Community commentary - Act II

[RyokoTK]

I love how all of the proposed scenarios and mods are feeble attention-grabbing efforts with impossible goals and nobody benefiting from them.

Discuss.

[interion]

[goran]

They do not want to play the mapping game. The best marathon game of them all!

[RyokoTK]

(.gif)

This is fascinating. However, the switch in position from pseudo-suplex to kneeling in the opposite direction is really bothering me.

[listener]

Recently? Yes, I would agree that most are just worthless attempts.

But there have been some (one) that i can think of that had something to come of it.

Aeon was going pretty strong, but then it sorta petered out.

[philtron]

When a person can't accomplish things, they do anything else to feel important. Like a small child eating worms on the playground to get everyone to pay attention to them.

[???Durandal???]

Perhaps the project's forum needs to be sub-divded.


real scenarios (I.e, the ones that actually have substance) get their own forum, and the rest of the garbage *cough* aspiring works of art, get placed in their own forum. So that way they won't get in the way of the professionals.


Just my two-cents.

[irons]

You know everyone will post in the "real scenarios" forum anyway, don't you.

[$lave]

You know everyone will post in the "real scenarios" forum anyway, don't you.

If people really want Projects to be divided into "Projects" and something more like "Projects - Hypothetical" I wouldn't mind moving topics between the two at my own discretion.

Given that there are barely any active threads in "Projects" as it is now though, I don't think another forum is really necessary.

[irons]

Why not just keep the current system and move everything to TBCR?

[thermoplyae]

this discussion so far sounds like cesspi7 and not like community commentary

[patrick]

commentary: community as cesspi7

[listener]

Long Answer.

Fine. Commentary. The community has shrunk in the aspect of professional (?) mappers, and there is an alarming amount of mappers that post stuff, and then don't pay attention to the good (great?) advice that the professional(?) mappers actually give. I don't claim to belong to either party, as there's a third group of people here on the pfhorums. These are the people who contribute to the community in some form, just not mapping.

And then there's the fourth. The trolls, the stupids, the people that just waste other people time, and take away precious tolerance from the people that actually need advice and tolerance to become better.

Short Answer:

Meh.

[RyokoTK]

this discussion so far sounds like cesspi7 and not like community commentary

WELL! I forgot about Cesspi7, but the two threads both revolved generally around the same concept, i.e. people posting low/zero-effort bullshit in order to get recognition, and then abandoning ship when they realize that scenario making takes honest-to-goodness work. As in, it's not always fun to make a scenario; it takes a stupid amount of dedication, time, and motivation to put together even smaller projects.

It gets tiresome telling people time and time again about this, too.

What's frustrating is how all-or-nothing this community is when it comes to pretty much any sort of project. I just don't understand what all these up-and-coming Mapmaking Superstars have against starting with something doable. It's like an endless cycle; some asshole plays through half of Rubicon and thinks they can whip something together like that, having never even seen Weland/Forge before. They post their dimwitted, cliched idea on the Pfhorums, thinking, hey -- I got all these great ideas, I just need some help putting them together -- and when nobody's exactly foaming at the mouth to contribute, the project withers away and dies without anything tangible at all coming from it.

But you know what's easier to make? Slight Photoshops of HUDs and physics models that nobody will ever use. And you still make the front page of MBO and Simplici7y. You get a couple good-natured tarts to post casually positive A-for-Effort responses, and you pat yourself on the back and consider yourself vindicated because now you're a Contributor! A real member of the community, keeping Marathon alive with your utterly unimaginative zero-effort crap.

Here's a hint to any would-be scenario makers reading this, who haven't left in a self-righteous huff about how Different and Special you are: scenarios take years to make. If you start your project now, you probably won't have something comparable even to Evil or TGI (two much smaller, conceptually simpler scenarios) for at least three years. If you want to have your valued recognition so badly before the end of the Mayan calendar, maybe you should work on something a little bit more manageable first. If it turns out that the only people that end up submitting things to Treellama's map contest are myself, $lave, and Tim, or something like that, I'm going to be horrendously upset mildly annoyed.

Nobody's trying. Nobody's trying to try. They just want their fifteen minutes. Do the easiest, shortest thing, and cry about how your sensibilities are being tread upon when people call you out for being baddies.

[$lave]

If it turns out that the only people that end up submitting things to Treellama's map contest are myself, $lave, and Tim, or something like that, I'm going to be horrendously upset mildly annoyed.

Maybe I'm just overly pessimistic, but this is what I'm expecting. I'll be overjoyed - sort of - if there are actually a sizable number of entries, but I seem to recall the last couple map making contests having at least twice the amount of "yeah, I'll enter!" posts than actual entries. If people's interest in making one netmap declines that quickly, then I don't know what the hell it would take to maintain interest in making a 3 level solo scenario.

In the 4 or 5 years I've been on this forum, I think that Dugit is the only person who actually stuck around for at least a little while to release content that gradually increased in quality to any real extent. Many people came and released a shitty netmap/netpack or two, but no one ever seems to actually have much ambition to improve.

[RyokoTK]

Maybe I'm just overly pessimistic, but this is what I'm expecting. I'll be overjoyed - sort of - if there are actually a sizable number of entries, but I seem to recall the last couple map making contests having at least twice the amount of "yeah, I'll enter!" posts than actual entries. If people's interest in making one netmap declines that quickly, then I don't know what the hell it would take to maintain interest in making a 3 level solo scenario.

