Ross Scott

Damnit, I have a Civil Protection script that covers this EXACT scenario, it's just been shelved for a long time due to the time involved with animating.

Is it safe to assume that this is why the website has been down for the last hour or so?

No, I used shared hosting from someone else, it just sort of happens.

 

Can't wait for the next game dungeon, fuck

I'll have a bunch coming.

 

I am curious and kind of worried though: Are you going to make a new series based on FM with Half-Life 2? It's just not cool to end the series at the first game.

I don't know yet. The thing is, the more I do of Freeman's Mind, that's time I have to keep postponing the movie, which I REALLY want to do. I also have many other ideas for other animated machinimas, but those can take a lot of time also. I basically have to play triage between making what fans want (all Freeman all the time) v. the best content I can do (the movie, other original ideas, etc.).

 

I need some help with regards to the subtitles for this episode.

Yeah, I meant to contact you about that. It's "Kurtz", a character from Apocalypse Now. It's one of those jokes I expect almost no one to get, but throw it in anyway.

 

 

(Downloadable copy will be up later)

 

Freeman's Mind continues in another backtracking-tastic episode! Between the previous episode and the earlier ones a while back that involved turning the power on, this is one of the most backtrack-heavy parts of the game. Unfortunately this means a lot of empty hallway wandering, so this episode isn't the most exciting, though I think the bottom portion is good. There was a bit of a delay on this episode for many reasons not related to FM, but I'm through most of it now and will be working on the next episode soon. I plan to have 1-2 FM episodes after this, then take a break to have a small Game Dungeon spree. After that, I guess the world ends, not sure.

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

I've been pretty busy lately and I'm working to have a new video out as soon as I can, but in the meantime, there's a new discussion I was invited to for the podcast "The Mute Button" however they may be changing their name soon as they're not the only podcast with that name.

 

LINK TO PODCAST

 

The podcast mostly focused on machinima and movies based on videogames. I maybe should have said more than I did, but I said most of things I wanted to and shamelessly plugged Gorilla Gongmore than a bit.

 

Anyway, I hope to have the next FM episode out in a few days, with a bunch more videos coming after that.

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

I was more thinking along the line of "an announcer insulting and berating their play" (which is honestly what I'd expect from Freeman!) but the name thing applies too i guess.

That's a non-issue, mine was designed like that from the beginning (before THIS rule was added).

Ah. That really does suck. Hopefully there's not too much revising you have to do, but yeah, that's very wasteful.

Well it's both good and bad news. Now I hopefully know what the problem is and can fix it, it's just frustrating. And no, there's a LOT of revising to do. It's more complicated than the previous post implies. There's a dead minimum of modifying or redoing about a third of the lines, could be more like half. Any lines that get permanently cut due to their new rules I'll try and release as extras later.

Honestly I really enjoy hearing you talk. Maybe you could release a weekly podcast? It probably wouldn't take as much precious time as any of your other projects, you could make money off of it through (hopefully minimal) advertising, and I'm 98% certain most people here would listen to it. Just had to throw that out there.

Well I'm not against the concept, but I'm pretty much operating at max capacity now. Any new project will take time away from something else. Additionally I find a lot of gaming news to be relatively vapid, or else not that applicable to me (oh great a new game, guess I'll see if it's any good in about 2 years or more!). I prefer the stuff I do to be semi-timeless so that if someone saw / listened to it months or years from now, it would stay about as relevant.

 

It's good to see Ross working on his movie project again. I know he took a break from it for a while during the whole machinima fiasco.

Actually I'm NOT at the moment (I was for a little bit before the fundraiser), I have too many other things to do with the shorter term videos, but it is a goal I'm working towards.

 

] Make sure no lines are longer than 5 seconds, I guess...

