s_d

I love the idea of a sarien.net meetup :-D
 
You could even make it a collaborative, multiplayer playthrough of SQ1 since that game is completely available. It could be crazy hectic and chaotic, but a lot of fun and definitely something that could be recorded for posterity.

HOLYSHIT!!! .. They put this on the front page of their Kickstarter page right underneath their pitch video.. words cannot describe how honored this self taught artist from small town WI feels at this moment.. SO COOL!! Now it needs to happen .. just so I can say .. in the smallest way possible I helped out and was involved.

You know, I was thinking about this HTML5 thing the other day. It reminds me a bit about the late 80s/early 90s with Sierra.
 
What made Sierra's games great (apart from the actual quality of the stories, the graphics, the gameplay, etc.) was that they were pushing the boundaries of the systems they coded. The graphics they managed to get out of SQ1 and SQ2 were truly remarkable given the quality of monitors and the processing power of the machines at that time.
 
People say that HTML5 is limiting, cannot do this, cannot do that. But I wonder whether people have a) lost that pioneering spirit and B) forgotten the point of coding.
 
In the late 90s we, for the first time, had hardware that outpaced software. Rather than trying to tidy things up and make it efficient on machines, coders just got something that "worked" and slapped it into the games. No need to save space when you're writing 30MB games on a disk that holds 700MB. No need to optimise code when it will run on a 500MHz machine and a large section of the target audience has 1.2GHz processors. No need to optimise memory usage if the game is using 500MB of RAM when most machines hold 2GB.
 
Games companies had to make games quickly and get them to market without really sitting down and making the machine do something beyond the ordinary. Current games makers aren't constrained by their hardware (at least not to the same extent) and the limits of games really are the imaginations of the conglomerates which fund them.
 
I have no doubt that with a pioneering spirit (which we know the games makers of the 80s had), they can do some wonderful things with HTML5, pushing it places even the designers didn't know it could go to. Assuming, of course, that they use it.

Yes, I did!
 
If you'd like, be sure to check out the link mentioned in the last one, http://www.sierra-ar...es.com/tgakick/, to download the flyer and go nuts with it.

Tawmis Vohaul discusses Stretch Goals

Sure I will try to get that done by the end of the day :-)

Well, we also have Troels's other idea, which is put the files on Bandcamp as lossless and host MP3 on site.
 
Now, I mentioned having an alternative, I may have a benefactor providing lossless hosting of my music. So we shall see. I will let you all know.
 
As for audio discussion, s_d, i agree with what you say about the HA forums, to a point. Still, it's the standard until a better place is found ;)
 
I also agree abot LAME vs aoTuv, i used Aoyumi (sp?)'s Ogg builds for years. The problem I had was that visitors of my website weren't getting the Ogg benefit, they were transcoding them, or asking questions like "I can use WinAmp or foobar, but how do I get it to work on my iPod?". So I decided LAME was probably non ABX-able in 99.9% of situations for most end users (note: *most*), especially given it's video game music casually listened to by again, *most* fans.
 
You're right , HA forums and most tests, including ABX, do not take into ccount what sound card/speakers/headphones you are using. That is a very valid point. But we're getting way beyond the scope of the thread ;) If anything, most fans are not using high quality cans I would imagine. But I have a feeling FLAC will be able to happen one way or another.

No worries FroggyMe6581!
 

Don't touch \ \ | V
 
 

And...split!

Thanks again, s_d! I just updated the front page with the new version.
 
Jess

Folks; my wife & I have been thinking about this for about three weeks now, but backer Maya commented, in the aftermath of funding, that we ought to put together a celebratory fan art collage. I agree, at least to celebrate the difficult journey that project had in getting funded, if for no other reason (like a tribute or something).
 
I have no idea how or in what way it will come together, but I made this topic to spark discussion. This will be fun, I think!
 
So... SpaceVenture Kickstarter community... what do you think?
 
Should we do something like this?
 
What form should it take? Physical, digital, etc? Video? Something else?

