Jon Bon

I couldnt agree with you more. The fact still remains that America obviously has the power to pass laws that affect the Internet (wether it's right or wrong is moot, how things should or shouldn't be is irrelevant). They ARE trying to pass a law, that does protect people. In it's current form, a joke, but it still remains necessary. Thankfully international copyright laws already exist, the problem is that not every country that has access to the internet adheres to these laws, and there for they remain unprosecutable in any country. I agree though that if you break an international law you should be prosecuted in your own country, by their means and methods. Because of international copyright/patent laws, there should be no scenario where a NZ uploads something illegal (pirated) in US that is not legal in NZ. You country either goes with international law, or it doesn't, period. If I create something, and you take and sell it without my permission, that's theft plain and simple, location is not important. Theft is wrong everywhere. Unfortunately, the NZ'er is not only affected by his countries laws the second he starts interacting with the rest of the world, this is why we have international laws, and interpol. Measuring the effects of piracy is also not needed. We don't need to know how bad it is, or what the outcomes are, just that is exists, and is infringing upon peoples rights as is. The amount of money pirates take from rightful owners is irrelevant, even if they didn't get any compensation, monetary or otherwise, they are still violating the proprietary rights of the owner/creator. 8% growth(industry, not company specific) can be attributed to anything, population size increase, demographical shifts, marked increase, etc. Also how much you want to bet the 8% is the major lables, and not the indy ones. My hypothetical point was to show that piracy is not a victimless crime. It's not about how much money priates steal, it's about the fact that they are stealing, and we are allowing it. I personally think America is a corrupt and immoral country, and that is why the laws as proposed wouldn't work. However I can't realistically stand by while people say the laws should NEVER come about. Additional it's extra frustrating to see the internet blow up with talk of these laws, but every day people lay silent about the injustices that are allowed to continue that threaten the vary laws being proposed. Everyone is fighting the wrong battle.

I spend my whole life devoted to the art of video games. When I grow up I become a video game maker. Eventually I am successful, and my games are worldwide popular. My company expands with the growth of profits. One day I am informed that a group from a foreign country has pirated (copied and redistributing) my most recent and popular game and is giving it away for FREE and selling advertisement space on the website they have it available at. I contact my lawyers in an effort to have the pirates served with a cease and desist letter. My lawyers unfortunately inform me that the pirates are geographically located where my countries laws do not apply to them and there are no international laws that govern their current actions. I spend a ton of money upgrading my security and release a sequel to the game, it also becomes worldwide popular. And again the pirates crack my security, copy the game, and redistribute it, again selling advertising space. Except this time my advertisers are wise to it and pull their ad space on my sites in order to advertise on my ‘competition’ (the pirates), and they do so legally. I must close close my business, no one will advertise or invest for a game that won't see it's return in profits, and there for I can't afford to pay my staff and I can't do it alone. Boy I wish there were some kind of law, or governing body that were here to protect me in the event of a scenario like this… That fictional situation is a very basic and small scale example of one of the effects of piracy. The current laws being proposed for policing the internet are being created in an effort to help prevent the type of situation described above. I do not agree with the proposals in their current form; however I fully recognize their need to exist. My understanding is that the generally agreed upon main ‘hiccup’ if you will, with the current proposed laws to govern the content on the internet is that people will lose their rights(in the form of censorship). Last I checked in the average ‘free country’ you do not have the right to public nudity, and with good cause. One could argue that clothing is the first form of censorship yet most wear it happily. People fear that if the law(s) pass the governing body (who will enforce the laws) MAY use it for outside interests. The majority of this fear lies in the fact that the proposed laws are vague in terms of what they can specifically remove/ban from the internet. So if it is possible to exploit the system, let’s not implement it at all? Have we forgotten about my game company? The next argument point the average person will bring up is the corporate owners who benefit most from this law change, and who will potentially exploit it. Corrupt business owners and law officials, really? That is the best counter argument available? As I said, the laws in their current form are too vague and allow too much room for interpretation and there for should not be passed. However piracy IS still a problem. Most people want to make money, a lot want to own their own business, and everyone wants to get paid to do what they love for the rest of their life, piracy puts that at risk. Change is almost always a good thing, but it does need to be done right. The corporate ‘big wigs’ will always be looking for ways to exploit the system, they will always be greedy and they will almost always end up on top. That is a problem with the way we run things as a society, and should not be a direct consideration when out right refusing the idea of a law. If half as many people concerned about internet policing showed concern with corruption it wouldn’t be an issue. Mass fear of a loss of rights is blinding people into thinking that any law that wants to govern internet content is automatically bad. I create a product; I patent it, and begin sales. Anyone who copies (pirates) my product is infringing upon my rights as the owner of that product, capitalism. By being completely against any law that looks at governing pirated content on the internet, you are valuing the illegal consumer’s rights over my own (as the product creator and owner). People are receiving little to no compensation for their work because of piracy, companies are passing up ideas based on piracy, and consumers are shopping based on piracy. Piracy (specifically in digital sense) does exist, today, right now. These maybes, ifs and possibilities, they speak of if these laws are passed, are just that, potential and not definite. I personally think the internet should be a free tool for the sharing of all information worldwide. But alas that is not the reality of the situation. However censorship IS needed; child pornography, snuff films, rape, and murder dictate it. But where does it end, female circumcision is illegal in America, but not everywhere. Does that mean photos of it would also be illegal? What about text, describing it's existance? What about drug use like marijuana? Will licensed smokers be allowed to have their photos (of them smoking) online, but not the unlicensed people? Obviously a law(s) that govern the internet as a whole needs a lot of discussion before implementation, but in my opinion, the idea by no means needs to be abolished completely. I for one can see the big picture and do not want to see the death of good art thanks to piracy. -Your right is only free to have, if it does not infringe on anyone else’s.

