Big gay Paranoia's big gay emo leaving speech
Right. That's it. I'm off.
I'll still in the competition threads I signed up for, probably with an alt or something (Fuzz; don't worry - I'm still working on your game) but to all purposes I'm leaving the BBS.
It seems as good a time as any. I'm on my 6,666th post here; a wonderfully pointless milestone, and I've got a load of good memories here, old and new. I may check back in a few months; maybe longer; maybe never. I'll keep my deposits and ocasional Flash submissions, but for the forseeable future that's all.
But why? Well, I'm not going to pull a Toast and go on a lame nostalgia fest about how much better it was when Inglor, Ninja and Liam were all active here, although that was a good time to be on the BBS. It's been great here with the newer regs for us hybrids :) Gust's coding bitchiness, Cybex's enthusiasm, Luis's superiority complex; it's been great.
Well, recent events which I shouldn't have to explain have called a lot of things into question. Who should I listen to? Who an I trust? What am I supposed to think? I don't know; and to be perfectly honest I'm not too good at handling situations where everything suddenly gets serious. I need someone to tell me what I should think, but at the same time I wont let myself be let enough to accept just one word about something. I've got no skill in really judging people, however much I may try to pretend otherwise. I'm a real idiot sometimes, and one with little capabiliy for making much out of anything on his own.
I can say with all honesty that all I've ever wanted to do was create things which people would like. To bring life to all the ideas I had floating around in my head, and to make things which were rich, imaginative and creative. And now, in light of these events, I find myself questioning whether I'm not just trying to head down a road to income, and money. And money is important; let's face it. I'm unemployed, which isn't too bad considering that a lot of my friends are too, but at the same time most of them aren't and I feel like I should be doing something. I want to go to university, and with Labour's vague hypocracy that's going to be more and more of a financial strain. And in many ways I feel like something's been killed off; the kid who wanted to make something great, with no concern for how much it was going to make him. The kid who would just spend hours clicking away to make something which would make his friends laugh.
I'm not the sort of person who knows enough to make a lot of money from Flash on his own, and to be honest I'm not even sure of why I really want to. I can see myself just getting exploited by some big orginisation, and I don't even know if that's really a bad thing or not. I've got this vague feeling that I should be standing up against the rabid capitalists with no sense of creativity or fairness out there, but I've no justification for that, or indeed any way to tell them apart from people who do care. I've got very little. The world's suddenly a much more cold and cynical place than I'd given it credit for, and certainly more so than it should be.
So, in the end, I think it'll probably by best for me to take a step back out of the community here for a while. Perhaps indefinately. I'm going to keep working at my Flash, and try to work a few things out. There's a lot of things I still have to learn and brush up on, and this seems as good an opportunity as any.
Well, that's it. I'm going offline. This isn't easy, but I sincerely wish all of you the best of luck; not just in Flash, but in whatever you want to do. Never lose sight of your dreams, as corny as that may sound. And it's been a lot of fun.
Hope you get modded at some point, Kirk and DFox :P And keep going for that 2K.
jmtb02, just keep on being as cool as you are, if you ever get to reading this. You're one of the best out there.
Glaiel, you're certainly great at what they do, but don't act so much like you know it :)
Luis, you've usuallg got a really good and respectable point of view, but not always, so remember that. And keep up with the incredible animation.
Toast, I hope you grow up to be a big, strong developer :P
The same goes for you Gust, and try to remember that making stuff is a far more creative than mechanical process. Just being awesome at the theory doesn't automatically mean great application.
Something similar to Delta, although with more emphasis on the awesomeness of the theory.
Cybex, I hope you get one of your reg projects off of the ground. And that you sort out the whole StarSyndicate thing.
My pet artist Fuzz, I just know you're going to get an award on your own one of these days :)
To the SFB, I've never really been too familiar with you here, but I've always had the most respect for you and your work. Your Decline series really got me into appreciating Flash, and your recent games have all been astounding, whatever anyone says.
Denvish, if you check here, I can still remeber Inglor Day. That was an awesome time :) I hope you manage to make a thread one of these days which doesn't simply turn into a big spam fest.
Shirty, zoy sauce and all of the other artists; you guys rule.
Bowlofchilli, Ninja, IWantComeCookies, authorblues, Rantzien and everyone else who's disappeared, you probably won't read this but I have a lot of great memories about all of you. Especially our BBS hot female Swedish cat :)
Anyone who I've forgotten, it's probably because I hate you :)
that last part was a joke <3 I've just got too many to come up with
Stay cool, guys.
Well. This is goodbye now. Hopefully by logging off I'll manage to revert to an older and more innocent self somehow (lol :( ).
Laters!
suddenly my sig seems relevant
for the benefit of anyone who looks back here if it ever changes:
![The Flash 'Reg' Lounge]()
