sure if I can say the same for the vast bulk of your viewers. I wouldn't want you to hurt your source of income; you're already running out of time.

That is a reasonable (on the low end of reasonable), though unfortunate, estimate for how many episodes he could produce by the end of the year, but, unfortunately, it is not at all a reasonable estimate for how many episodes are left in Half-Life 1.

This is a warning man. Either you need to bet money against me, or muzzle your comments along these lines until after FM is done. With this many comments, I want to see a $20 minimum if you plan on making more.

 

 

 

Well I completely bombed the time estimate in my last post, I really don't know why I thought I was going to get it done sooner, I think it was a combination of the scope increasing and underestimating just how much content there was. This one had so much I decided to split it into two chunks, although unlike some other episode there is a natural splitting point in this one. Working on this one reminded me the most of Strife mostly due to the scale, although Strife is hands down a great game, whereas Revenant is more complicated. I'm still working at getting the Game Dungeons cut down to only the best content, in this case it may have spiraled out of control a bit. If you enjoy seeing quirks and frustrations in the game with the videos, you'll likely enjoy this one.

 

Also I may as well mention I ended up fixing the level load delay that plagued me through recording, but it happened so late in production, I didn't mention it in the video, so you'll get the more raw experience. Even with the "fix", the game still fights me from using it every single time, so the video is still pretty representative of the experience.

 

Because this video took so long to make, I'm going to scale down my original plans for Halloween. I'm still going to have a Game Dungeon, but it won't be a grandoise game with a huge scale, just because I don't think I'll have enough time. The voicework on the next Freeman's Mind is done, but there are some complications arising in other areas. I'll find a solution to it one way or another, more Freeman's Mind is coming.

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

Hey, it made it on PC Gamer!

 

http://www.pcgamer.com/2014/09/28/mod-of-the-week-steam-tracks-trouble-riddles-for-half-life-2-episode-2/

I hope you have another Halloween episode planned, but have you thought about doing an Anniversary Game Dungeon?

Originally I wanted to flood all of October with scary-themed RGD episodes, but I think that's unrealistic now since I'm trying to get through FM, I'll just have to save that for next year. I'll try and have something for Halloween and possibly another one for October, I'll have to see.

 

YOU LIE! Downloadable copies are never available later! I don't think I've downloaded any Freeman's Mind episodes this year.

That means I haven't even seen the 720p resolution yet. I don't actually mind waiting, but I was wondering if there was any

date that you were planning on uploading the original copies?

I updated everything once I did the donations, I plan to put the rest up later. I want to put them up the same time I update the episode pages and I don't have the smoothest system for doing that. In addition to not having entries for RGD yet, the whole process would be at least an all-day procedure and I've just been sacrificing everything lately to get more videos out. One of the reasons my productivity is higher is I'm essentially foregoing all entertainment aside from watching something for 30-45 minutes before I go to sleep each night. I'll get to the downloads, I'm just playing triage as usual.

 

My favorite joke has to be the one about Microsoft.

For those who don't know, MS has had a culture of having employees rate each other at the same time they'll routinely lay off the bottom 10% of their workforce. It's created an atmosphere of distrust and in some cases sabotage.

You sure as hell know how to make fans happy, Ross. Especially after your signature, long hiatuses.

The thing is the voicework for 59 was done for about 2 weeks before it posted so I kept working ahead. I have another short video that I was working on that will be appearing next month hopefully. The hiatuses usually mean something else is coming in the future.

 

 

(Downloadable copy will be up later)

 

Here's the next episode of Freeman's Mind. This one contains the most shouting there's been in an episode in a while, but Freeman has some legitimate grievances. I originally considered skipping this area for FM since I felt like it was one of the more contrived areas, next to the giant fan room, but I saw some comments of people saying they had been looking forward to this part, so people will get the full experience instead. In any event, I'm happy with how this episode resolves the previous one. As a bit of side information, the very last part of this episode was literally played and recorded in slow motion. It was the only way I was able to preserve the motion blur AND not have the game glitch during the demo playback. Something about the one of the teleporters the demo system in Source simply did not like.

 

The voicework for #61 has been recorded, although it will take a little longer for the editing than this one did. In the meantime, I'm likely taking on more than I should and I plan for the next video to be another Game Dungeon. I'm aiming to have it by the end of the month, but I'm not promising anything. More videos coming one way or another!

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

The developer told me he's getting more feedback on the bugs and is looking into it. Feel free to post any technical stuff here (or on moddb if it lets you), I'm sure he'll take a look at it.