Sega's crusade against Shining videos

If you've followed the blog for any amount of time you know I tend to ramble on, so I'll try to keep this short.

This video explains something I had heard about in 1 or 2 of the of the retsupurae podcasts. Something about Sega acting crazy and removing videos on YouTube that were even vaguely related to the Shining Force series. This video explains it in detail.

Although I recommend listening to the entire video embedded bellow, I'll provide a link to the part of the video where TotalBiscuit explains the situation seeing as the entire video is considerably long.

And since the video is rather long, here's a summary.

Sega Going Nuts

Months back, Sega began to systematically take down videos on YouTube that just mentioned Shining Force, even videos that didn't even feature ANY footage of the game. As long as Shining force was mentioned, it was taken down from YouTube.

Videos were flagged down so fast that it caused several channels to be taken down entirely. Sega isn't even responding about the situation at all.

I'm fairly sure false copyright claims is a crime and thus illegal, but I'm no lawyer and it may vary from country to country.

It's assumed it's someone that works at Sega, or at least someone in Japan. It's suspected that they're just removing all videos that mention Shining force just so they can manipulate the search results for those keywords.

Backstory (Optional read)

In my opinion, it's worth going to the beginning of the video and watch all of it. It talks about how Sega of Japan seems to hate it's non-Japanese fans.


There's a considerably big and devoted fanbase to Shining Force, these fans have sent emails, packages, and even petitions to the developers of the Shining games, to express either their love for the games, how they would love to have a translation to the 2 final episodes of Shining force 3, and asking them to make more games in the style of the older games.

Sega of Japan's response in particular was harshly cold, if a response was given at all. The current producer of the series actually went on twitter and posted a rude comment towards the person who organized the campaigns and sent the packages.

I'm really summarizing it though. If you're interested, watch the whole video.

My Opinion

As for the YouTube issue thing, it's been confirmed it's someone from Japan. I guess there's still the possibility it's not someone from Sega.

More than that though, it makes me think about how it's a miracle that YouTube even works. The "shoot first, ask questions later" policy is just terrible and unfair. Really makes me wonder how that site hasn't had more issues like this in the past or even functions at all. Also makes sense why most serious LPers use blip.tv or other hosting instead.

For me this is more about how badly YouTube's policy is than how crazy Sega might have become.

Sega really should issue some sort of statement about this mess though, but it may be too late as it is. This whole Shining story kinda makes them sound like massive dicks and everyone who has heard of it considers boycotting Sega to some degree.


I don't believe there was that much miscommunication between the new producer of the Shining series and the non-jap fans, I think at most he jumped to illogical conclusions or was butthurt that people liked the older games for whatever reasons. There's some fucked up ego thing going on there.

You know, any developer should be honored to have fans like that, and Sega of Japan basically spits in their face.

I'm starting to suspect Sega doesn't actually have a PR department at all.

DotA 2 thoughts and opinion

Yesterday I was gifted DotA 2, which confuses me because steam always said I already owned the game.

I dunno who the guy who gifted it to me is, so i dunno if it's someone I used to talk to. If we used to chat and if you're reading this, dude, I'm sorry I don't remember who you are.

Anyway, this gift made me think about a few things, the main thing was how much i dislike DotA, but also about how I used to spent tons of time in Warcraft 3 playing all the different maps.

My problem with DotA back then was how elitist the players were, and often really racist (not towards me, but it's still awkward). I just didn't want to associate with people like that.

Ok here's the thing, you control 1 guy. It couldn't be simpler especially compared to other Warcraft 3 maps. Where the "depth" came from, was from ambushing, getting last hits on shit and shopping. I always thought the shopping part was really, really annoying to get into, as in I just refuse to bother learning the best order to buy items. and the strategy is a fucking joke.

Another thing that bothered me was that bored DotA players would drop by Footmen Frenzy games and try to play it using only their heroes. And because they're used to a poor ass simple game, they just always lose. I mean, any average WC3 players would do way better than they would.

Here's why, in Footman Frenzy under your control you get heroes, towers, an army, a base and special units. To beat a player you have to destroy his base, and even if you're losing overall, you can win if you're smart. As I'm told, most DotA matches are decided in the first few kills.

I'm not saying simple games are bad, I'm just saying in DotA, it's fucking boring..

Magic 2013: The Broken Edition

I LOVE Magic the gathering, and had always been a fan of it. So when they started making PC versions of the game I was ecstatic because I could now play my favorite card game without having to spend so much money on "booster cards" or whatever else they decide to call it. This was pretty much Downloadable Content before it was popularized on the current gaming consoles

All card games are unbalanced in someway. While it may not be what the original creator had intended on doing people exploit or randomly find out problems in the games that just overturns the table... currently I am playing Magic 2013 when I have a few minutes of relax time, but I've already managed to find some exploits.

