Posts made by GearSecond

Hey, Baki, Was this your game? Or was your project completely different?

My first five or so choices have already been taken, but I'll go ahead and nominate Jewelry Bonney since nobody's done her yet.

It's hard to tell when I caught up. The anime and manga during Enies Lobby were neck-and-neck. It was after Water 7 but during Enies Lobby. It could be as early as Chapter 380, or as late as 420.

The timeframe is fuzzy. I started watching K-F in 2005. When I ran out of their episodes (they were midway through Skypiea, probably around episode 170) I joined up with them after lurking for some time. Then, looking for more One Piece, I ended up finding my way here… where I also lurked for some time, mostly downloading other subs I found. The I can probably narrow down the timeframe to "after Gear Second was animated" but "before Rob Lucci and Luffy fought, and before Gear Third was a thing". I'm pretty sure I can also recall some other fights being read before I watched them animated, including Franky's. And Zoro's three-headed move thing was new in the Manga at the time, too. That should narrow it down somewhat. If pressed to guess an exact chapter, I'd have to estimate 408, simply because I recall Franky's hair and Monster Chopper being very new at the time. Opening 6 came out shortly after I caught up… which really narrows it down.

Finally signed up for AP a couple months later when Gear Second was animated. Grabbed it as a name. Been active in the community since, although I usually take breaks and then binge these days. I haven't watched an anime episode in years; ever since Thriller Barque, I've exclusively read the manga. In fact, I still haven't seen the ending of Enies Lobby (Merry's Death, Garp, etc) in the anime. Probably won't until K-F catches up and I do a rewatch.

I'm not sure there's a simple solution to the problem, just because speed scans have always existed, and so have spoiler threads where early pictures and scripts are released. Personally, I think One Piece is good enough that spoilers won't ruin a chapter for me, because the art and the pacing is so critical to the enjoyment and most chapters don't have massive spoilers in them. There are, obviously, some big twists, but even then I question how bad any single spoiler can be. But I feel you: I hate spoilers, too, and would prefer to walk in unspoiled most of the time.

At the same time, I tend to binge One Piece. I go months with deprivation, then I read 30-50 chapters in one go. I manage to avoid most spoilers just fine and still participate in the community. I admit, the spoiler for this latest chapter is a doozy, but a big part of the problem rests on the shoulders of people who aren't being careful about marking their posts.

As far as solutions go, my favorite is to simply stop supporting speed scanners like Mangapanda. Having them speed scanned, hosted online, etc, simply perpetuates the spoilers faster and, in the past, has even led to false rumors being spread about the story due to rushed translations. I don't think this is a big problem anymore, but it once was. Instead, we can go back to supporting proper scans. There's a severe shortage of these since the speed scans have started being hosted on manga hosting sites. This is a big part of the issue: reading your manga on a reader contributes to the issue because they make money on ads by having the first scan up. Don't encourage this. Wait 2-3 days for the regular, downloaded scans to be available. And supporting these groups means there will be more of them. At present, there's only really one source for those right now and that's not okay.

Something everyone might be overlooking: Oda has only demonstrated the existence of a singular moon in the sky. It's entirely possible that the giant model is more of a geocentric solar system than proof of several moons.

@Bloel:

Yeah Sengoku was a legendary zoan type. Hito-Hito no mi Model:Daibatsu I think, which is something along the lines of 'super awesome massive golden buddha' fruit.

So that's what Oda meant when he said a Human who ate the Human fruit would gain "enlightenment".

@TräshCät:

well wouldn't that be like rain dinners? huge impressive casino/resort located within a desert … run by the boss of an underground criminal organisation ...

can't wait to see what dofla is planning! glad that we finally get to know him better. hihi

however I do have to admit that I'm not too fond of all the similarities with the alabasta arc. most of you probably find it nostalgic and great but I find it a bit uninspired. the scene with the cage would have been enough to get that nostalgic feeling.