Christ, that's a NEW requirement that's been added since I submitted it AND since it was rejected. My longest lines are 8 seconds, they're all "easter egg" ones though, not main gameplay ones. The thing is, a lot of their lines work this way in tandem. They'll have the basic line, then the "extra line" tacked on sometimes, which can come to over 5 seconds together. For the "extra" lines, I just combined them, again, this was TOTALLY VIABLE at the time they listed the requirements. So I'm kind of pissed off that they keep changing the rules and they could have saved me a LOT of work if they had TOLD ME THE RULES to begin with, but fuck it, at least now I know what to do.

 

Alright, I guess we can call of the dogs, I have to revise the damn pack to their ever-shifting guidelines. I'll clean it up and match it to their specifications again then resubmit. I'm reminded of Empire Strikes Back when Vader says "Pray I do not alter it further" in reference to terms of agreement.

So with the Gorilla Gong update will they finally fix their registration issue with the birth years? I know it's probably silly but after years of putting an earlier year when signing up for accounts after I turned 18 a while ago I really really don't wanna do it again because I should be damn well old enough for a site that doesn't sell anything.

It'll be night and day man.

Sorry for all the late replies, I was spending all my time on the videos:

 

 

You could always put the WAVs into FLAC... Usually drops the size by half, and it's still lossless.

the filesize would be a lot larger though since FLAC is unlikely to compress much further in a compressed archive.

 

Also as a side note, a single Bitcoin is worth about $630 USD right now...

Wow, was that you? Thanks a bunch if so. I'm more tempted to save the cryptocurrency as I see it having a lot of potential (or doom, hard to say)

 

Also, thank you for showing to me the magic that is Eternam. I've downloaded it when I saw your RGD episode and have more than 50 hours in it so far and enjoying it very much.

Oh there's more where that came from.

 

All this fracking (to say nothing of the potential of Libyan/Iraqi/Iranian oil) will act to push the price down.

The amount of new oil we're getting out of the ground doesn't offset the amount of old oil fields that are shutting down. There could be a million years worth of oil in the ground, but if we can't get it out faster or cheaply, the price will still rise.

 

One thing I'd definitely look into, regardless of what you actually end up speculating in, is automated trading (of which I've had some experience for FOREX markets). If you or someone you know can write a program to buy/sell stocks / currencies / whatever, then go for that instead of relying on a human being to make the call. Software like MetaTrader can be used to test & monitor it - so design the trading program, test it on MT4 or MT5 using historical data, and if it does well using lots of historical data & realistic conditions (ie, don't forget brokers' fees, taxes etc!), try using it for real.

From my perspective this sounds volatile as hell as it can probably lose your money even faster than a human can.

 

If you still feel guilty

Oh I don't feel GUILTY about this (unless someone donated who really can't afford to), I'm just glad I didn't alienate fans in the process.

 

giving money feels generally better than receiving it

I think it partially depends on what your economic level is. It's like the saying "money can't buy happiness". Well actually, if you're below the poverty line, money buys a TREMENDOUS amount of happiness and can increase your lifespan (if it doesn't go towards Mad Dog).

 

If you have any massive collections of conceptual art or source engine documents or old beta sound files, I'd love to hear from you.

Not much for FM, but I do have some extra stuff for CP I'll try and get out eventually.

 

I wonder how many people that started watching FM died before its end 7 years later.

 

about your stocks ideas. ive been in your shoes trust me this is not an option. stocks a a really risky, im telling you cause i learnd it first hand.its true that every stock if given enough time will go your way, but problem is if you use credit support from broker your position will be reopened every day or so, and u lose money every day if you miscalculated market trend.

I think my goals are likely different than yours are, it's a lot of writing, might be better to email me about it. Short version: I'm considering long LONG term stocks in areas I've researched as a possible venue of getting out of the US dollar, for short term I have regular info from someone who's done trading for 30 years and offers advice. I'll test it first before spending a penny. Regardless, I don't trust my OWN judgment AT ALL for short term stocks. If don't have expert consultation, I'm not doing it.

 

Ross, how do you feel about Notch (Markus Person) tweeting about your fundraiser?

Similar level of shock like the rest of it.

 

I suppose Ross would have the final say, if he was to have a say at all. Might be better to just let people interpret it however they want.

