Lip synching is boring

Internet Stupidity
Does the internet act stupid because of the large penetration of young users or because of a large penetration of older people acting immature? Or both? What's your call? I am actually hitting a saturation point with some users across several different sites, including Newgrounds which seems to be like a bright blue light that attracts some really ridiculous people. And I have no clue how old they are but they still act this way.

BTW I am pretty sure Luis is never going to go home, he's going to be a nomad for the rest of his life.

At 2/8/08 01:37 PM, jmtb02 wrote: Internet Stupidity
Does the internet act stupid because of the large penetration of young users or because of a large penetration of older people acting immature? Or both? What's your call?

I honestly believe that every person on this world is intelligent. Intelligence can be expressed in so many different forms. Some may not be good in mathematics or language, but can pwn any nerdy ass when it comes to setting up a business and getting their ideas across. Others are talented in music and art, which is another form of intelligence. In fact, i don't like people who call other people stupid. Stupid people don't exist, only people who do not put their intelligence and talents to no good use exist.
You probably meant stupidity on the internet in a more goofy way though, and yeah i have no explanation for that. I don't really know what you mean with it anyway, but i guess many people just like the internet as a place to not be serious or something, which i think is OK.

At 2/8/08 03:33 PM, AloneInTheDark wrote: Stupid people don't exist, only people who do not put their intelligence and talents to no good use exist.

You just contradicted yourself there :P Everyone's intelligent in different ways, so it follows that people must lack intelligence in certain areas. Intelligence and stupidity are antonyms (or, rather, stupidity is a lack of intelligence), therefore we're all both stupid and intelligent.

It's pointless debating semantics anyway. Unless you want to analyse everything in its most technical way - and who does? - the meaning of words comes more from connotations than anything, and I think we all have a pretty clear idea of what general stupidity is and who it applies to as a description.

Re:Internet stupidity

At 2/8/08 03:33 PM, AloneInTheDark wrote: I honestly believe that every person on this world is intelligent. Intelligence can be expressed in so many different forms. Some may not be good in mathematics or language, but can pwn any nerdy ass when it comes to setting up a business and getting their ideas across. Others are talented in music and art, which is another form of intelligence. In fact, i don't like people who call other people stupid. Stupid people don't exist, only people who do not put their intelligence and talents to no good use exist.
You probably meant stupidity on the internet in a more goofy way though, and yeah i have no explanation for that. I don't really know what you mean with it anyway, but i guess many people just like the internet as a place to not be serious or something, which i think is OK.

'Not be serious' since you're anonymous if you want to be. I agree with you about the intelligence thing by the way.
To answer Jmtbs question, in Newgrounds' case its because of the amount of younger people here. Its started getting to me more in the last 6 months or so and driving me away a bit.

nET AM STUpit

I disagree that you could just chalk this up to the age factor alone. I've been coming to NewGrounds sine 2000, that means I was 11. I registered first in 03 with one account, then when I decided the move on to being a more mature artist I started a new account, this one, to erase my past.

But even at 11, 12, 13 as a really young kid I noticed morons floating around who clearly weren't children by their behavior.

You guys are trying to be to black and white about it, and there isn't a black and white answers. it's going to be gray with loads of different factors bleeding together. Sure age can be part of it, but there are plenty of people who just don't "get it" in terms of how things work on the world. Plenty of people 30, 40 and older think they've got it all "figured" but really don't have a clue, because as far as I'm concerned there aren't any definite answers, and the people who think they are spread their beliefs and cause conflicts which drive people to be single minded, and thus stupid.

It's not that people are actually stupid to me, it's just that (and we all do this) pretty much everyone thinks they're right, it is our nature after all, and people who think they're right want everyone else to know they're right. This sort of behavior ends up coming across as stupidity for often than not.

Madness 8

I love Krinkels' madness. I mean the official toons made by him. Pretty much every fan cartoon though I find to be absolute garbage. They're all clones that try to be exactly the same, but not as good. It's saddening.