I was more thinking guy A and guy B agree to rep all of each others posts in an effort to raise points. I was also thinking only limit the number of rep able to give to like 3 a day or something, that way it doesnt change much other than the fact that you can't over rep, makes rep more rare and there for more appropriate. I understand and agree with not selling the work for points etc. You could always have the uploader rewarded with points for each individual IP who downloads their picture/audio etc. that way people wont just upload crap only to get the points. No doubt mate. Anything good is worth waiting for. Thanks for the quick reply. Cheers!

Hey thanks Wyzrd, I appreciate that. I got so swept up in what I envisioned the points system to be, I forgot to mention that I am also for a complete wipe out of the current points. It only makes sense since they wont really be the same systems. Before the swap over you could always have you and your staff offer silly things for really high rmxpu point costs. Like 100k points and X staff member wheres a (blank) and takes a photo for community. That kinda stuff, and make it fun for everyone, that way you can drain most of rmxpu's points before the reset and people feel as though they earned something with them. It's also a great way to get the community together before the new launch etc. -Cheers

My apologies, I suppose I was some what unclear. I do have some character sprites complete as well as a few paper dolls, but no where near enough to include yet. This pack is a forever ongoing project, and something I do in my spare time as inspiration permits. I will take a look at what I have and see if I can spend some time getting something together for the near future as far as character sprites go. For now it is just icons.

Ahh, bummer, kk. I had thought about it, and the best general piece of advice I could give(and will still incase you get stuck in the future) is: stop thinking about the task as a designer and think about it as a viewer. Sorry I couldn't help.

Hmm, what is a 'builder' in this context, like a tradesmen? What is main function of the company/group/person? The banner is for a website, what purpose does the website serve? Does the company/group/person have any other pre-existing logo/banner or a color etc they use? What region and climat is the intended consumer? What demographic is the intended consumer? With some more information I could definitely give you some ideas.