My interpretation is Freeman says some things and thinks others. Otto and I considered adding reverb to distinguish the two, but it didn't work out so well. As for how NPCs react to him, I see it kind of like "in the land of the blind, the man with one eye is king" situation.

It's actually at my parents since it ended up being kind of heavy to mail to Poland. They took a picture of it that I have somewhere.

I agree completely with you - it's amazing that after all this time he can still do Freeman's Mind with the same dedication (if not more) as in the beginning. In this Internet Era there are a lot of people with talent that start interesting (sometimes amazing) projects but lose interest after a short while, let alone finish them.

Well I'll be honest, it's mostly fan loyalty keeping me going on Freeman's Mind, otherwise I might prefer doing other videos.

 

I've just donated 22.01 USD.

I gave a few bucks to both of you because you guys bring so much fun and joy into my daily internet life

Thanks a bunch, you'll probably get an email later too.

Welp seeing as I've been a fan of Ross since the beginning back in like 06 I decided to contribute 100 as a thanks for all the years of dedication and enjoyment I had. Its the least I can do

Wow, thanks a ton, I'm always amazed by donations on this level.

 

Now, your fundraiser made me aware of how much fun I got without ever paying back a dime for it. Which is fine as long as the business model works out. But reading about your struggle with money made me feel so sorry and somehow selfish that I never gave back anything which I could so easily do.

Well I definitely don't take that outlook, I mean I never would have considered this a realistic way to earn income as it is. It's more like a magic carpet I'm trying to ride as long as I can. I certainly don't feel like people OWE it to me (unless you're selling bootleg copies or something).

Ever heard of Felix's Mind? That one's actually good

I'm actually a little biased against Felix's Mind, since I heard in an interview, he emphasized repeatedly Freeman's Mind was NOT an influence for the series. Okay, I might buy that, except he then took my exact same title art and modified it for his video. To me, that came across like having your cake and eating it too.

 

By the way, Ross, the track you used in this video is also called "Prison & City On Water Fight" by Mech (a.k.a. Mediastudio). Although within official soundtrack that was released on a CDs it's called "sWitch" with Stephen Rippy, David Rippy, and Kevin McMullan being mentioned as contributing artists. I'm not sure which title/artist is more legit in this regard, but it was a damn mighty fine choice for a music track, sir.

Piotr Chancewicz, Artur Affek, Janusz Lakomiec, Krzysztof Najman, and "Mech" Maciej Januszko are ALSO additional artists for the Painkiller soundtrack, the credits were the biggest mess I've ever seen, so I went with unknown.

Thanks a bunch, waiting is no problem as long as I feel like there's a chance of a reply.

Here's some news on what's going on this month:

 

APRIL FOOL'S DAY

 

I seem to have disappointed more people than usual this year, and I admit, this might be the meanest AF joke I've done. Sorry about that, my intent wasn't to make people feel bad, this was just the only idea I was able to come up with in time. I had some other ideas, but they were more elaborate and I didn't think I'd be able to do them this year. I literally thought I wasn't going to have anything this year, which would have been a first. The fundraiser was a huge morale boost however, and after I finished the last FM episode, I had the Freeman Across The Universe idea and decided I had enough time to go through with it. To be clear, I'm not planning on making Freeman Across The Universe. It's not that I want to disappoint people, it's that I REALLY want to make the machinima movie idea I have. I have confidence the movie will be the best video I've ever made and top Freeman's Mind AND Civil Protection. It's still going to take a long time however, and it's just not feasible if I'm busy expanding FM to other games as well. Also I wasn't lying when I said I forgot what game that screenshot is from. I think it's from a zombie survival mod for Unreal Tournament 2003 or 2004, but I COULD NOT find it again, I tried. Whatever mod it was, it came out no later than September 2004 if anyone wants to try and find it.

 

 

DOTA 2 VOICE PACK

***

EDIT: Below is the original post I made on this, but you can call off the dogs. Since my pack was rejected, Valve has since updated their guidelines (which they KEEP CHANGING) so that mine is no longer applicable. I'll re-revise it to their current iteration and try again. This will likely take a few weeks.