I'm not finding it nostalgic, really. This hard has been a little less exciting than expected. The island's extreme conditions are more plot-related than inherent to the island. The villain's design is far more like a generic anime character. His power has been done before, kinda. It makes little sense how everyone got defeated by him so easily. He doesn't seem that powerful. I like the secret science lab stuff, but that doesn't seem to be the spotlight. I'm more excited to see where this goes in regards to Law and Doflamingo than anything else.

I hope you're joking. Fansubs and scanlations are NOT the sign of a healthy community. It just means its fanbase is full of free-loaders. Also, FUNimation is a professional company and I'm sure as hell they aren't letting a group of college students with some time on their hands do their shitty subs soley for "competition." It costs well over $100,000 to dub a single episode and the anime industry is shit right now due to piracy. As for Viz, they have every right to "not want competition." They bought the license to One Piece and therefore can do what Shueisha allows them to do, and getting rid of scanlations is one of those things. They ARE trying to support the community and they have shown it in many ways: doing the speed-up, releasing Color Walks, trying to get the manga as close to the weekly serialization as possible, etc. Also, I'm aware Viz's translations aren't perfect, but scanlations are generally worse and usually a mixed bag, full of typos and mistranslations everywhere. If you understand Japanese enough to the point that you can tell which translations are good and bad, then why are you reading any English versions (whether it be Viz or scanlations) at all?

That's simply not how piracy works. Funimation has said before that they won't be shutting down fansubs because they recognize how important groups like KF are to the community. It's not about them letting there be competition, it's about letting someone else be left alone when it doesn't actually affect them. There's an abundance of studies which have demonstrated that decreasing piracy will not lead to an increase in sales. The anime translation industry is built upon fans who got interested via fansubs. There were bootleg subtitled VHS tapes being released in America long before we had a halfway decent translation industry. And they primarily came about to capitalize on that. The anime industry has never been strong or a big part of media because they're paying the same price as other studios to translate and produce and yet they have a smaller market. Piracy is not "lost sales". Of course Viz doesn't want the competition, but the idea simply being that in a traditional capitalistic system you sell licenses and retain the rights to intellectual property. But it's time we rethink that and move beyond that. Piracy has never been theft. You're not removing the property of someone else. You're simply making a copy. They bought the license but, guess what, people are capable of producing a quality translation in a timely manner and that technically creates a system of competition. As has been demonstrated, Netflix reduces piracy. And yet the big media corporations are using licensing to choke them for creating a legal and profitable business. It's about control, not providing a high quality product. In that regard, the fans have a duty to release their version of a product with regards to creating a decent product for the fandom. As far as translation quality, Viz will always be better than speed scans. They have payed translators whose job it is to translate and they release on a delay. The goal of places like MangaStream has always been a fast release. But groups like NULL have provided a quality translation and while they've always been behind they've focused on accuracy. And at the end of the day they were releasing high quality releases you could download and keep. Between the two of them, they produced two products both better than Viz but in different ways. I admit I'm not reading the Japanese version to assess accuracy; my grasp of the language isn't that good. However it's not that hard to check multiple releases from Stephen's to NULL's to speed scans and Viz to get a good idea of how accurate they all are in relation to each other. And that's what's important: their relative accuracy and quality. And at the end of the day, it's rather nice to read something in your native tongue. It's the one thing a dub can do that no fansub can; let you sit back and enjoy the art.

You sound like a spoiled child. "Its wrong because I say so and I want it!"

I mean how dare those licensed legal retailers sell what you can steal for free!?

And there lies the rub. Licenses are about as bad as software patents at this point. Yes, they paid for the legal distribution rights for a certain area. But we have the internet. We have the most powerful tool mankind has ever built. We need to stop thinking like licenses are the end-all-be-all solution to releases. And we can't think of piracy as lost sales. See, you've made it pretty clear you didn't understand a word I said. The entire point being that the legal releases are killing the fandom. It's not about getting stuff for free. It's about the fact that I'd rather pay NULL for releases than Viz, regardless of who purchases the license. It's about them providing something for the fans instead of for profit. It makes no sense to say anyone who supports piracy as a consumer tool is a "spoiled child". Because you're basically saying that whoever has the money to purchase a license has a right to nickel-and-dime the fans just because they bought the license. And sure, traditionally that's true. But now the internet has given consumers a tool to fight back and demand a quality service. Stop thinking like it's 1955 and start thinking about the potential here to provide a quality and yet profitable service for the fans.

