The Legendary Zoltan

How annoying it is that all this stuff happens to all these great artists. Like the one that LionTamer posted about Shael Riley. I can't wait until it happens to me! Hahaha.

Thanks, Bardic Knowledge. I will. I'll be announcing the demo soon. I've only let one person play the game so far and it's totally eye-opening about what people want or need when playing a game.

EDIT: Demo out on January 30th at zoltanmetal.com/gamedev/ That's right! I have decided to enter the world of video game development. I've been working tirelessly with RPG Maker VX Ace for the past 6 or 7 weeks and I'm nearly finished! Info and screenshots are available on my website. http://zoltanmetal.com/gamedev/ The idea of this game is that there are 32 rooms in a tower and getting out of each one is a puzzle or a riddle. It's a very difficult game and I am currently in the Q&A stage and taking steps to make it as understandable as possible while maintaining difficulty. It will feature an all original soundtrack. If you like difficult puzzles, you will like this game. I'm so excited!

Well, DAMN it! I didn't get what I want at all. I hope it's the best browser game ever and all the browser game players revel in its greatness. I, unfortunately, will not be playing it because I prefer PS3 games. *sigh* Fittingly sad, indeed.

I think that setting would be quite popular but it isn't really the kind of setting I like. I like green places in my games. Agni is extremely cute to me though. Appearance-wise, I am very attracted to her. I have no idea what kind of personality or back-story she will have though, so it is hard for me to decide whether or not I'd want her as a character in the next big Final Fantasy. Yeah, I agree. They should do whatever they feel the most enthusiastic about and not let the fans decide. Because most of my favorite games do not have really long-running series, this is the first time ever I've gotten excited about a count-down site. I have a bad feeling though. I only play PS3 so the chances of whatever it is being available to me are already greatly limited.

It seems to be Italian for "flag". So that means it's Square-Enix's flagship series. . . HOLY CRAP IT'S FF15! Wouldn't THAT blow people's minds.

It's about time someone stepped in to counterbalance all these negative Nancies. I've loved Star Ocean since the first and each one just gets better and better in my opinion. SO3 is my favorite soundtrack, though. Star Ocean games have always had UNBELIEVABLE sound quality. Anyway, to my disappointment, I am starting feel less and less like this is a Star Ocean announcement. Even though everything about the graphic on the countdown site looks like SO4 graphics, there are new words that push my mind away from Star Ocean. The two new words that have appeared since I last looked are "Supremacy" and "Bandiera". It depends on what the story of the game is but supremacy doesn't really remind me of Star Ocean. Then again "Bandiera" isn't so far from "Vendeeni"...Maybe. You guys may be interested to know, that out here in Japan the countdown will end on 12/12/12 at 12 o'clock. THAT'S TOMORROW!!!

http://liftoff.square-enix.co.jp/ I'm not sure what it is but we'll find out soon. I hope so much that it's a new Star Ocean game on PS3.

That is amazing. Total dedication and total skill! I applaud this guy and his girlfriend. I would LOVE for these two to be able to make a business out of this, if that's something they'd like to do with their lives. EDIT: It took them 170 hours to make it. That's about a month of full-time work for a single person. How much would you guys be willing to pay for that if you had a lot of money?

You may or may not care for their opinions but Lusipurr.com seems to think the Wii U sucks. They hate a lot of things though. I haven't read them because I was not planning to get a Wii U but if you are interested, there are two stories about it right on their front page.

This phrase really resonates with me. I agree that there really does need to be a substantial amount of work already accomplished by new developers to show us that they DO indeed possess some kind of work ethic. If it's a big company, I can kind of see why they wouldn't start working on it because it would probably be a big project and they'd lose a lost of money and time if it ends up being unfunded. But to do that, they'd need a good track record or completing games. I'll be sure to keep all of these things in mind if I ever make a kickstarter for a game I want to make. (Because I might ^_-)

Some people feel quite strongly about whether or not Kickstarter is good or bad. Despite the possibility of battle, I'd like to state my philosophy about making good kickstarters (even though I've never made one ) I think the amount of money being requested should be directly proportional to EITHER how close you are to finishing the project OR to how much value there is to your name. I mean that when Double Fine asks for a million dollars to make some adventure game, it's a pretty safe bet for backers because they are established as being an entire team of people whom are capable of creating games to completion. Alternatively, when the guy in the Tiny Titans post asks for just several thousand, I still feel like it's a safe bet because despite having no idea who he is, he doesn't ask for as much and there is already plenty of art and gameplay footage available. On the other hand, the Lore guy and the Heresy guy have me worried because I've never heard of them, they have no gameplay footage or screenshots, and they ask for a very large sum of money. The risk is just too high for someone to fund them in my opinion.

That helps a lot Sole Signal. Thank you. I'll be sure to find out about the number of online transactions my bank account allows. I've never heard anything about that so it may be limitless, if I'm lucky. Ejunkie looks like a very useful site for people who sell online. I'll read it up a bit. Thank you, Zircon.

Hmm. Thanks, Kupernikus. I'll try and tough it out. Brandon, I don't think it takes any particular skill to put that stuff on a website. I haven't done it yet, but once I do, I'll let you know how.

Thank you Mr. Zircon. Thank you Mr. Bahamut. It sounds like I should go for it, then.