***

A few people have asked me what the status on this is. The answer is sadness and frustration. As stated before, Valve sent me an email months ago saying "the developers of "Dota 2" had to flag it as "incompatible", so it cannot be used within "Dota 2", yet the entry on the Steam Workshop is still pending. This is frustrating me to no end, because I can not get an answer WHY it is incompatible. They may be rejecting it based on the name, which is an easy fix, but it could be other mystery reasons also. I tried to follow the guidelines to the letter. The fact that they can't give me a REASON as to what's wrong with it I think is very unprofessional. Since then I have tried emailing [email protected] twice, [email protected] once, and made two separate posts in different DOTA 2 dev forums with NO REPLY. I honestly don't know what to do next. The only thought that comes to mind next is to resubmit the pack as the "Ross Scott Voice Pack" instead of the "Freeman's Mind" one (the pack doesn't contain overt Half-Life references). My guess is if I do that, I'll get another rejection notice, months from now, with NO REASON given again either. Frankly, I think this is bullshit. I spent months working on this, if someone actually did look this over, they could at least pick from some pre-selected reasons as to WHY it's not compatible (improper database format, audio quality, etc.). If Valve doesn't want my voice pack, I can live with that. But not even giving me a REASON so I know how to FIX it feels very dysfunctional and passive-aggressive from my perspective considering how much time and work I put into it. I feel like if they can't even give an honest reply why they reject a pack with thousands of votes, maybe they're not really ready to be operating the steam workshop for voice packs, or else they're understaffed. Since I've tried doing this cordially with no results, I'm thinking my next step is to gradually get more obnoxious about it. Anyway, if anyone has any suggestions how to contact SOMEONE at Valve about this, please let me know, or feel free to make noise about this to get their attention on my behalf.

 

 

GORILLA GONG

 

We have a BIG redesign coming to Gorilla Gong soon, it's going to add a bunch of new features, have a better layout, I'm really looking forward to it. I should have another post on that in a few days.

 

 

MORE VIDEOS

 

I plan to keep moving forward with more videos, but it may get held up a little bit as I have to do my taxes for two different countries, and the person who was going to send me the 500GB SSD says it broke in transit from Fed Ex, so I may end up having to get one myself afterall. Regardless, my plan is to get to a certain point in the game for Freeman's Mind (I think it's 2-3 episodes away), then do a small Game Dungeon spree afterwards, so I'll be alternating between those two series for the near future. I have some other things planned, but those are less definite at this time.

 

 

REPLYING TO PEOPLE

 

I am still WAY behind on replies, but I do still intend to reply to all emails. I kind of put that on hold so I could make the last Freeman's Mind episode and April Fool's Trailer. If I haven't replied to you yet, it's not me intentionally ignoring you.

 

- - -

 

ADHD version: Ross isn't making Freeman Across The Universe, he wants to make a badass movie instead, sorry. Valve isn't replying to Ross about the DOTA pack and it's kind of pissing him off. More videos coming!

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

So anyone recognize all the games used in the video?

Played the shit out of long time ago and have never heard anyone mention or know of it.

I showcased the best part of it too.

 

Hmm, do you know what game the year was released?

No, but my screenshot's dated 9/30/04.

the one youre talking about is YOU ARE EMPTY! I think

No, I almost included that one for the trailer actually

Is it from Postal 2?

Nah, though it does have a similar look.

Good news! The fundraiser ended up being so wildly successful, that I've decided to expand Freeman's Mind to EVERY first-person game made! Check out the trailer below for a small taste of what's in store:

 

 

 

This is of course a large undertaking, so I've decided to cancel the full-length machinima movie I was working on so I have enough time to cover every first-person game made. Now I admit of being a little deceptive in this trailer in that it's at 1080p. As a result, a few shots have some framerate drop, but it's nothing too crazy. Freeman's Mind will still be at 720p for now as there's a BIG difference between capturing a 1080p clip at 180fps for 10 seconds v. 10 minutes. A difference of 60.