 
Incomplete list:
 
Videos:
 
nextheory:
http://www.youtu.be/D8SrJhYTJOQ Nelson Miguel:http://youtu.be/4wvKc8n0-aY Warbirdgames:http://youtu.be/j4qMKZzLebM Don C.:http://youtu.be/2whYTeEeD_s Tawmis Vohaul:http://www.youtube.com/user/tawmisvohaul/videos Jason Ferron (SkyeFyre): http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL5040A73185222ACF http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9DbuYU8e-ro Numerous "Nyan Cat" videos and "It's a Wonderful SpaceVenture" which I'll summarize and add later. 
Images:
 
Aging Still:
http://25.med...yqkzlo1_500.jpg Maya:http://bentkey.net/post/24784386159 David "Ohverture" Alexandrou:http://fav.me/d52dcmh Guybrush20X6: http://lvl30psy.thec....com/comics/12/ http://lvl30psy.thec....com/comics/13/ Jason Ferron (SkyeFyre):http://bluscreen.zxq...php?current=208 Happy Cock Head:http://i48.tinypic.com/drf29t.jpg Jared87:http://i2.pho...htAndromeda.png Brandon Klassen:http://www.sierra-ar...es.com/tgakick/ FroggyMe6581: https://p.twimg.com/...A-d_y.jpg:large https://p.twimg.com/...EMbbf.jpg:large Decaffeinated Jedi (the entire LOLBlatz thread!)http://www.spaceques...-the-interwebs/ nextheory:http://nextheory.com...oom_640_001.jpg Monolith_Pig:http://www.spacequest.net/index.php?app=core&module=attach&section=attach&attach_rel_module=post&attach_id=140 Poetry: 
David "Ohverture" Alexandrou, 2012-06-11:
 
Ode To 218K
-----------------
The Spaceventure got underway
And stalled around 218K
But you increased pledging power
While I was in the shower
And funded this bastard TODAY!
 
There are also haiku and my terrible limerick (which had one malformed non-rhyming stanza). If anyone else has, knows-of/remembers, or wants to author some more, that would be awesome, too. These could be read aloud to be dubbed over imagery by a KS backer with a golden voice (as yet to be found)... I (or Mrs. S.D.) could probably do it reasonably well. If we have trained voice actors amongst our KS backers, that would be much better.
 
Games:
PledgeQuest & The Mysterious Cartridge: http://www.spaceques...e-spaceventure/ Music: So, I'm not sure here... there is lots of music from before the Kickstarter associated with the fan games. However, as far as fan music authored for the KS project, I only know of the as-yet-forthcoming "Ballad to 218K" that Ohverture is composing right now.

PCJ and I were talking on #sq a moment ago. Maybe we could come to a sort of compromise?
 
PCJ raised the very pertinent point: "Why would we host FLAC's if no one is downloading them?" And the obvious response is, well, we won't know if anyone's downloading them until we offer them.
 
Offering all the variants of SQ soundtracks as lossless FLAC's, however, is quite the investment.
 
So the compromise we thought of was: How about we offer Spikey's "special edition" soundtracks as FLAC + MP3 on the site, and all the other soundtracks as high quality MP3's, then see how many spring for the lossless downloads? If it turns out to be a straight up bum's rush, we could spring for the extra storage and offer everything as lossless.

Thanks, man! Don't worry. I would never, on principle, deprive anyone of a superior alternative, just because I can't get in on the fun.
 
I think we just need definite confirmation that we actually have the space on SQN to host FLAC's. (Frans said we had tons of space, but I don't think he quite realizes how much music we're talking. Fred and SquallStrife already mentioned the Tandy "alternate" soundtracks of SQ1 and SQ2.) If we don't have the space, that kinda renders this whole conversation moot. Unless someone else can host the FLAC's.

Oh, man, I love it when HA is claimed to have come to a consensus on anything :) I suspect that a deeper dive into the forums will reveal a less clear picture.
 
Don't get me wrong, I love the community there at Hydrogen (and have participated at times), but any in-depth discussion on the merits of individual codecs is incomplete without mentioning the fact that the resulting artifacts are as much a factor of the source material (usually genre & original mastering) as they are a factor of codec/bitrate choices. As well one must discuss the equipment one is using to listen to their music; for example, Troels' old warhorse iPod and probably earbuds will mask a lot of inherent shortcomings in playback. I, on the other hand, worked in the pro-audio gear industry some years ago, and ended up with really nice cans and good playback equipment. My ABX tests reflect a clear dominance of codecs (which is also why I'm so passionate about my personal choices; anything else annoys the living shit out of me). Also Nyquist-Shannon must be brought up at some point ;)
 
Personally, I've not been at all impressed with the progress of MP3 (specifically LAME) in the past four years or so (only one significant psychoacoustic model tweak/improvement, really... mostly bugfixes otherwise), as opposed to Vorbis which has had significant improvement (Aoyumi's wonderful AoTuV work, surround support, etc). Anyway, that's neither here nor there.
 

No such proof will ever be forthcoming (either way). Millions have their ears trained to the artifacts they expect, making audio fidelity a highly subjective exercise. I recall a study, some years ago, in which a statistically significant (low p-value) body of early 20-somethings preferred MP3 to uncompressed in ABX :)
 
What does one make of that?
 