This is an amazing idea. From what I have read so far you guys are really making this site into something useful. 1. Will the number of reputation points a user can assign be limited by day, week, or month in order to avoid exploitation? 2.I personally think that points for pictures should not be given at all, people will still contribute and upload as they do now, but won't be inclined to attempt to exploit the system by uploading work they do not own. Same with audio, although people do make unique forms of music, there is so much free rights stuff out there that it would be very easy to upload audio without others ever knowing where it came from. See number 6 for explanation. 3.I am not sure how the referral system would work, but I would hope the person referred would need to be active for X amount of time after the referral for the person who invited to get any points. Otherwise I see massive room to exploit this system. Or even better only award points to referrals where the person then subscribes(may be how you want it already). 4.The gems and crystals idea is a good one as well. Will points still be trade-able, in other words will there be a sub economy between the users for points? So will 5 people be able to pool their points and use one account for their subscription purposes? 5.Will users still be allowed to submit their own shops for creation or is the job section sort of a more effective reverse of this? If so, will it be possible to make a needed job as a user and offer my own points as payment for the completed job. 6.As a user will I be able to add content(Games/Media) to GDU and then offer it for sale for GDU points which are given to me when the game is 'bought'? (This way instead of awarding points for submitting pictures and audio you can simply allow the users to 'sell' their graphics and audio for GDU points) 7.Obviously a subscription can be bought with real life currency, and GDU points are earned, Gems are bought with GDU points, and gems trade for subscription status. But can GDU points ever be bought with real life currency? Suggestions for subscription benefits. GDU point discount, X% off all products on site that cost GDU points. X amount of dedicated file hosting(not sure if this is possible), but would allow people to launch their game through the site.(have it done per file, and by size, so like X number of files and no more than X amount of mb) Automatic entry into a monthly contest where you award either a product you sell(for points) to the winner for free, or possibly reinvest some of the money from subscriptions into an awards system, maybe send a T-Shirt with site logo on it, or a mug, etc. Vista Print, is an excellent site for that stuff. Not sure if the chat room will have a size limit but, gauranteed place in the chat room. Asthetic bonuses, ability to change(color) and customize(font) your forum name, Forum Avatar border, animated gifs avatars enabled, and other minor things, much like other sites. Higher reputation awarding cap(see number 1). Help Desk-Using your already exisiting staff, or hiring/volunteers(pay in points or real money) whatever spots needed, make a team of 'experts' the subscribers would have access to. You would tell the subscribers to post their problem in the form of a thread much like normal but allow them to select from a list of experts by title(scripting, eventing, graphical, audio, etc.) to assign the problem to. The expert(s) would then recieve an email and be able to contact the person with the problem in order to render assistance. Alot of the time the problem might even already be solved. If the problem remains unsolved by the community, the subscriber is then contacted by the suggested expert(or next available one) and together they decide a time for a metting, they meet in chat or where ever agreed upon and the expert helps them the best they can. As far as paying the experts, which ever currency you choose, you could have it be a case by case scenario where first come first serve gets paid. Well that is pretty much everything that immediately came to mind when I read this. These are of course just my suggestions take em or leave em, but I must say this is definietly going in an excellent direction. I have been dying for a good game making subscription site, and unlimited seems to be shaping into what I am looking for, I knew I picked the right community, keep up the excellent work Marked and staff.

Duely noted, I will definitely add those the next time I work on the pack. For now I added a download link for the pack itself as I had yet to make it available. The pack is far from complete but I wanted to release it now because people were trying to use the icons from my teaser pics which came out blurry of course becauset they are purposely not in the correct resolution.

Yeah I didn't want to add RTP stuff to the tileset, I figured if someone wants to use it they can just add it to whatever tileset they want. Thanks, I appreciate it. I am self taught and that is my fourth pixel art project. -Cheers

I have been working on Hedge Maze Tileset, made it using an RTP tree. Here is an example of a simple map I made using the tileset, on the left you can see areas with detail, on the right you can see the plain walls. Here is the Tileset. Here is the Autotile. Credits Free use for anyone. If you use it in your creation, just credit (Jon Bon) somewhere appropriate in your credits section. Not the highest detail ever, but perfect for what I needed, I and figured I would share it with everyone. Cheers.

Here is the revolver icon from the pack I am working on.

I am super excited about this idea, sounds like you got a great concept going mate. Like the look so far, can't wait to get a hands on feel. I saw a Project Cardv3 comment in the thread, Yeah!(even if its low on the list hehe). Definitely looking forward to the future of Unlimited, cheers and keep up the superb work!

You may want to check out RPG Maker XP, as well as look into RPG Maker VX Ace, and decide which you like best before you commit any money. Some people prefer XP to VX, and Ace is rather new, and I have heard nothing but good things so far. I have yet to look into Ace, but if in my opinion it is better then XP I will get a copy of VX Ace.

14 episodes at 44 minutes a pop, hardly a short movie. Grand Star and Earth 2 also only have 1 season. As I stated at the bottom, they are complete in the sense that there are no new episodes. Many excellent sci fi series only have 1 season because it wasn't all pop culture like it is now, and still required the standard millions of viewers to remain in production. Even now a lot of excellent produced acted and written sci fi shows only have one season as there are now so many that it's hard to grab enough of the audience to maintain the show. The ones mentioned above are more mainstream sci fi, with a few Canadian gems such as Grand Star and Andromeda. Even some multiple season shows known to represent the genre have had trouble in the early days of sci fi fandom, such as Stargate, who had to swap networks in order to remain in productions, but moved onto a multi-series success. The original Star Trek was almost cancelled multiple times as well as only gained it's truly following once the show began reruns of the original 3 seasons, also moving onto a multi-series success. Anyhow, if you(anyone) are into Sci-Fi then definitely check those series out, a truly collection wouldn't be complete without them.