 

As you can see above. By playing the right cards you can increase your creature cards to an insane amount in one turn. This is most doable on the green decks since they have lots of creatures that have abilities to summon more creatures. There are some elements that are insanely unbalanced like the */* creatures. I mean look at that screenshot up close, one of those creates is a 52/52 power. Not only that those slime on the top right corner gets x/x boost for each land I have when they attack. That's just insane.

If you look at this one, you would think you are seeing the same thing. Except originally I was on the verge of losing. I had two creatures summoned, while my opponent had several creatures over me with flying (meaning my ground based ones could not block them it if they chose to attack. In addition the opponent just casted Rite of Replication and copied five of my Chancellor of the Spires. I was screwed. Then one card was drawn by me that changed the game around.

The clone card was the one luck/strategy I needed. I chose my Chancellor of the Spires.

The important thing about the CotS is the bottom portion. This broken trick can only be done by decks that have replication/cloning instant and sorcery.

Luckily for me, my opponent had just used this, and it pissed me off. While there is a kicker (pay mana for extra benefits) it is not necessary because of the infinite loop trick. Instead just choose the CotS and then select the Rite of Replication again. Repeat as desired.

While broken it is still pretty darn fun. There are plenty of whacked stuff in this game and I'll post them if I remember.

Froa-Bro

Tink from Disgaea 2 appears as one of several new collectable creatures in the sixth generation of Pokemon games.

TF2's Xmas crap and the adult swim cosmetic items

Adult swim sets

I have to admit, I got a kick out of the Brock Samson hair.

http://video.adultswim.com/presents/valve/

However, after the initial reaction, I started thinking about it and imagined how it'd look in a full game with 32 people. While it's more and more true that TF2's "vibe" has long been destroyed, and the game feels like a circus, this really feels like it's taking it way further.

"Smissmas!" update

Oh those fucking crates and Xmas items...

Skipping all the stupid cosmetic shit, here's what's announced:

• New MVM map announced
• New robot class: the engi bot
• New comic (link)
• 3 new weapons (that actually aren't dumb re-skins for once, i hope)

Update page here.

That's about it.

---

Had originally planned to post stuff I colored, but I got bummed out (December isn't a happy month for me) and sucked into Forsaken World again. I had 7 pics planned with Zach, but I've only finished 3, and been stuck on the 4th for a while.

In case you haven't heard, the humble bundle 7 is up

Most would argue this is worth it for binding of Isaac alone, and they're probably right. I personally never had interest in playing that game because of how it looks, I just can't get past it.

http://www.humblebundle.com/

Here's something I don't get though, I've heard the game is supposed to be hard. Yet, every time I see Zach playing it, he makes it all the way to the end. Actually, I've never even seen Zach die in binding of Isaac.

Might just be that Zach is just oddly good at the game though. I dunno...

I like the theme of this sale

http://www.gog.com/

But seriously, considering some of those.

Bro-Bots

C'mon, dog! You gotta pound it, cause when we're together, we're BAMFs!

"Duke Nukem 3D" and "Metro 2033" for free

Man, it's a wonderful age we live in.

Duke Nukem 3D: Atomic Edition

(Edit: Promo for this one ended, I only saw it on the very last moment it seems)

Being given away on GOG.com, To get it, you just need a GOG account, then go to the following link:

•  http://www.gog.com/gamecard/duke_nukem_3d_atomic_edition

And add it to your cart as you were purchasing a game, and checkout. It won't ask you to pay anything and I'll be added to you GOG account.

Like so:

Metro 2033

THQ is giving this one away on facebook.

It's even easier to get. Go to:

• FreeMetroGame.com

It'll send you to their Facebook page, all you got to do is like the page, and they'll give you a code.



Now, the page has instructions on how to get the game, but I skipped all of them, and started Steam immediately.

Go to the "games" menu and then "activate a product on steam...", paste the code there, and you're done.



Enjoy guys.

Forsaken World: Werewolves race

This is something we've known about for months on FW, the next update is going to introduce a new playable race, the Lycan. aka the werewolves.

Didn't expect this update so soon though, goes live tomorrow (December 12).


Now, similar to how WoW handled the Draenei, the Lycan were "sexy'd up". However, most are expecting this update to kinda suck, here's why:

This new race can only use 2 classes, and each is gender specific. If you're a male werewolf, you HAVE to be an assassin, and if you're a female, you HAVE to be a priestess. The complete lack of a new class to play is a disappointment, seeing as a lot of people have already played those classes to death.

Still, the wolf gals can look very cute...

As a pervert, I feel obligated to start a wolf priestess tomorrow.

Love beween gumps is an awkward thing

I don't particularly like game grumps, but i think it's cool Jon tweeted the URL to the audio of this and Arin re-tweeted it.