Krinkels' work though is something different. So much goes into every painful moment of it. He does that all manually. No tweens! Which is why his stand out as something much more monumentous than the rip-offs. He also has this pace he uses, it's so leisurely in the way the story is told. It's especially interesting to me, because the toons are SO violent that I'd actually expect things to move at breakneck speed. I think of it almost as the Flash world's equivalent to the approach taken by the Coens to No Country for Old Men.

Another thing I love is his cryptic, seemingly nonsensical story. What the hell is going on? Holes ripping open in the sky? INSANITY! I love that so much. Even if at the end there is no payoff, to me the journey alone is worth it. My theory on it is that his whole little "Madnessverse" is some simulation system organized by some group to 'test' the limits of what these people can do. Vague maybe, but it's how I see it coming together.

I hope he continues to make this insane things he does.

At 2/8/08 01:37 PM, jmtb02 wrote: Does the internet act stupid because of the large penetration of young users or because of a large penetration of older people acting immature? Or both?

Definitely both. Smart people would never come on teh interwebs.

BTW I am pretty sure Luis is never going to go home, he's going to be a nomad for the rest of his life.

He's home alright, he just thinks the forums are kinda dull lately.

I don't know how many of you read my blog post, but in case you didn't, i'm basically saying that I'm done making flash games. There's more details in the post, but I'm ready to move on to bigger and better things.

Yo! nobody knows me here, but i just wanted to see how other people are reacting to SHIFT. I think its a kickass game, but maybe too short. anyways, anybody played it?

At 2/8/08 08:49 PM, Swordstick76 wrote: Yo! nobody knows me here, but i just wanted to see how other people are reacting to SHIFT. I think its a kickass game, but maybe too short. anyways, anybody played it?

If you want to see other peoples reactions, I think that the 750+ reviews for it would do just fine ;)

hum didee dum, i feel like a retard. but i specifically wanted to know what the developers believe... so this question is here to stay...

At 2/8/08 08:54 PM, Swordstick76 wrote: hum didee dum, i feel like a retard. but i specifically wanted to know what the developers believe... so this question is here to stay...

As a developer, I definitely think that the general idea is the best part of the whole game. The coding is flawless (but it's far from the most advanced we've seen in flash games, I think that "even" I have a good idea of how most of the stuff in the game could be done), and all the portal references do of course ensure a score boost.

However, I saw in one of the reviews that the idea might not really be his.. I believe that many of the people here have heard about the '300 Challenge' (a guy called Sean Howard has taken it upon himself to think of 300 unique game ideas in 300 days), and this is the idea from day #1: Negative Space

Please note that I can't say for sure that he got the idea from that, but it does seem very similar, and if that's the case then the most outstanding part of the game should actually (at least partially) be credited to someone else. And apart from the idea there really wasn't much that made an impression on me... So yeah, the more I think about it, the more I think that much of the praise this game has gotten here on NG, as well as all around the web, simply has gone to the wrong person if the origin of the concept is taken from Sean.

At 2/8/08 08:13 PM, Glaiel-Gamer wrote: I don't know how many of you read my blog post, but in case you didn't, i'm basically saying that I'm done making flash games. There's more details in the post, but I'm ready to move on to bigger and better things.

COUGH ATTENTION WHORE COUGH.

Yeah it's a shame your going and you will be missed, but seriously if your "moving onto better things" i don't think a bunch of people on the internet should need to know.

Isn't it meant to be personal?

Here's to my 1st post here.!?! Hurrah

At 2/8/08 04:14 PM, Paranoia wrote:

At 2/8/08 03:33 PM, AloneInTheDark wrote: Stupid people don't exist, only people who do not put their intelligence and talents to no good use exist.

You just contradicted yourself there :P Everyone's intelligent in different ways, so it follows that people must lack intelligence in certain areas. Intelligence and stupidity are antonyms (or, rather, stupidity is a lack of intelligence), therefore we're all both stupid and intelligent.