I think as long as the scans are leaked someone will translate them and put them online. I don't think there is anything to worry about there. I'm sure One Piece will be available online next week as it always is and people will forget this ever happened.

Who is currently releasing HQ English scans within a week of JUMP's release?

Good God man! Do you realize what you are saying?!

I would love to know how old everyone is who agrees with statements like these. I just want to gauge maturity levels, also finding out what these people do for a living would be nice. Because people like you GearSecond are no contributing zeros and just don't understand how the real world works.

I'm not saying buy VIZ or even like VIZ, i'm just saying those who truly believe in the above statement are as dumb as a sack of of door knobs.

Again, statements about immaturity and being a "spoiled child". Please think for a second what the potential of the internet and groups that make releases for the betterment of the community can do. Stop and reconsider that "the real world" is bound by certain rules that the internet simply doesn't abide by. We're more than capable of having scanlators provide a quality product that can compete with Viz. We're more than capable of translating it ourselves. The internet has given consumers a great tool and we want to shackle it to the limitations of the old world.

While there's absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to support legal One Piece (and I know for years, back when Viz was just starting out and 4Kids was responsible for the dub, we talked endlessly about being willing to support legal, high quality One Piece translations) I can't help but feel like we're losing our backbone as a community over this. Many scanlations and fansubs are the sign of a healthy community. I'm glad that KF has stuck around and Funimation has been very nice about having competition when it comes to subbing. As a result, I'm far more willing to buy their dub releases. Why? Because they respect our community, they don't issue takedowns, and they are putting out a product that I literally can't get anywhere else: a show with full English voice acting. Viz is a different matter: they don't want competition and their competition is providing the same basic product they are. The big difference is that Viz can bind volumes for traditional reading. As a community, we shouldn't be supporting Viz. If they can truly put out a better product they shouldn't need C&D orders to get sales via a monopoly. It's also time we as a society rethink the application of capitalism to ideas, but I digress; that is a topic for another day.

There's a distinct lack of scanlation and subbing groups compared to a few years ago. Traditionally there've been a handful of subbers/scanlators who rushed out the newest episodes, perhaps one or two that were a couple weeks behind but aimed for a good mix of speed and quality, and at least one major translator that was a couple years behind but aimed for the highest quality. One Piece's foreign community has been lucky to have this so far. It's been a real blessing to have an abundance of choice ranging from speed to quality. But now there's no major English HQ translators. Nor any English scanlators best I can tell. NULL was way behind and I could accept being 2-3 years behind waiting for their release, but now they've quit. There's still quite a few people subbing the anime, though they're all speed subs and the only real alternative is KF. For perspective, KF is on Enies Lobby and when I first joined these forums the Manga was in the same place.

This concerns me. It seems like the translators are dying out. The old-school translators have broken up for a myriad of reasons or they've gotten tired of all the work. They've been generous thus far; many of them have day jobs and do translations in their spare time. I can hardly blame them for shutting down a free service. But at the end of the day, they represent the community's health. In a way, we're stagnating. The posts on this site are all "General Discussion Thread, Part X" and there's few original threads discussing the series here. It wasn't always that way. Now all posts are categorized. Stuff like takedowns should have their own post, not be shoved at the backend of a Viz General Discussion. But more on point, we're losing scanlators and subbers and that's a concern. As fans of the manga, we're dead in the water without NULL and even though I hated their watermarks Binktopia/Mangastream were the only ones releasing in English that I can find. Our "where to find OP manga" thread is 2+ years old and there's been few updates. The scanlation section of the site may as well be for Italian releases only (props to them for keeping up releases, though) and this isn't a good position to be in.