Lossless is lossless. How good it is is only a factor of encoding size. I've read that Apple lossless is actually smaller in niche cases... but man, talk about obscure niche of obscure niche. Stick to FLAC.
 

OK, I feel better about that. But what of Ogg originals, as in Tom's case? (assuming he's even interested in participating here)
 
That being said (and all of the above)... I'm sticking to my above suggestion that originals be the focus here. I do understand the convenience of providing MP3s for casual listening, but it is worth an investigation into which demographic it is that the music archive here is going to serve. Other than other musicians (whom almost certainly will clamor for FLAC), I mainly see fan game authors gracing the forums here, and I suspect they'd want the flexibility to transcode as necessary for their game. I am most certainly not lobbying for Vorbis files (while I'd be overjoyed to see this, I am also a realist).
 

Sounds droolworthy!!
 

I hope our small community can find a way to achieve that for you, and the other wonderful musicians here. I love what I can do in sampling, mixing & slicing & dicing, and playing around with really high-quality FLAC masters. Not that I would ever inflict my creations upon anyone, but it's certainly a fun hobby. Maybe I'll inflict them on my kid. She's still at an age in which I can do no wrong, so I might as well take advantage of that for a short-term ego-boost...
 

Erm... what? I missed the Codec Crusade/Holy War thread?
 
/me takes his ball & red wagon and heads home

Spikey, I did not lobby for native Ogg Vorbis versions alongside the originals. I merely mentioned that it is a bandwagon I'm still fully on-board with. Also, please do not suggest transcoding between lossy formats as any kind of real solution. It compounds artifacts of both formats (even MP3 to MP3 far from perfect). To make a blanket statement that transcoding is costless ignores all sorts of details (reductio ad absurdum here would suggest that encoding a 320Kbps VBR file to 64Kbps CBR loses no noticeable quality as well).
 
My simple statement was... keep the originals. The only reason for mentioning JWPlayer at all was that pcj seemed interested in the music archive at SQN having the capability to play the stored files via a web-based player, and, as a result of preserving/mirroring originals, since Tom's music archive are Ogg Vorbis files, then they could be played via the browser player just the same.
 
I agree that downsampled versions can easily be transcoded. That's why I'm suggesting that the originals be kept (FLAC, Tom's Oggs, and whatever is in MP3 only). If anyone sees fit to have lossy versions transcoded from the originals, that's where I suggested 128Kbps-ish VBR MP3 files (though IMHO, this is unnecessary). Further, any originals that are not FLAC would have to be transcoded from lossy to FLAC to provide "FLAC and MP3" which is equally ludicrous as the (admittedly contrived) severe downsample scenario I mentioned above.
 
Hence my three-word pitch would be...
 
Originals and MP3

Back (sort of) on topic from the above foray into begging for a World O' Fan Wonders thread for the Troels Pleimert Memorial SQ Fan Content Library... shall we also have a thread (or list) of fan games that are in-development?

Thanks for the musical assistance, guys!
 
At long last, I can finally say with confidence that we have reached the beta-testing stage!
 
As much as I'd love to release this game right now, I don't want to really want to release a bug- and mistake-ridden product either. So if you're up to it, play the game and see if there are any mistakes I might have overlooked:
 
Pledge Quest (beta version)
 
(And just so it doesn't seem like I'm ignoring anyone, your podcast theme felt perfect for the end credits, MI. As for the intro, I found a good match in a really unlikely place: a collection of old MIDIs that Trapezoid posted to the AGS forums a year or so ago. The rest of the music in the game is unused music from SQ6 [that may have been used in the demo].)

Come on now. Most of the people who are the least bit interested in having an alternate format are coming from the viewpoint that one is inferior to the other. That's the whole reason they ask for alternate formats. You can't just transcode from one to the other without getting into the very issue they're trying to avoid in the first place; quality loss. Further quality loss, at that.
 

I don't believe it's the future, I believe it's now. Or at least it should be and we should be pushing it as much as possible. Technology has a tendency to stagnate because of personal familiarity and bias. Why is MP3 still the most used format? Because everybody knows what it is. They're used to it, all of their peripherals use it and so they stick to it like glue. Technology caters to this and so we've not moved beyond MP3 for the past 10+ years. Personally, I believe we're never going to start heading into lossless format anytime soon as long as we keep giving MP3 (and even OGG) attention it doesn't deserve anymore. Our storage spaces are immensely superior to what they used to be. We're with the same lousy format we've had since the late 90s. This is partially the reason why I don't have an iPod because I don't want to support technology that doesn't support lossless. My Sony Walkman, though inferior in features, allows the playback of WAV files. I made a conscious decision to avoid non-lossless compatible devices. Sure, very few others are going to do this, but the way I look at it we can't just go with the flow or we'll never get anywhere.
 