That would be a rather strange way of looking at things. I don't really see the point you are trying to make. When someone is intelligent in a certain area they can exploit that to make something out of it, they shouldn't exploit the area's they do not know a lot about... That's why i said that everyone is intelligent in a certain aspect, but that some don't recognize it or put it to a good use.

At 2/8/08 01:24 PM, ArthurGhostly wrote: Lip Syncing is hell

That is all.

It does get rather long and annoying sometimes, but it actually helps me in real life.

Since I've began lip syncing I noticed I can read lips pretty well. I can get the gist of a conversation while listening to my MP3 player on loud and it pisses my friends off.

I thought it was interesting how many people said the gameplay in Shift was a rip-off of portal. I think it's interesting that unique gameplay equates to being a Portal ripoff :).

But to answer your "is this from someone else" thing, even before all these flipping games there was a book published in the 1980's called Round Trip (link) in which the reader could read the book right side up, and then at the end of the book read it upside down with similar black and white imagery (picture below).

Jmtb02 do you have that book!!! where can i get it?!?!

I made another painting of a friend, whaddyall think!?

At 2/9/08 12:55 AM, As-Soul wrote: Jmtb02 do you have that book!!! where can i get it?!?!

I made another painting of a friend, whaddyall think!?

her fingers look like a photo

At 2/8/08 11:48 PM, jmtb02 wrote: I thought it was interesting how many people said the gameplay in Shift was a rip-off of portal. I think it's interesting that unique gameplay equates to being a Portal ripoff :).

Two rules about the internet. Unique gameplay is automatically a Portal rip-off and unique animation is automatically a Ren and Stimpy ripoff.

Obviously the gameplay has elements of its own, but I think it's also safe to say that the inspiration came from Portal, and that a number of elements were borrowed. "Now you're thinking with shifting" was a pretty unmistakable nod coming from the already-borrowed idea of an outside instructor-narrator that guides you along in a playful yet mocking manner, making light of your death as its main source of humor. Such tidbits, and a few other gravity-based puzzle games of late considered, the game is pretty thoughtful, but no benchmark of creativity either.

At 2/9/08 04:40 AM, NegativeONE wrote: Obviously the gameplay has elements of its own, but I think it's also safe to say that the inspiration came from Portal, and that a number of elements were borrowed. "Now you're thinking with shifting" was a pretty unmistakable nod coming from the already-borrowed idea of an outside instructor-narrator that guides you along in a playful yet mocking manner, making light of your death as its main source of humor. Such tidbits, and a few other gravity-based puzzle games of late considered, the game is pretty thoughtful, but no benchmark of creativity either.

Hardly anything's really original if you look to hard at it. Whatever you do, somebody's probably got there first. Whether the similarity is due to a rip-off, inspiration, or just co-incidence is the only real issue.

As for the mocking narrator, that's hardly a new concept. I remember the sarcastic gargoyles in Medievil as far back as the PSOne era, and I'll wager good money that even they weren't the first to use the concept. The concept of gravity-based puzzles has, in a very small way, been around for as long as platformers - the best example I can think of is that old obstacle of a moving platform which you have to jump down to just as it floats past. While not as much of a thinking exercise as newer games, it nontheless has all the signs of that kind of challenge - awareness of environment, awareness of (basic) physics, good timing and skilful movements.

The whole issue of originality is a bit of a weird and often ill-thought out one, anyway. People seem to confuse 'inspired by' with 'ripped-off from', and 'similar' with 'copied'.

Interwebs Stupidity

I think it occurs a lot but is really pretty bad on NG, for instance thestudentroom.co.uk has about 90 percent of its users under 21 yet they're seem to be real mature about things, so I go there win I feel like a serious thread...

Those are some very fascinating opinions, and some interesting different takes on SHIFT. but then if we are talking about the issue of creativity and copying of someone else's work, where would you inted to draw the line? "ok, well you can parody this, but if you make it too similar, you'll get sued." Like do you believe that monolith's playable tributes to mario are cheap rip-offs? Personally, i believe that there should be a line, but as a newbie to animation, i'm not sure where you could or should draw that line...