 

BONUS!

 

I did not cover all the games I wanted to in this trailer! One game was so obscure even I forgot the name of it! I have kept proof of its existence below:

 

 

If you know what game this is, let me know in the comments!

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

Was a little sad he didn't make a ghostbusters reference

Well it seemed too predictable. I actually meant to saying "plasma pack", then realized after the fact I should have said photon pack.

 

Intentional twist, or oversight?

Freeman has received head trauma.

I forgot to normalize the audio to this episode, so it's going to be too quiet. I'm going to nuke the original link soon and replace it, otherwise it will be identical.

 

 

(Downloadable copy will be up later)

 

Here's the latest episode of Freeman's Mind, now in HD! This episode is about average, it has a lot of the hallway wandering Half-Life is known for, but is broken up with the action. I didn't remember which way to go when I played this again, and could have easily broken about 2-3 episode into 5-6 pointless ones if I recorded this the first time through. I would argue the game even steers you towards the wrong objective way too early, leaving you lost. While old school FPSs can have a lot going for them, I've never been a fan of maze-like level design that tries to trap you. Also for the time being, I'm discontinuing releasing new videos on blip.tv, but will continue to leave the old ones up there. The reason being is ever since Maker Studios bought them out (shortly after my joining blip), the performance of the site has kind of gone downhill for me, so for now, future episodes will just be coming out on Youtube.

 

Thanks again to everyone who donated, you're the direct reason this episode is in HD right now. I actually didn't wait until any of the parts to arrive since I wanted to get it out ASAP and it absolutely was every bit of a pain in the ass to process as I anticipated on my system. The next episodes won't be released until I get the computer parts, but I can keep working on them in low definition and swap it out later. I'm still afraid to go to 1080, though I'm looking into possible options for that in the future.

 

Also, as of the time of this posting, I THINK I have responded to everyone who has donated money, which has come to roughly ~850 people since the fundraiser started. I still have yet to respond to most other normal emails, but I'll get to them as soon as I can.

 

More videos coming! In HD!

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

Also I have added a link to all the isolated voice tracks to Freeman's Mind so far (597MB) as a bonus.

Ooh shit. Someone get to work on a proper Freeman's Mind: Black Mesa dub ASAP!!

These are in high quality MP3s. If somebody REALLY wants the original WAVs, I can send them, though they were almost a GB then using maximum 7z compression.

Wow. It's been a week, but my brain is still adjusting to the new reality of what's happened. You guys not only sent more money than I was due to earn this year (without additional work), but this is easily the most money I've ever received at once in my life. Receiving this money has been like a weight being lifted, it should buy me all the time I need to get my life stabilized financially again. When I made the fundraiser video (which I was hesitant about doing in the first place), I thought the odds of getting enough money for the SSD were pretty good. The 12k figure I put on the funds raised thermometer was just a pipe dream. That was just me calculating how much I would need (with taxes) to supplement my own income so that I wouldn't need ANYTHING for a year, and could focus just on making videos. I never expected to GET that much. I thought MAYBE I'd hit the 1k mark. Some people have asked if I've been super happy and excited about this. I was initially, around the 1k mark. Since then, I've mostly been in shock as I've never had anything like this happen to me before. But since it has happened, I'll put it to use! This is the second-most thankful I've felt in my life (the first being when I accidentally had my carotid artery sliced open as a kid, was bleeding profusely and almost died), so, thanks!

 

How I feel about all this

 

 

FUNDRAISER OVER?

 

There was never really an expiration on the fundraiser, but I will be disabling the counter showing how much has been raised in the near future. The reason being is that only counts how much money is in my Paypal account, so if I withdraw anything, you would see the number go back down, not showing how much has been raised since. I'm still ALWAYS happy for donations and the "prize" of any line you want voiced is still applicable, for both past and future donators. Also I have added a link to all the isolated voice tracks to Freeman's Mind so far (597MB) as a bonus. Also, due to popular demand, I've implemented some cryptocurrency donations as an option:

 

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I honestly have NO IDEA where cryptocurrency is headed, but hey, I'll give it a shot if people want to send me some! As always, anyone who donated will receive a "thank you" email from me, although I need more time to catch up on email replies to everyone, the response I've received has been overwhelming, it's gong to take me a little longer to get through it all (also if you donate via cryptocurrency, I won't know who you are to thank unless you also email me). I've spent most of this past week focusing on Freeman's Mind.