If lossless is what we're aspiring to as a new audio standard then we need to start pushing it yesterday. We've already gone too far with MP3. I know, I'm a little dogmatic about this. Put simply, I'm not interested in what the masses want or are used to so much as the continued improvement of my field of industry. And we've gone backwards since the CD and we haven't bounced back yet. This bothers me. We should be bettering ourselves and what we use, not moving backwards. Regardless of whether most people hear the differences or even care about it, we need to keep improving it and pushing for advancements. The only way to do that is to push these formats. If people really want MP3s so badly and don't care about quality then THEY should be the ones transcoding, not the ones that do care of quality and will lose exactly that if they are forced to transcode themselves.
 
Of course, there's the size and bandwidth standpoints, which I've already agreed with. We can only do what we are able to do. I don't know about everybody else, but the MP3s I get out of LAME are still larger than OGGs at the same bitrate regardless of quality comparison. I still to this day can hear the differences between high-bitrate lossy and lossless formats. It bothers me every day that we haven't moved beyond this. There are a myriad of issues I could go into why this affects an artist's ability to compose and be creative that I won't go into. Suffice to say, we'll never get anywhere unless we advance ourselves. And that's true today more than ever. It's a different world now. The indie scenes, home studios, film makers, game developers, people with their own websites, etc affect the popular demand more than the industries did of old. Before we had to follow what the record companies gave us and what technology presented us with. And that was all physical media. Nowadays, everything is digital and virtual. We create our own levels of quality now. The industries follow us. We should be setting the standard instead of remaining complacent.
 
That's my spiel for the day lol.

Tawmis Vohaul discusses Stretch Goals

It's too soon to go into much detail, but I have a feeling we'll see Pledge Quest's Bea back in action sooner or later.
 
Jess

So... you're saying you've a nice unfinished IF adventure to share with us? ;)

Chris, I'd settle for a podcast or video, or another commissioned comic, honestly (I really loved those, actually). I'd actually be really happy to see another commissioned comic if you can swing it, and if it doesn't hurt the budget...
 
At least to tide me over until LCA5 :)

Chris, I'd settle for a podcast or video, or another commissioned comic, honestly (I really loved those, actually). I'd actually be really happy to see another commissioned comic if you can swing it, and if it doesn't hurt the budget...
 
At least to tide me over until LCA5 :)

Waiting for the next Living Concept Art, that is. Mark's tweeted about the cool new animations, Scott's said that they're working on it and it's coming soon.... I dunno, I was expecting it to be out by now. I'm half antsy because I want to play it (of course) but half because I think it would seriously help any PayPal donations and get us some of those sweet stretch goals.
 
At the same time I realise the last few days of the campaign were completely nuts so it makes sense for it to be late and I don't want them to rush it if it isn't what they want to release... GAH! YOU ARE TEARIN' ME APART MARK AN SCOTT!
 
Actually, I think it's the whole campaign has got me over excited. I'm so nostalgic over Space Quest. Every KS that came along I was thinking "Oh, yeah, it's okay. But wouldn't it be awesome if there was a SPACE QUEST Kickstarter?" I literally haven't been this excited over anything since Christmases when I was ten and under. It's MADNESS.
 
Anyway, I am reeeeally looking forward to LCA5. Erm, which I guess isn't a big revelation...

I'd like to politely add another voice requesting FLAC audio files. Anyone can very easily transcode FLAC to MP3 (yes, they have to at least understand what that means, or possibly ask for help) but it's not possible to add lost information. Yes, there are number of reasons why that's meaningless, but if there was ever a reason to wish to preserve audio archivally, we currently have no better way than a highly-compressed lossless format. Of those, FLAC clearly leads.
 
If Frans has sufficient space, or such space becomes affordable, then I see little reason not to host low-bitrate MP3's alongside them (128kbps seem to make all the MP3 people happy). Regarding Tom's music archive... well, I'm still on the Ogg Vorbis bandwagon, and as such, I think it would be better to at least mirror his original files (again, for the best archival quality) and transcoded 128kbps MP3's alongside them. So, original format plus small MP3 files would be ideal. There is really never any reason for high-bitrate MP3 files, in my opinion. Also, IIRC, JWplayer supports Vorbis now, as well.
 
If there is insufficient space, then perhaps you should consider putting a PayPal button to Frans's account on the front page somewhere so that the community can contribute to making that possible.