I recently reread the following article from Zircon's site because I plan to sell my own CDs on my website in the very near future. http://zirconmusic.com/tutorials/text/how-to-distribute-and-sell-a-cd/ Zircon makes it sound quite easy and of course the PayPal website does as well. But there are a LOT of links in all kinds of locations on the paypal site, SEVERAL of which refer to the fees involved. The "Websites Payment Standard" service which I believe is the most basic and common one takes like 3.6% + 40 cents per transaction which is only like 76 cents for a $10 transaction. Not bad right? But if you click on some other links you'll see all these places where it says "other fees apply". And then if you click on that it says something like, "PayPal charges the following fees" and it's a huge list and I don't completely understand when such fees apply. Does anyone here who has experience with a PayPal merchant account have any advice, cautions, or calming wisdom for me? Thank you very much. I appreciate the help.

What do you think of this? http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1376466869/lore?ref=live My opinion: Although, the grammar is quite bad, the art not great, and nobody in the old days ever thought, "This game is Dark Souls, Diablo 2 and Minecraft all in one," I'm kind of interested. He has drawn me in with his 3D screenshots and it SOUNDS as though he has no plans of giving up and that is the most important thing. What is your opinion of this kickstarter?

Thanks a lot for your help. I haven't plugged anything new in but I'll go ahead and unplug all unused appliances and buy a better power strip for now. Since the situation SHOULD be exactly the same as about 5 days before when I recorded a perfectly clear guitar, I'd like to think there is some kind of outside magnetic field interrupting. Is it possible for a magnetic field from the next apartment to spread into my room?

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/81603940/Bane%20of%20my%20Existence%21.wav Turn volume way up when you listen to that. Do you hear that fuzzy sound? I just recorded a clean part with that exact same sound and setup 5 days before and it came out crystal clear. I've checked all the connections and can't figure out what is causing the sound. Any ideas? If I do any of the following, the sound gets quieter or disappears completely. -cover the strings with my hands. (can't do that while playing though) -touch the effects pedal. (Doesn't matter what part you touch, either) -touch the metal part of any of the involved guitar cables. Thanks a lot for your help in advance.

So that's the song I'd like to remix. I have an idea and I'd like to hear people's opinion about what execution they think would be the coolest. Later, I will probably need quite a lot of collaborators. Here's my idea. I wish to create a scene where Celes is playing the main melody of this on a guitar or something while despairing about the possibility that all the other party members could very well be dead. But then after she finishes playing that melody, she stops, sighs, and another party member (let's say Sabin for now) arrives and the song continues on as a duet of two guitars. Then 2 more party members show up with a bass guitar and a cymbal. And it just grows until many but not all of the members have been reunited. The most important question: Should the first melody play, then have some walking and sitting down sound effects before jumping right into the next musical part or should it actually have spoken dialogue? For example when Sabin shows up, Celes actually reacts, "Sabin!" and stuff like that? If we go the dialogue route, it could become this huge epic thing that people love. Then again, maybe will think that's just cheese and letting the listener imply everything is the way to go. What do you think? Thanks a lot for your input. I would love to make this a remix that involves a large number of people.

Thanks everyone. Excellent feedback. I appreciate them all. Ebuch, I can definitely see what you mean about a lack of melody regarding the intro and where that part repeats but I thought that high part in the horn section counted as a melody. When the piano and timpanis are playing straight 4th notes, the string section is supposed to be the melody there. Do you think if I made those voices more outstanding in some way that it would solve the problem? Thanks, Ebuch. G-mixer! My man! I haven't put any effects on there yet. Needs more reverb, compression, and bass, eh? OK. I've read about compression many times and still don't TOTALLY grasp exactly how to use it. I just need to use it on the parts that have a big changes in volume, right? I actually programmed all the notes in with the mouse. I did not play it on a keyboard or anything so that's why it's perfectly quantized. I guess the best way to remedy that is just learn to play the most melodic and busiest parts and re do them on the keyboard. That should give it more humanization. Thanks, G. Hey, mickomoo. When you say rhythm section, do you mean something that also includes a drumset? There are already quite a lot of string parts in there and some winds near the end. I'll try adding the winds into the other sections as well perhaps. Thank you. You guys rock! I'll make you all proud with a much improved version based on the comments. Look forward to it! ZOLTAN

I agree that this is very Rob Zombie-esque. Nice work on that front. It's cool sounding but I feel like it doesn't have enough mid or enough bass overall. It depends on your taste but I personally would like to hear some cymbals added to the drum beat as well. That synth effect you have along with the guitars is PERFECT! It really brings out the Zombie style, too. Good job!

I'm quite happy with it, too. It sounds really good. Although I can hear the snare drum perfectly, I can't really pick out the bass drum most of the time. They sound quite similar actually. If that's what you want, that's fine, of course. This is professional yo!

I've got to say. Those are the coolest sounding drums I've ever heard. Are they samples? Please tell me what samples they are, if that is the case. Quite brutal indeed. I would definitely agree with "cleaning" it up. You can still keep it brutal but make it easier to hear what's going on. I can't believe I'm about to say this but the cymbals are way too loud in my opinion. I think the snare, kick, and guitars balance is fine but I also agree that you could add more bass to the mix. Try EQing the hell out of this thing and see what other soundscapes it makes. You might find something you like. Good work!