However, the first action I'd recommend taking is to choose to not support Viz if they won't support the community. I have no doubt that they genuinely believe legal manga is the best thing for their communities. But it's really only what's best for them. It's neither what's best for the fans, the health of their community, nor the original author of the series. And as such, we shouldn't support their online releases at cost. Their translations are somewhat shoddy, the quality of image is only high because they have access to the original prints, and so long as the translation is decent and the images are high-res I think the community can put out a superior product. Supporting Viz after they issue takedowns sends them the message that hurting the community is profitable and thus best for them. That's not right. We as a community need to demand/provide downloaded, non-watermarked, HQ English scans. I for one won't give Viz any money unless I can have decent scans on my hard-drive. I won't buy any volumes of their manga that I don't have a satisfactory copy of on my computer and neither should anyone else. Instead, support Funimation. They care about the community. They let fansubs live on without hassling them. And in the end it's for the best of both the community and the series. Free, high quality translations has gained One Piece and other series more fans than any other distribution method. I've dumped hundreds into imported merchandise since getting into this series. And the last thing I want to see is the English-speaking community snuffed out because Viz bullied us into buying their sub-par product and shutting down any competition.

@flyingteapot:

It's actually really sad to see MS dropping those series. One Piece might have been getting some better translations and better quality scans thanks to the larger fanbase; but as for most of the series on that list, MS was the best option out there for their fans.

Are there any major HQ English groups out there at the moment? NULL is gone and they were always behind (with good reason) but it seems like MangaStream was the only English scan site out there doing releases (and they had watermarks). Even our release section contains primarily Italian releases.

Don't bother with online readers. The only one ever worth using shut itself down a couple years back. Even then, having the downloaded chapters is really nice. Use CDisplay to view them. If the filers are named properly, CDisplay with automatically do the hard stuff for you.

The real question is: anyone know of groups doing HQ English scans these days? For the new chapters, of course. Seems like NULL was the only one doing anything, and they quit while behind. The only halfway decent scans I've found are all watermarked and the translations leave a lot to be desired. Are there any active English groups anymore? I kind of dropped out of the community for awhile and Franky House seems to have shut down some time ago.

@TheRussian:

Honestly, if you're looking for volumes that have already been translated into english by Viz, you should just buy them..

Is it wrong to want a digital copy of the physical volumes? On top of that, some terms were changed, like Zoro's name. I know it's for legal purposes, but it's a "mistake" that bothers me. I own a couple volumes as it is, but the convenience of having an entire collection on my network is really nice. Shame that the community has decided it's impossible to download scanlations and then decide to purchase later. I know I wouldn't be all that interested in purchasing the manga if I hadn't read it all those years ago. And I started with scanlations. Now that NULL has taken down the first 19 volumes, getting into One Piece in America is costly unless you want to read low quality scans. In the long run, scanlations are going to bring Oda, Viz, and Funimation more money than a world without them. No western fans -> No purchases -> No merchandising. I've spent hundreds on One Piece POP figures, volumes, flags, you name it. Without HQ scans of the early volumes, I'd never have spent all of that.

Thinking that scanlations are lost sales is backwards thinking.

I pretty much agree with a lot of the posts which dislike the Tenryuubito, Spandam, and Akainu. I'm not sure if I can really blame the Tenryuubito. They're despicable people, sure. But they've been raised that way, and really don't know any better. They're also complete and total morons. I can't help but feel that even the founders of the World Government they are supposedly descended from would want to smack them for their idiocy.

Spandam is also incompetent, but he's well aware he's screwing over people's lives, not because he feels entitled, but because he wants to, and enjoys being in control and having power.

Akainu is just plain sadistic. Of all the Marines, he seems to be the closest to "Absolute Justice". He is just doing his job, but he obviously takes great pleasure in it, and enjoys watching other people suffer, especially emotionally.

Blackbeard has done some pretty crappy things too, but everything he's done is to further his master plan. I'm sure if offered an alternative, he probably wouldn't do most of the stuff he does, since it would no longer be necessary. He still killed a crew mate, which is absolutely unforgivable. Still, he's not as high on the list as the others, if only because aside from killing a crew mate, his actions aren't because he wants to do them, but because they are a means to an end.