In the 4 or 5 years I've been on this forum, I think that Dugit is the only person who actually stuck around for at least a little while to release content that gradually increased in quality to any real extent. Many people came and released a shitty netmap/netpack or two, but no one ever seems to actually have much ambition to improve.

Actually, Project X had a good turnout from people that haven't really produced content otherwise. But then, the contribution bar was a little lower -- only one map.

I should get around to putting that together, shouldn't I.

Collaboration seems to be a slightly better motivator for contribution than competition is. In a contest, I think less-capable contributors might be afraid that their maps will just be ignored, since they'll most likely be completely overshadowed by more experienced mappers.

[Crater Creator]

I don't want this to be a hostile environment for the inexperienced. Sure, we're not running a preschool here. But if somebody's ready to get their feet wet and the community response amounts to 'guaranteed failure, shame on you and your ambitions,' that does more harm than good. If the pfhorums are meant, in part, to be a place that fosters new content creation, then it can't afford to habitually chase away the riff raff.

Those with the drive, patience, time, etc. to come in one day and dump a completed scenario on us all are probably disciplined and tenacious enough that they could finish with or without the pfhorums. But I feel like too often people succeed in spite of the pfhorums community, rather than thanks to it.

So my hope is for each side to meet the other half way. To the newbies: take the constructive advice you get seriously, and among other things make informed decisions when defining the scope of your project. To the veterans: be tolerant of the newbies. You don't have to help them and you don't have to play along with their delusions, but try not to drive them away.

[treellama]

ready to get their feet wet

[RyokoTK]

But I feel like too often people succeed in spite of the pfhorums community, rather than thanks to it.

How many projects in the last few years can be counted as a success?

Edit: For the record, my hostility is toward people who have nothing except ideas. People that have even a little bit of content get help and critique. People that have no content get rolled eyes.

[Dugit]

Edit: For the record, my hostility is toward people who have nothing except ideas.

Perhaps it would be prudent to make a distinction between nothing and nothing. Things like texture-rips, color tables, vague story frameworks and physics models, for example. Trying to get collaboration with even these (on top of obligatory vague idea smorgasbord) is like, well, asking a shadow to dance.

[listener]

Well, maybe there should be a tolerance for some new people. I'm not saying the ones that come in a announce a scenario that they have nothing for, but for the people that have legitimate mapping questions. Ones that haven't been answered a million times before though.


I've seen people come in, post something asking for legitimate help, and get burned. That's not how to make a shrinking community better.

[RyokoTK]

Perhaps it would be prudent to make a distinction between nothing and nothing. Things like texture-rips, color tables, vague story frameworks and physics models, for example. Trying to get collaboration with even these (on top of obligatory vague idea smorgasbord) is like, well, asking a shadow to dance.

This is a fair distinction. Important to know: everything you listed, combined, can be done in an afternoon. So it's basically nothing, but not technically nothing.

Well, maybe there should be a tolerance for some new people. I'm not saying the ones that come in a announce a scenario that they have nothing for, but for the people that have legitimate mapping questions. Ones that haven't been answered a million times before though.
I've seen people come in, post something asking for legitimate help, and get burned. That's not how to make a shrinking community better.

Yeah I'm guilty of this. Just as they're (often) guilty of not searching beforehand, but that's not a great excuse.

[Dugit]

I've seen people come in, post something asking for legitimate help, and get burned. That's not how to make a shrinking community better.

Although things are pretty dismal, I never had an experience like that. Stupid questions? Of course I got 'burned'. Legitimate questions, however, I had no difficulty with. Without people like Ryoko, irons and Treellama, Aeon would have no learning curve (and actually good levels, like the fare after Asphodel, excluding Blaze).

[RyokoTK]

Although things are pretty dismal, I never had an experience like that. Stupid questions? Of course I got 'burned'. Legitimate questions, however, I had no difficulty with. Without people like Ryoko, irons and Treellama, Aeon would have no learning curve (and actually good levels, like the fare after Asphodel, excluding Blaze).

It's funny you say that, because just now I was playing Aeon, and after wandering around Words Which I Command for 15 minutes without finding a save, I got cornered in a tiny room by super troopers, killed almost instantly, and kicked back to Lapsus Linguae. So I'm wondering which good levels you're referring to!

(The level is also a vacuum level with no O2 rechargers, only canisters, and I was very much on the brink of suffocating prior to that because a terminal said there was a concealed door to the northwest. He meant northeast.)

[Dugit]

It's funny you say that, because just now I was playing Aeon, and after wandering around Words Which I Command for 15 minutes without finding a save, I got cornered in a tiny room by super troopers, killed almost instantly, and kicked back to Lapsus Linguae. So I'm wondering which good levels you're referring to!

(The level is also a vacuum level with no O2 rechargers, only canisters, and I was very much on the brink of suffocating prior to that because a terminal said there was a concealed door to the northwest. He meant northeast.)

Wow. Replaying Words Which I Command, I could've sworn I put a saver in the bottom-right room (with the 1x and double-door switch), but it's a terminal instead. My, that is poor. Another thing to add to that list.