Chandelure

I'm sorta regretting shading this one. This is a good example of time not being very kind to me. When I first sketched it, I really liked it, but the passage of time has easily eroded that feeling away, and I can only see it being...not that great.

I think I'm some sort of artistic magician. The nuances of my drawings pull the wool over everyone's eyes as they get distracted by whimsy or whatever, but the more you look at it, the more obvious the flaws become. But it happens REALLY fast. Like, it might only take a few minutes to see the crap under all the glitter.

Oh well. It's Chandelure. The body is sort of cheating. Or at least, it feels that way to me.

Nidorina

This was practice coloring Zach's sketches straight off without doin line work. It was interesting, both easier and harder than I thought it would be.

I think Zach may have doodled her because, when I played through Fire Red recently, I started saying that Nidorinas were oddly adorable.

Doodles like this is why I wish I had a good idea for a game, so I could include characters like her in it.

Zubat

Now, imagine caves full of these things.

Despite being an admittedly pretty lousy Pokemon, due mostly to the fact it doesn't learn any decent moves until just before it evolves, I've always sorta liked Zubat.

Salty tears were shed

Posting this here for 4 reasons:

• This game looks awesome and fun.
• I'm a fan of Pat from 2 best friends play.
• This was some royal ass kicking.
• The last victory was even sweeter than the other ones.

I think Pat never won a "brawl" before. It's nice his first victory was a total cleanup.

Over Time with the Administrator and Miss Pauling

For better results, read the last panel a dozen or so times.

Steam Autumn Sale 2012

Posting this here because it's easy to not hear about it.

They got the "flash sales" thing going on again, so check every few hours.

Pro-tip: rather than opening steam to check the sales, open your web browser, it's way faster.

I'm actually hyped about this

I played the first game, and I gotta say, it was fun and had good gameplay.

It's not out for PC, nor do I know if they have a PC port planned, So I can only hope. Come to think of it, not even sure it's out for anything at all.

I like some of the choices for characters in this, but the vehicle design looks drastically more boring. Still, it's a minor detail.

Speaking of detail, the TF2 character voices are so off...

"King of Famicom"

I love sprite movies, retro games and KoF. So this is right up my alley.

Also megaman's special move is totally not what you'd expect it to be, but that just made it funnier.


Kinda hope that Jimmy sees this one, he hasn't been on aim since he moved.

What kind of Pokémon hack would you make?

I've been watching creepy pastas on YouTube, and there are a lot of pokemon ones. Sometimes if the creepy pasta is good, fans of it will make a romhack that acts just like the creepy pasta.

So after watching a dude talk about another pokemon creepy pasta on Youtube, in the related videos there was a tutorial on how to use basic rom hacking tools for pokemon games.

The tools looked decent and simple to use and it seems to cover everything which makes sense because pokemon games are really popular.




So I start thinking to myself:

"Well, I'm sure I could do a romhack if I wanted, and it'd be nice to have a project to work on. But... what would I make?"

That's always the problem isn't it? I've learned to use many tools to make games in the past, but the only reason I never made a game is always because I never had a good idea for it. Editing a game is different though, the core is all there, you can just tweak stuff around a little.

I've been asking around for ideas, mostly out of curiosity to see what kind of pokemon hack they would do. The question is:

What pokemon rom hack would you make assuming you had a team do it for you. In this scenario we assume you're just the brains of the operation and all you need to do is decide things. 

I think I'd like to do a romhack even if the idea isn't that great, just for the experience. So I'm open to ideas and suggestions.




When I asked Zach what he would do if he could make a romhack, his response was "I dunno". but then again, that's also his response to "What are you doing?" and "How do you feel?". He says "I dunno" a lot actually...

As for myself, I had this vague idea:

---

You would play as a trainer who was walking through a desert like area with his 6 pokemon, but there were all caught in a sandstorm. The trainer gets separated from his Pokémon in the storm, and when it passes, he starts looking for them.

Now there's 2 ways I imagined this going:

• The trainer is the one that fights. He goes through all the areas around the desert looking for his pokemon and beating up wild pokemon and humans alike. His pokemon team would basically just be himself.
• One of the pokemon finds the trainer right away (a Numel), and he sets to find the rest of his team with it.

The goal is simple, find your lost pokemon. That's it.

In either case, the lost pokemon could be just hiding and/or cornered by other pokemon, trapped somewhere, collapsed from hunger/fatigue or stolen by another trainer.

It would not be a long game, I imagine playing it wouldn't take more than 1 hour to beat. Probably not even 30 mins if you're replaying it.

Would probably disable capturing wild pokemon, but allow the player to get the lost pokemon in any order. Much like megaman, some orders could be easier than others.

---

Could be fun.

If you guys have comments or ideas I'd love to hear them.