@TräshCät:

oh god … why are most robin genderbends so scary~~~? :cwy:

Robin fans have always creeped me out with their fan art…even before this thread.

You've really had the ability to guess this since the existence of Reverse Mountain was revealed.

I'm willing to bet most of the crew's dreams will be met when (if?) they reach Raftel. Luffy's will technically be met on arrival, or at least as soon as he finds One Piece. Nami wants to make the entire world, and as far as we know she has both maps of all the islands they've visited as well as large portions of the Ocean Floor. She would need to get Raftel and the backside of Reverse Mountain (foreshadowing?) to achieve this goal. Sanji wants to find the All Blue, which may be the area surrounding Raftel and Reverse Mountain. Nico Robin wants to find the Rio Poneglyph, which is strongly hinted to be on Raftel as well. Of course Brook wants to see Laboon again, and it's entirely possible there is a secret river/canal/stream somewhere that serves as a passage back to the rest of the world.

So reaching Raftel is the real goal of most of the crew.

I enjoy Fairy Tail, but it does feel like a bit of a rip-off of One Piece. I haven't gotten very far, I stopped reading a couple volumes in (something about an island where the villagers became monsters or something) because that's where the translations ended and I kind of forgot about it. It's not as good as One Piece, but if you can stand the fact that most of it is a rip-off, then it's a somewhat enjoyable read. If you ask me, though, the characters are all drawn a bit too much alike, and I like the art style for the same reason I like One Piece's, but the characters can seem odd at times. Anything not ripped right out of One Piece, though, feels like it's taken straight out of a Fantasy RPG. Their guild leader looks like a Gnome in World of Warcraft. It fails at originality. Still, worth a try.

Naruto actually isn't such a terrible manga. Again, I've only read the start (up until they have their chunin exams) and I enjoyed it a lot more than the anime episodes I watched. Not my type of manga, but I can't say it's bad. Also worth a try. I've heard of some stuff later on that seems genuinely interesting. I have yet to hear anything good about it after the time-skip. So you should probably give it a shot, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend it, just because it has a lot of good and a lot of bad, and from some images I've seen later on, a good bit of ugly in there as well. Not as good or as consistent as One Piece, but you'll get some enjoyment out of it.

I find it hilarious that Brand New World currently has the most votes, considering it was pretty much universally despised when it first came out, and ended up having the shortest run.

Working my way through this game now.

I almost lost one character, but I took the Coward Door out (if you've been to this level you might know what I mean). I was pretty sure he was about to keel over, and I ended up in a circle back to the beginning of the room. Figuring my choice was between killing him off or trying again later, I went ahead and took him out of there. I don't think any game has made me feel more disappointed in myself for letting something like this happen.

Just grab Microsoft Security Essentials. It's free, doesn't slow down your computer, and does a good job.

AVG and Avast! will both give you trial versions, and neither of them are particularly good at running in the background. They're easier to deal with than Norton, which will slow your computer to a crawl, but they certainly have a way of making their presence known.

At no point do I expect that this movie will in any way, shape, or form, be something fans of Sherlock Holmes will enjoy as an adaptation.

It does, however, look like an entertaining film, just not one which will make you think too much. Definitely have to see this.

@Buuhan1:

Well I like the aspect of being able to grand theft anything, hense the title. But I hear IV don't have as much as previous games. I've seen that you can hijack airplanes and other air vehicles in the older games but now IV.

On one hand, it does have some crazy stuff the others don't, and I know a lot of people were disappointed by the lack of character creation. But the truth is that the game feels much more personal, more realistic, and it's no less fun. If you're really aching to jump out of aircraft, The Ballad of Gay Tony has that in spades.

It's still GTA, just with better writing, and a little more realism. If losing the ability to pilot planes means that you don't want to even play the game, then perhaps it's not for you. Try Microsoft Plane Simulator. Or something. Just try Saints Row I guess. But it's definitely worth it.