 

 

WHERE IS THE MONEY GOING?

 

I've heard many stories before about people who win the lottery going broke after a few months because they spent it all. My brain is simply not wired that way. I've had enough financial stress over the past year that I'm going to make sure this money lasts as LONG AS POSSIBLE. I don't want to go on a shopping spree and be back where I was the next day. I want to make smart decisions and still be making videos decades from now. If you're curious, here's what I have planned:

 

-Reserve cash to supplement food and rent: I want to make sure I'm always several months ahead for groceries and rent. This one thing reduces my stress more than anything else and is where the majority of the money will go.

 

-Smaller purchases I could have used for months: Stuff like replacing my broken shoes, replacing a ripped pair of paints, replacing my partially-broken headphones, in short, stuff I would have bought a long time ago if I hadn't been economizing as much as possible.

 

-Some money for long-term volunteers: This is money for a small number of people who have given me a tremendous amount of help with the site or videos over the years.

 

-Computer parts: Maybe! Josh Phillips of LPC Gaming has offered to donate a 500GB SSD drive and some other viewers (thanks to Chris Cogdon, Joe McJoey, and CyDrake583) have offered to donate some parts as well. So while this fundraiser was originally for the SSD, you guys have me covered there as well!

 

-Gorilla Gong: Besides making my videos, I want to improve the Gorilla Gong site, we have BIG plans for it, hoping to really make it explode with some of the features we have coming. I can't reveal everything now, but it's going to be awesome.

 

-Re-opening t-shirt shop: This is a low priority, but I do want to make this happen. The t-shirt will likely relaunch sometime in the future at a lower price to buyers with less money going to me (like $1 a shirt), but many, many more designs to choose from.

 

-Long term stocks investing and MAYBE some trading: Now before everyone panics, I'm going to pursue this very, very cautiously. I've wanted to learn more about stocks for a while now since I want to put my money where my mouth is regarding things like peak oil and the economy declining. Additionally, I know of a trader whose advice I respect, so I may dabble in this, but not without expert advice. In any event, I will not be risking a significant amount of income in this, I'm not much of a gambler.

 

-More videos: Most of these don't actually COST anything (besides the food and rent part), but I have promised to complete Half-Life for FM this year, also you can expect a lot more Game Dungeon later on. For the long term, I hope to divert some funds later for making the full length machinima movie I've mentioned before.

 

-Robot attack dogs: Some Japanese company is working on it. They're having bugs in the AI where the dog doesn't discriminate against the owner and got set back by some casualties.

 

 

So, while my plans are pretty conservative and not as entertaining as a kickstarter scandal, they should lead to more videos in the long haul.

 

 

MISC STUFF:

 

On thankfulness + guilt: I'm amazed how many people feel bad because they ONLY donated a small amount. Guys, I can get a leg of chicken + thigh meat from the deli for about $1.50 here. It ALL counts to me. Also, if you can't afford to donate and feel guilty about it, don't. It's not like you OWE me the money, I'm happy to have you as fans. As long as I can stay afloat one way or another, mission accomplished.

 

On SrcDemo2: Many people informed me of this piece of software and certainly threw me a curve ball regarding motion blur. Now that I've had time to test it, my conclusion is it WILL cut down on the sizes needed some due to .PNG compression. However, I will probably continue using my motion blur technique as SrcDemo2's requires a MUCH higher framerate to approximate the quality of mine, so the load on the CPU doesn't make it very practical.

 

On RAID 0: While two fast drives in RAID 0 might handle most of what I need in terms of capturing, since I'm being donated a SSD, I plan to stick with my original plan, plus I was leaning towards that anyway since SSDs beat out RAID 0 in noise levels any day.

