Ross Scott

Look, I don't really want to get into this further, but I'll just say this much: -I already have a project manager who has been very helpful. -I've received many volunteer offers, whom I've been reviewing and my project manager is helping to take care of, however I'll ask for additional help as I need it. There's not a lot of sense in hunting for animators when you don't have any models for them to work with and may not for another year and a half or longer. -The way you talk suggests you don't understand all that's involved with an extensive machinima project. I think Unreal will be better, but Source was a nightmare. The engine had so many bugs that had no explanation, some were so devastating they almost tanked the episode until I could invent a workaround. Valve themselves INTRODUCED a bug between Episode 1 and 2 that they haven't fixed to this day. What percentage of done is fixing a bug that has no known cause and holds up the entire project? One bug like this may take 15 minutes to workaround. Another one may take 6 weeks. Source Filmmaker when it was released (and still not by default, best I know) doesn't support physics, sprites, or global map-light realtime shadows. Why accrue extra accountability for your percentages that were based off not knowing that information? I'd rather just not give a percentage, than state 10% for 6 months, then suddenly change the number to 1% because of previously unknown variables. Stuff like that is terrible for morale. -I simply can't afford to hire people except for specific jobs I can't do myself and there really is no substitute for from a volunteer pool. While I have raised a lot of money, I need to make it last a long time. Minimum wage comes to about 15k a year and specialized work is worth more than that. I couldn't even hire one person full time. -Volunteers are notorious for flaking out. I've received over 100 emails before of people offering to help, giving me their past experience, examples, I say great, ask them to help on a simple thing to start out, I never hear from them again (I call them "the suicide note"). I want to say the "flake out" ratio on volunteers is something close to 80% or higher. Typically, the more complex the skillset, the more likely the person is to disappear randomly. So much of what you're saying is more akin to what you would expect from EMPLOYEES, not volunteers. I think the attitude you're suggesting can be potentially disastrous the more complex a volunteer project you have. Imagine every person you're assigning something can leave anytime he or she feels like it, and you may not have a substitute for them. I don't mean this in an unfriendly way, but your planning sounds like the classic scenario of a mod that's started and announced, but never sees the light of day (which is the majority of them). Another way to look at it: Black Mesa has been in development since 2004, has had more interest and volunteer resources than practically any mod in the industry and STILL isn't done. They took 8 years to get the first portion out, I'm sure I'll be a lot faster than that for the whole project. -The thing to take away from this is I'm the last line of defense. I have enough experience with volunteers and planning that I'll be able to handle whatever help I do end up getting (stable or not), but if anyone leaves, the movie will still get made. I've produced over a dozen fully-animated machinimas, which were akin to making small mods. I can't promise speedy operations, but I will get it made eventually. I guess you'll just have to trust me (or not) when I say that I've likely already thought about everything you're talking about years ahead of time and do have a plan that I think has the highest odds for success for my budget / situation.

I can say that I pay about 1,034 zloty a month (little under $300, depending on exchange rate) in social security and health coverage in Poland each month. That's going to be the same for pretty much anyone self-employed. Beyond that, I don't think my girlfriend would be comfortable with me revealing everything else, plus some expenses fluctuate. Imagining project percentage updates is kind of meaningless. I'm years off. That's the best way to look at it. This is going to be the longest video I've made and in a different engine. I have a lot of experience making machinimas and I have done some things in Unreal, so I have an idea of what's needed, but trying to accurately assume projected deadlines just isn't very realistic right now. All numbers would have to get shifted every time I make a new Game Dungeon, or have to spend half the day downtown taking care of paperwork. Here's something worth keeping in mind: Out of successfully funded kickstarter games that come to market, virtually ALL are over deadline. You're talking like I've never planned anything out. I have lots of things planned already, but frequent status reports would only slow things down and be inaccurate. I really doubt the movie is going to come out before 2017 and it's highly possible it will be after that. I got setback a lot this year due to various things, but I'm going to keep working on the movie regardless. Sorry, but it won't happen, that would be an issue with copyright from Valve, you'll just have to live with being able to download them for free. Yeah, that's my main concern. Here's a good way to look at things: I ABSOLUTELY will try my best to get the movie done faster than Freeman's Mind was. Thanks, I have a bunch of stuff coming for this month. Thanks, but I really meant all I said in the video, I see this whole thing as pressing my luck, people have no OBLIGATION to watch the ads, if I really expected people to cough up money, I'd put it behind a paywall or something. I'd like as many people to see the videos as are interested and if I can find someway to stay afloat, then mission accomplished.