Here's an odd question maybe someone can answer:

I picked up some apple cider, the unpasteurized, literally freshly squeezed from some apples a couple weeks back. Is there any chance of this fermenting into hard cider, and if so, at what point would it become alcoholic? I'd like to know before I let the kids in the family have a drink of it. Going by Google, it's already become carbonated, but from there I can't find anything but guides on how to make it ferment.

And yet…the fact that the moderators aren't ego tripping and banning everyone for any reason makes these boards...you know...enjoyable.

If you'd like we can go back to Griffin's Place. Everyone remember that? It was so much fun, and clearly evidence that we need more strict rules around here.

@IrishLuigi:

@ AL - My dad says you probably photoshopped 'em.

That's how awesome your speeds are. It's unbelievable.

He said it was work.

Not surprising, considering that most companies would want excellent internet. Especially if it's a large building, I'm sure someone talked them into getting some sort of ultra-line "guaranteed" to "always be up" and "increase productivity".

I suppose you didn't specify it has to be a home line, but considering it's a work like, it has an advantage.

Good luck using it for anything at work. I can't think of anything that would take up that much bandwidth that you can use there.

Well, according to my girlfriend…

Oh, you mean internet speed.

/thread

A skeleton musician is pretty cool.

A perverted skeleton musician…WITH AN AFRO! Now that's EPIC WIN right now.

And uh...Miss Goldenweek didn't exactly leave an impression like other Baroque Works members.

Heya Help Forum, perhaps you guys have an easy answer.

I'm working on a website right now and am trying to get it to where you only need to load the index and from there the content can be loaded from elsewhere, or at the very least hidden until needed.

I've seen it done before, and I believe it can be done using Ajax, and I also have Dreamweaver so using Spry isn't out of the question(actually that may be preferred) and I'm trying to avoid PHP.

Has anyone seen this content swapping done and knows a (relatively) simple way to do it?

If you installed it then it's now part of your Operating System.

Also, I don't know why you "only installed it for Windows Movie Maker". SP2 is the best Service Pack. It improves on SP1 and SP3 gives some people issues, and it's really just a collection of security updates. Worth having.

Windows Movie Maker, though, is a horrendous program that will eat system resources and crash every 5 minutes. Get a decent video editing program.

Now, if you've just downloaded it but haven't installed SP2, then it will be wherever you designate files to download, probably your desktop.

Edit: In case you're confused and still want to know where the service pack files go, that answer is: Everywhere. Your entire operating system has been updated. There isn't a separate folder for them, they update, replace, and delete older files, and once it's installed, it's not getting uninstalled. What, exactly, do you plan to do with it, or did, when you thought it was a folder?

I got this on the 360, as I do most multi-platform games. Thus far, I've found it more enjoyable to play a game while tracking my Xbox Live friends, and while getting achievements. Though it doesn't apply here, taking games online is easy enough as well, and the controller works better for me with most games. Just in my experience, a PS3 game needs to be an exclusive to really take advantage of the console. MGS4 and LittleBigPlanet are a couple of my favorite games, especially MGS4, and they go beyond what you can do on the 360.

ahem Xbox Loving aside, I'm enjoying this game, and I've finally gotten used to the controls for the most part. I'm glad the vehicle controls are usable, I'm really tired of developers adding insanely complicated controls to vehicles, especially helicoptors. The boss fights also get really intense. On one hand, they're challenging, on the other hand, I can expect to die several times due to either having no clue what I'm supposed to do, because I get unlucky, or just because the fight has some weird part of it I haven't grasped yet. One boss has what ends up being a one shot kill in most cases, and it's actually hard to avoid the gas if you aren't already at a distance.

So I could say I'm enjoying it, but the graphics are horrible. Sure, you don't need good graphics to make a good game, I just want them to look…current gen, not like something on a PS2. Especially when there's such little variety in buildings and enemies, a little eye candy wouldn't hurt.

Does anyone know a place to get some information, like upcoming episode dates, etc?

Yes, I tried google, but unfortunately all their listings consist of "Haruhi Season 2? Still no release date, just a re-airing in April".