Yet another masterpiece Grimm, keep up the amazing work mate. Seems very non repetitive, excellent execution.

Here are some other great (complete)Sci Fi series you may have missed: Earth Final Conflict Babylon 5 First Wave Stargate Earth 2 Andromeda Seaquest Sliders Quantum Leap Outer Limits(new or old) Farscape Firefly Grand Star Those are all complete(nothing new), and are all more or less unique ideas from each other. Those plus the Star Trek series, and a few currently running series are my top favorite sci fi of all time. I have watched each series many times, check em out, they are all long before sci fi got all pop culture and was still true to form.

Looks great, shade the boots a bit more as well, they look flat compared to the rest. Keep up the good work.

Yeah, but you are forgetting that the online was removed, not 'not included', totally different. They went all the way to making the game intended to be played online, then before launch they removed the ability, and don't put servers up. The same is with the new one for 3DS. What I was saying is that they have gone on record to stating they did not plan on making the 3DS on in English. The online stuff is my example of why the handheld popularity for the game series is dying in English, and is why we get all consoles, but not all handhelds. Anyhow you don't have to cite anything I can tell you play and follow the series, Joey however makes lie statements, like the above one. Also, there is no way you beat Lao Shan or Yama solo, as their HP is too much for anyone to deal in that period of time, they are specifically made to be killed with 3+ ideally 4. 3 can only normally even kill once they are geared PAST the online elder dragons. The main reason they take so many to kill is that you must use turret type systems to damage the monster, as well as stationary spikes etc, that in conjunction with barrel bomb+ allows enough damage to kill. Only the weapons tiered past these fights deal enough damage to realistically not use the other means of hurting the monster and focus mainly on using your weapon. This main reason is why the game is intended to be online(3-4) players, and is why the handhelds are not as popular(in realistic comparison) to the consoles, and why we will most likely(as stated they do not plan to) get an English release. I base all this off my experience in playing each game, following all the news for the series, and their official post regarding not planning an English release.

Wow. Did you pull that out of thin air? Have you even played all the handhelds, and beat all the guild quests? Lao Shan(MF1/2, MFU) Ashen Lao Shan (MF1/2, MFU) Yama Tsukami (MFU) Fatalis (MF1/2,MFU) Crimson Fatalis (MF1/2, MFU) White Fatalis (MFU) Above are the online only monsters I was referring to(the 3+ to kill bosses). It's apparent you have not played the entire series, nor have you played to the end of the games. I am continually stating fact, backed up by evidence. If you wish to make further statements regarding the series, I am going to have to ask you to cite your reference for proof. Sidenote: My desktop died right after my previous post and for some reason rmxpu wont send me notifications when I follow threads, sorry for the late reply.

I totally understand. I have completed the map, and sent you a link via pm. Much more functional than before, I even added a bonus tile I made to make the stairs more 3D as well. Hope ya like it.

Hmm, ok well your best bet would be to either give me a copy of your game, or make a new game and copy over the map, and the tileset from the database. That way I can add the ship to the end and customize the flags without erasing yours, because if I don't have the flags you have already set there is no way to copy the ship setup over. Once you give me a game with your map and tileset(in database) it should only take me a few minutes to setup the flags, I already have the ship added to the bottom of the tileset.

It can't be made 3D with Photoshop unless you overlay two pictures. Here is an example of how your ship is supposed to look when walked on. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppdbsrrVPWU And here is an example I found of a giant ship. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zdyev8mQLEY&feature=related Your method of walking on the ship is an unnecessary work around, and loses you the ability to have 3D. I strongly suggest you take the 20 minutes to combine and resetup the tileset with the ship at the bottom. Sorry to bug, but I hate to see poor quality for no reason. EDIT: LOL @ the accidentally recorded audio, had the laptop muted so when I checked to see if I had recorded audio it was quiet.

Last time I'll reply hehe. I will combine the tilesets, setup all the flags, and remake the ship and dock scene for you if you would like. I estimate it would take me less than an hour.

Yeah, by doing that you lose the ability to fake 3D. I took a screenshot of your example to show you. Notice the player character is 'on top' of the box rather than behind it, this is what the layering effect in the tilesets section is for. If you combine the ship tileset, to whatever tileset you used for the water and walls, dock etc. then you can have a true 'fake' 3D effect, allowing the player to walk behind things, as well as taking out your need for the weird jolting port up the stairs and the jump onto the ship. Overall what you have now 'works' but trust me you would be far more happy with the results of a combined tileset, and a fully walkable and 3D ship.