You wouldn't be the baby. His expression resembles my own to what you're saying. VTM Bloodlines is a longer game than Half-Life. It's possible, but I didn't like how it had to be done as a service, which affects my taxes, plus the additional fees + their recent public perception after being hacked didn't help either. Besides, if people really don't want to use Paypal, they can always email me or I have the bitcoin option too. It's like the video said, my heart really isn't into business stuff, I look at it as a means to an end. I only want money to the point I don't have to worry about it.

Prepare to be disappointed. I'm expecting there will be so many comments that I'll probably be 5-10 minutes behind what people are writing and I highly doubt I'll get to everyone for the first livestream. I haven't settled on what service I'll be using, but if you're expecting an answer as soon as you type it, you may be competing with thousands of others. This will be semi-anarchy at first, but I'm thinking over time we'll get a better semblance of order going.

Yes, so I get to keep more of $12 once a year than I do from $1 monthly. I didn't want to point that out in the video because I wanted to minimize the "look at all the ways you can pay me" infomercial crap. This was honestly a rough script for me to write since I was fighting a lot of my nature with it. Yeah, but wow, the timing sure worked in my favor. I'm not sure what people have in mind, but I think it would be pretty underwhelming. Not always, but a lot of the time it's mostly me going in with a list of notes of what kinds of shots I want to grab, screencapping them, then exiting and processing the clips for editing and repeating. Additionally, I try to free up all computer resources when recording higher resolution games to minimize the possibility of any stuttering. While I do have a multicore processor, I don't always have full faith in Windows' ability to manage things without any bottlenecking at all. That and I'm usually not giving any sort of performance while I'm doing this stuff, I'm typically trying to get the footage I need as fast I can and I don't think it would be very interesting to watch. Well I confess, even before the fundraiser, I've been holding out for Pascal next year. I usually only upgrade one part at a time and make it last as long as possible however. That and the Oculus Rift (or Vive, whichever ends up being better), since I look at that less as an upgrade and more of an escapism portal that I've been wanting for a decade or so. But yeah, I've actually never bought a full desktop system. I assembled my first one in high school (for $400 including monitor) and have only upgraded incrementally since. Even then, I never buy top-tier stuff since the premium is so high and it depreciates rapidly. I believe VoodooPC predates them.

Maybe, these both seem like things that sound easy in concept, but seem like they could get suspiciously longer. I tend to be more cautious the easier something to do is also, since I don't like the videos to dip below a certain quality level. Oh well thanks a bunch man. Again though, don't feel obligated if you're scraping by yourself. That's part of the reason I told everyone how much I make, so some people would certainly go "well damn, I'm making as much as that working the grill, I think I'll keep my money afterall". I don't want to exploit or deceive anyone. Besides, even if you never donate a dime, coming back after a long time to see more videos is always appreciated. No worries at all, it's not like I'm handing out donations myself. Again, I really look at the situation as me pressing my luck, so don't worry about it. No, it's all the same as far as I know. It might be less for directly from another Paypal account, but that's it. As for mod tracker, I talked about that in moon gaming actually, but edited it out since there was so much other stuff. Not that I know of, I think just cancel the old one and do a new one instead.