At 2/9/08 01:18 AM, atomic-noodle wrote:

At 2/9/08 12:55 AM, As-Soul wrote: Jmtb02 do you have that book!!! where can i get it?!?!

I made another painting of a friend, whaddyall think!?

her fingers look like a photo

two of them are, i was on a time limit, and couldent finish, you got a really good eye, lol. the middle on the right side, and the back one on the left side

At 2/9/08 10:33 AM, Swordstick76 wrote: Those are some very fascinating opinions, and some interesting different takes on SHIFT. but then if we are talking about the issue of creativity and copying of someone else's work, where would you inted to draw the line? "ok, well you can parody this, but if you make it too similar, you'll get sued." Like do you believe that monolith's playable tributes to mario are cheap rip-offs? Personally, i believe that there should be a line, but as a newbie to animation, i'm not sure where you could or should draw that line...

What you fail to realize is that there is a large difference between a parody and a rip-off. A rip-off is a blatent attempt to utilize another person's idea for your own advancement. Meaning a serious project. Where a parody should always obviously be such due to it's comical nature. You draw the line where an artist is obviously trying to further himself via using someone else's idea, i.e. monolith gave credit where credit was due aka a tribute. The kid who submitted cursor*10 ripped the original makers off, though in this case it's theft. And finally the guy who made Shift really justed used a narative delivery method similar to Portal. No harm done in my opinion.

At 2/9/08 10:49 AM, Deathcon7 wrote: And finally the guy who made Shift really justed used a narative delivery method similar to Portal. No harm done in my opinion.

I don't know why you are all discussing whether the portal references is considered a rip-off or not, if it's due to what I wrote than I must have made my point very unclear..

What I meant with "all the portal references do of course ensure a score boost.", was simply that a big part of the success that Shift got was due to those references, as Portal is extremely popular among the users here on NG. I don't think negatively of the game for this, rather the opposite as I myself also really like Portal.

Portal Rip Off

It's obvious that he used some elements form portal, but does that at all make it a rip off?

Look at all 2D sidescrollers, are they all ripoffs of the Original Super Mario Bros.? I don't think so. SHIFT is like portal in some ways, but it isn't too much like it IMO.

I really don't think shift is a ripoff from portal by far. The only thing i can find similar with portal is the third person objective instructions. In fact, i think it is more similar to the psp puzzle game 'Crush'. What's important is that Shift differs in concept and style, there's nothing wrong with copying details from other games methinks.

At 2/9/08 10:49 AM, Deathcon7 wrote: What you fail to realize is that there is a large difference between a parody and a rip-off. A rip-off is a blatent attempt to utilize another person's idea for your own advancement. Meaning a serious project. Where a parody should always obviously be such due to it's comical nature. You draw the line where an artist is obviously trying to further himself via using someone else's idea, i.e. monolith gave credit where credit was due aka a tribute. The kid who submitted cursor*10 ripped the original makers off, though in this case it's theft. And finally the guy who made Shift really justed used a narative delivery method similar to Portal. No harm done in my opinion.

hum. Perhaps you're right about those things, but giving credit to a mario game (like monlith does) shouldn't matter in the long run because, as long as he didn't make the game with (what's his face, the guy who created mario)'s permission, then it would still be a rip-off, and would probably be sued. As for Shift, i think i agree with you. he was just poking some fun at the humor of Portal. So then i ask, what is a tribute, and what makes it any different from a blatant ripoff? and why do we (the people of newgrounds) consider it to be any different from a rip-off???

Shift

It was a great game, got me thinking a bit. I dont care if peopel are saying he got the idea off blah blah or whatever - or even the portal "rip offs". He executed the game well, and thats what counts. Many games are un original ideas but are fun due to the execution - take defense games for example.

New game
A platformer, you play as a toaster and can fire a piece of toast. All that needs to be said ;D

its coming along nicely

:: Enemies are BUTTER LOLZ!