From what I've heard, by the time they got close, something always came out that they wanted which, of course, required work to restart.

Whether or not it was the graphics engine each time or if they just thought "well, we already have to restart, may as well use a newer engine too" I don't know, but it shouldn't have taken so long.

@Mokenda_mint:

True, but one doesn't have to sell through Deviantart. Someone can always go through a different online store service, such an cafepress and just advertise the product on DA.

The product selection/image sizing is infinately better too

True, but I'd assume most people buying art on deviantart just see something cool that they can afford, so they buy it if it's available. I doubt these people will go through the trouble of tracking down a link to cafepress on the person's main page just for that, when other people have a big button on the side(that's red if I remember correctly).

In short: Don't give them a cent, downlaod firefox/NoScript, and enjoy the free image hosting/publicity.

Garp gets some cool points for being all around awesome and being related to Luffy.

But Lucci wins in sheer style points.

@captain:

could you be stupid and not know it?

Only people who are stupid and wise will understand they lack intelligence.

More on subject, I'm pretty sure I have some family that lived in Canada…I'll have to look into this.

Eraser Tool?

Just mask the layer. You achieve the same effect and it's non destructive.

While I agree that most sequels end up being worse, I can think of many times, especially with games, where the sequels managed to improve. If Ubisoft can put effort into this game, and add content on top of an already perfect sanbox, then I don't see it won't be better.

Stealth based games, in particular, have a track record of being better than their predecessors. See both the Sly Cooper series and Metal Gear Solid as an example.

There's tons of jaggies in that image, and you can't really "clean" them up.

I'll do a quick clean tomorrow when I have time. It's already 1:30 AM here, and I need to get some sleep.

As someone who didn't mind the repetitiveness of the first game, this looks absolutely incredible. It's like they've taken the amazing engine of the last game, and are filling it with tons of content.

If the promises hold up(something I'm skeptical about) then this will certainly be a great game, and they aren't giving naysayers of the first any reason to avoid it.

@brennen.exe:

Such as? Note that Greg appears to be using the Magic Wand, which selects pixels with the same color range. That is not the same as using the polygonal lasso tool, which selects what you outline specifically.

Such as the technique I outlined above.

Selecting an entire color range on the entire image is much easier and faster than both the magic wand and polygonal lasso. It's like the Magic Wand on steroids, and it leaves less jaggies.

I don't know what kind of images you're editing, but I've done some pretty high res stuff, and correctly using the lasso on all of it could possibly take hours once I'm done.

The Polygonal Lasso is, frankly, a waste of time, especially when there are better, faster alternatives that don't require you to go around the entire image by hand, which was the entire point of this thread in the first place.

Actually, if you want to sell anything, you need to subscribe.

There's also some premium areas, and supposedy a place to put it up to be "critiqued" but that seems rather pointless, considering that the comments below the image will work just fine.

Stick to the free account, unless you have a strong base of "fans" already watching you and willing to buy your artwork, the subscription isn't really worth it.

Here's something you can try, although you have to be careful, since his hat is pink too, though luckily it's a different shade.

First, crop the image down as much as possible. Literally, as close to Chopper as you can get.

Go to Select, Color Range, and select the pink background with the eyedropper tool. Mess with the "fuzziness" bar until it seems most of the pink is selected but not Chopper's hat. Hit Accept. Now most of the pink(aside from probably the dark pinks/purples) should be selected, but NOT CHOPPER'S HAT. Go to Select, Inverse. Now everything that wasn't previously selected will be selected. You can try using the magic wand and alt-clicking on the darker area to remove them from the selection, but if not, I'll present an alternative later.

Now go down to the bottom of the Layers panel, and hit the Mask button. Everything not selected should be automatically masked. If you DID NOT de-select the darker areas earlier, be sure you're on the Mask portion of the Layer(shown to the right of the Layer itself) and use a black brush to mask them. If you can't seem to do this without creating a bunch of "jaggies" then use the pen tool, set it to pathing, and draw around the areas. hit Ctrl+Enter and it will become a select, then just Fill it with black.