This is a blog post. To read the original post, please click here » New video! This one probably isn't what a lot of you were hoping for, but I admit this is one aimed at a real minority of the audience. I tried to make it as enjoyable to watch as I could. The short version is this is a fundraiser video and I'll be happy for any donations I can get. There's no obligation to donate anything however, you'll still get all the videos. This is another experiment of mine to stay afloat, like many others. If you are interested in helping out though, the donation page has been updated to make it a little easier to use + now includes stat tracking! Donation Page I was originally going to use Patreon for this, but for reasons discussed in the video, I decided against it (them being hacked recently reinforced the decision). For those wondering, I'm unfortunatley going to be pretty empty-handed regarded prizes, although if there's something you really want that doesn't take a lot of time, I can consider it. It's mostly an issue of time more than anything else. If you've ever wanted to know what my financial or work situation has been over the years, it's all in the video. Something I was considering saying that's not it the video is if anyone has alternative solutions to my situation also, they're free to suggest them. I was a little hesitant about saying that on Youtube since a lot of suggestions might not be so practical ("You should live in a dog house, it's much less expensive, woof!"). One big news item in the video that's worth repeating is I plan to be setting up monthly live video chats in the near future, so anyone can communicate with me and I can let everyone know what's going on. Ideally, I'd like to start this sometime late October, but realistically, it may not happen until early November. I'll have details posted here once things are worked out. For the time being, next up, regardless of how the fundraiser goes, is going to be as many Game Dungeons as I can cram in for October. There will be a bit of a delay, but expect several for late October and of course, a Halloween episode. While the overall future of my videos is a little like the Magic 8 ball answer "reply hazy, try again later", for the time being, there's a bunch more coming! - - - ADHD version: Did you know Ross accepts money? Also he'll be doing live video chats in the future! COMMENTS

Okay things DID go wrong, it will probably be within another 24 hours. There's barely any from FM, it's very robotic to record. There are some from CP, I'll get around to releasing them at some point.

The video will explain everything. If nothing goes wrong, I should have it up within 24 hours.

Hell, that'll get fixed ASAP.

This is a blog post. To read the original post, please click here » Goodies! In anticipation of the fundraiser campaign I should have coming out soon (expect a video + more info in 1-2 days), as a good faith gesture, I'm releasing all the stuff I've been meaning to for months! DOTA 2 VOICE PACK RELEASED! While my original plan was to sell this in the Steam store, I've decided to release all the files to the Freeman's Mind Announcer Pack I was working on for DOTA 2 for free. The reason I didn't follow this thing through was because midway through its production, Valve changed the rules, which made about half my lines unusable. This was a huge morale killer and by that time I was able to resume work on the videos again, so this pack remained in limbo for a while. Truth be told, I'd rather just make more videos than spend another month or two working on this again. Ironically, I'm not even that big a MOBA fan (though I do like RTSs and action RPGs individually), this was more of a fan request thing that never quite made it. Still, I put a whole bunch of effort into this and I'm sure you'll find some lines entertaining. DOTA 2 Freeman's Mind Announcer Pack (51MB) You're allowed to use these files for anything you want, under the following conditions: 1. Don't sell this as a voice pack. 2. If you make something substantial with this, please credit me (Ross Scott) for the lines if possible. While this pack is free, donations are still welcome! ALL WEBSITE LINKS UPDATED! Besides the DOTA 2 files, all the links to the videos on the site should now be updated, making it easy to find anything you may have missed. In the future I hope to have an overhaul of the site to make everything easier to access, but in the meantime, info on all the videos can be found here in the movies section. Additionally, all Freeman's Mind episodes are now available to download from the episode pages, and I've also updated the archive of all my isolated voice tracks for Freeman's Mind. You can download the updated pack HERE (680MB). That's it for now, the fundraising video is next, followed by as many Game Dungeons as I can get done for October! - - - ADHD version: Dota 2 files released! Freeman's Mind voice files + downloads released! Web links all updated! Ross is having a fundraising campaign soon, donations are appreciated! COMMENTS