 

On Freeman's Mind: I've completed the dialogue for the next episode, just waiting on some help with sound effects. I won't be waiting for the SSD to arrive for THIS episode, so I'm going to clear up a ton of space to record this episode in HD. In any event, I'm working to get the next episode out ASAP.

 

- - -

 

ADHD version: You guys have sent Ross a lot of money! This has changed Ross's outlook on life, thank you! New Freeman's Mind episode coming ASAP!

 

LINK TO FORUM COMMENTS

I don't know how many people would agree with me, but I've never been in a rush for the Freeman's mind episodes

Not enough

 

Anyway how in detail do you feel about all of this?

Kind of like the scene in Speed where they get everyone off the bus and it detonates, but they don't have Dennis Hopper yet.

 

So how are you holding up Ross? Getting the used to the idea yet your fans are willing and able to support your creative endeavours? You must take to the film director carreer path like a divine calling now. I sure would have.

 

I'd love to see what you could do with a real film crew and cast. In fact, I'd put good money on a bet that you'd be able to take most ordinary film directors and critics by surprise.

I feel a bit overwhelmed, but have a more positive outlook than I've had in over a year. As for a movie, the one I plan on making I think will surprise people, in terms of writing and direction it's going to be an order of magnitude above anything else I've done before.

 

Ross- bit off topic, but i tought you like to know. In one RGD episode you mentioned lack of french revolution games pre-napoleon. Well, new Assassin's creed game has just been announced (named "unity") and by looks of it, it takes place during french revolution.

Yeah I almost thought of mentioning maybe Assassin's Creed will do one in the video. That's fantastic, from the look of the teaser trailer it could be great. The video definitely has the right vibe!

 

Ubisoft is horrible for DRM though...

Honestly, just about any game I buy, I also get an offline crack for it (unless it's meant to be multiplayer). I think it's bullshit that a game company dictates when you can play the game you paid for.

If Civil Protection is even worse, what could it be?

Each episode is basically like making a small mod.

 

don't ever let yourself get bought out or sold to another corporate a-hole again if you can help it.

Well when I signed up with Machinima, there weren't really other options. Hell, until 2013, when Valve officially made a statement, there were NO copyright protections for having content up and there have been plenty of copyright witch hunts since then. Nowadays it's much less of a worry for the stuff I do, and yeah, I don't exactly have a burning desire to hook up with another corporation.

 

Oh, THAT'S how you could always record in Half-Life: Source and I couldn't. Good new piece of information.

From a fan from 2010:

 

"

I e-mailed you a while ago concerning a problem with the demo playback issue with the Steam version of Half-Life: Source, well we found a fix for it, and if you fancy using the Steam version over the emulator, here it is. It turns out the "demoheader.tmp" file is totally missing from the game files. What I did was, having Half-Life Deathmatch: Source installed, copied

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\\half-life deathmatch source\hl1mp\demoheader.tmp"

over to

C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\\half-life source\hl1

and

C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\\half-life source\hl2

You won't be able to play older demos, but new ones should work. I've e-mailed this to Valve, but I doubt they'll apply an update to fix this any time soon

"

 

There were concerns that you removed some of your older voice track files of the series to save up space.

I have them all, I'll release them in the near future.

 

In terms of long term financial planning and not needing money, you could buy a real Accursed Farm house in Poland:

Great price, but one step at a time, I consider this money "fuel" for the whole year. Although not having to pay rent might even itself out pretty fast.

 

He can't get it from Newegg since he lives in Poland...

Maybe he watched the short version.

 

Ross, just being curious- how many episodes more you think will be until end of Half-life?

I don't know, I literally haven't played past the point I'm at in many years.

 

so... this is probably a good opportunity to once again try to direct Ross' attention towards the awesome idea of Flattr.com, which is basically a monthly budget to spend on stuff you like on the web.

I might consider stuff like this in the future, but for now I may as well finish HL first.

 

Paypal only donation option?

Not necessarily, but I would have to figure out how to do something else.