Everything but Chopper will be masked. Leaving a White or Transperant background.

Seems like a lot of instructions, but once you get the process down, it's a quick way to do things, though it works better when you already have a white background. Yes, some hand cleanup is involved, but most of the work is handles automatically. Oddly enough, simply magic wanding to do the same thing will result in a more jagged look, and I have no clue as to why it works differently. Perhaps using the Color Range tool creates more accurate, smoother selections?

Give it a shot.

Any news, Franky?

The Vet is probably the best place for him, until you figure out what's wrong. While it does seem odd for him to be "suddenly unhealthy", it's not as if animals don't do that, going from healthy to deathly ill in a matter of hours.

Best of Luck.

You're asking for episodes unreleased on DVDs to be handed to you, immediately, in a terrible format. You've turned down all the help that has been offered, and act like we're at fault here. There is nothing anyone here can do to get those episodes put on a home media format any faster, and even if they were released, we aren't going to rip them and convert them into the file type you demand.

Instead you can wait for the DVD, download fansubs of those episodes, or try looking for clips on Youtube.

Nobody is going to help someone who is demanding, and then ungrateful when people try to help. If you can't wait for a DVD, then that's sad.

I'm probably going to rehash what's already been said.

You need to pick what your site exists to do, what is the purpose. Then you need to find a way to deliver that in a way other sites don't (generally) offer. This is a little harder to do when it's just a fan site, though, and not some form of service. It also means that it's easier, since you don't need to try any fancy or experimental coding to get something to work. You also need to pick a theme, and get an idea of what it will look like, and how the page/navigation will flow.

Now, you need to buy the domain and find hosting.

From there, I'd go with Dreamweaver. If you have Photoshop available, then Dreamweaver shouldn't be too far away. The code isn't as clunky as it once was, although you'll encounter an issue from time to time, it's not usually to picky. It has tools for basic JavaScript and PHP, as well as an easy to use CSS system, but most of that is for dynamic sites, and a fan site will only need static pages.

From there it's a matter of investing the time to make a complete site, make sure it's not a total eyesore, and then uploading the files and folders to your server.

Yes, it sounds simple. But creating a simple site still can take weeks, especially if you plan on checking all your spelling/information/links. If it is a fansite, then making it complete and correct is a high priority.

Now, if you want forums, you're probably not going to be coding them yourselves. I don't like BB's Forums, at least their basic form. The software requires a lot of configuration to turn into something refined, but at least everything is set up for you, and you can cut it down as needed. Getting the forusm active is another issue, and once they are active, keeping them moderated is an even tougher task, and you'll probably need to pick some people you can trust to do it while you're not there.

That's basically all the advice I can give, but if you can come back with a basic "prototype" of it in a few weeks, I and some others here would be glad to comment about it, and help you out.

Just…too...Awesome!

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Photoshop would be frame by frame.

After Effects may have a more elegant solution, possibly involving photoshop. But After Effects isn't an easy program to work with.

If you haven't had much experience with either program, you're kind of screwed.

Traditionally, how "good" an RTS game is would be based off how well it's multiplayer goes.

It's entirely possible, even if the demo was repetitive, that singeplayer was not, and I doubt that a match between 2 or more actual players and not AI would be more interesting and varied. The single player aspect of any game, especially RTS, can only keep someone entertained for so long before the matches must be done against someone who can make intelligent decisions.

@Green_vs_Red:

PC fanboys not liking an RTS game

What The Fucking?

PC fanboys hate anything done with a controller. Especially if it's something they consider "better" on the computer. You'll see tons of arguments like "I can instantly move the reticule wherever I want with a Mouse, but I have to slowly push it to the other side of the screen with a controller". Halo was really one of the first games with a simple, intuitive control scheme that could be used on a controller.

Making a Halo RTS like this is pretty daring, and if it doesn't suck, I'll be impressed. If it manages to pull off the controls and be an amazing console RTS, then it's certainly worthy of the Halo name.