This is a blog post. To read the original post, please click here » New Game Dungeon! I think this might be the shortest one so far, but I promise I didn't skimp any on the quality. This game certainly had things to talk about. I originally was going to start working on the Patreon campaign next, but after the muddled reaction to Moon Gaming, I felt like I should get another Game Dungeon out first to let people know I wasn't abandoning other videos. On that note, I think I'm going to discontinue Moon Gaming as the response to it wasn't what I was hoping. While I think it has potential to be better, I don't think it would be a LOT better than what was already seen. Since that's been scrapped, after Patreon is set up, my new plan is to get as many Game Dungeons out for October as I can. I have a couple smaller episodes planned and at least one larger one for Halloween, but I'll just see what's doable. More stuff coming! COMMENTS

Well the overall feedback on this looks pretty clear. In honesty, I was pretty happy with how this came out, but it could be because I had someone else to comment also so I wasn't in a vacuum just spouting out my own thoughts. Apparently me spouting my own thoughts is enough however! For everyone talking about it improving, I can see it improving somewhat, but not a LOT. So in light of that, I think I'm going to discontinue the series. My new plans now are to get a Game Dungeon out ASAP (I have a short but good one in mind) to sort of make amends for everyone disappointed by this one, then I'll be working on Patreon. I'm still figuring out what I want to do for October, but in all likelihood it will be as many Game Dungeons as I can manage.

This is a blog post. To read the original post, please click here » EDIT: The reception to this video has been rockier than I was hoping and it definitely affects future plans. I want to get a better bearing on what people think of this. Please give some feedback below: [poll id=11] New series! Welcome to Moon Gaming, the only gaming show that takes place on the moon (I think)! I've been wanting to make this for a while now and while we ran into a lot of technical issues, I'm more or less pleased with how it came out. This series is going to be composed of "Let's Play" sessions. Normally I'm not very interested in "Let's Plays" myself, because it tends to be a lot of dead air or talking about nothing particularly interesting. Moon Gaming hopes to solve those problems by editing it down to just the stuff worth talking about. So even though this is technically a Let's Play, I guarantee every shot in here is one that I thought belonged. If anything, I may have been a little overzealous about this first episode and cut a little too much, but the playthrough ran on a lot longer than we intended. We originally planned for only one episode, but we had so much to talk about it ballooned into three. I think future episodes will go much more smoothly. I'm very optimistic about this series as the turnaround time is definitely faster than Game Dungeon, so it can hopefully buy myself some more time to work on the movie. In this inaugural episode, I'm joined by Tom White of the show Weird Video Games. I met him from being on TGWTG network and I generally recommend his videos; some of my favorites being https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xB8fWRD-p5c and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjsGXnTBvB8. Tom will be returning for future episodes and I have another guest lined up also. As for other videos, my next focus is going to be setting up a Patreon campaign, along with an accompanying video. If I'm lucky, I'll have another Moon Gaming episode for this month, but if not, expect several for October as this show format allows me to squeeze in more videos than I normally would be able to and I'd love to have more Halloween-themed ones. I'll try my best to have a Game Dungeon for October too. Busy! COMMENTS

I'm actually not sure if the knuckle joint always corresponds with completing the level, I just decided to assume that for the sake of the video.

I don't feel like retaking the test, but I've done these before and I'm INTJ. I'm borderline I/E, real high marks in NT and moderately low J.

I'm really not trying to bum people out with this stuff, it's more like I don't like how invisible it is. For #1, I can't say for certain, though with my own "escape from machinima" entries, that was really bad for me and everything on there (not counting my google speculation, since that was just speculating) was true. So it's VERY easy to imagine it getting as bad or worse in the actual industry. For #2 I'm kind of cynical so I don't think it can be changed through populist or democratic means. If I did, I would endorse boycotts, but there's a history of gaming boycotts not being effective at all. I guess the upside is not ALL games are like that, just higher profile ones it's more common. Yeah, just to be clear, there are WAY more serious issues going on globally than anything in the realm of gaming, but the more you question our most harmful practices, the more you have to question our whole system overall, which I think a lot of people aren't really willing to do mentally. I just figure gaming is an easier realm to tackle overall. Also for the record, anyone working on a game who deliberately pushes themselves I don't see as a problem, that's just their motivation. The problem is companies exploiting or demanding that type of behavior with EA Spouse crunch time hours, no overtime pay, routine layoffs, etc. Imagine if EA had to pay time and a half for every hour over 40 that a person spent on a game, it would drastically change their approach to things.

You know I found something that proves it was more than my imagination: Now this is only using anaglyph mode, but back when I had an s-3d setup, I was using page-flipped shutter glasses. Regardless, if you look at these, you can tell there's definitely a difference between the two. Unfortunately it's likely multiple settings are different, but just from that screenshot I think the TriDef one definitely looks better. The roof windows and general perspective just seems better somehow.

Sorry for the slow replies: I may be misunderstanding, but I've already tried this, it's not an ideal solution since some songs will get overrepresented. So if you have a song that's electronic AND metal, it appears twice as much on playlists. I ideally want every track to have an equal representation (within its own category). As for custom tags, I really think there's enough within ID3 to work with. I think it would only need 2 different fields max, maybe just one. No, I think that's a completely different thing. That just cleans up badly labelled or organized files. I'm talking about custom criteria for organizing soundtracks so that you can get similar sounding tracks on a playlist. Yes and no. First, while mood can be very subjective, I think tempo is absolutely crucial towards sorting tracks the way I'm envisioning. Mood or situation for listening could work, but the categories you list is part of the problem. You have things like "energetic" and "poignant" that aren't especially helpful for manual sorting. I want to boil these down into as few categories as possible (but still practical). When you have thousands of potential mood / style combinations like this, it makes manual sorting rather impractical. Besides, where's the benefit of labeling a track "aggressive" AND "angry"? This is way too much. I'm trying to find a system simple enough I can practically follow a flowchart as to how to sort the music and at the end the tracks basically sound similar for that category. Guys, here's the thing: If I know the CRITERIA for how to sort thing, then everything falls into place for me. This is a subjective thing and not everyone will have the same opinions, but the more feedback I get on this, the more I can figure out my own system that works. Lately, I've been trying to put some categories into different moods, and some based on situations where I might want the music. Here are a few examples of what I mean for soundtracks (this all assumes no lyrics): Racing - Rock: Music with a fast enough tempo to be suitable for a racing game with a rock / metal genre overall. Somewhat neutral in tone, without strong "strife" or "angst" overtones. Example: Frag: Music suitable for a deathmatch or fighting game with pretty constant action. A slower overall tempo than "racing" with more irregularity in the beat also suitable. Generally some variant of heavy metal. Example: Scary Calm: Music suitable for a horror game, but is generally just mild tension building rather than moods of intense suspense or fear. Example: Medieval Simming: Music suitable for some sort of medieval sim game. Generally calm pacing, with nothing too soothing or riveting, but has some instrument use or style that suggests a medieval environment. Example: Now the alternative to this would be to have some sort computer-assisted system that could spit out analytics or suggested organizational system that could be refined manually, but I don't know of anything like that. If I have to sort it all myself, the variables need to be as few as possible to still work. I'm anticipating a few dozen categories, but hopefully not much beyond that for soundtracks. Let me know if you have any feedback along these lines. I'd like to know how other people decide what sorts of songs go together (that's NOT based on artist / album).

That might be the problem then. I only went to normal 3D theaters. Literally the whole time I was watching Avatar I was thinking it needed more depth (except for the scene with the alien pollen or whatever it was). I liked the transparencies from the glass, but it was still too flat. Always. Oh I will, I'm just waiting for the first generation consumer versions. If I thought DK2 was as good as it was going to get, I would have one by now.