mysticjim

I'm having trouble adapting it for Youtube. The scope is way too vast and modern CGI just isn't capable of delivering believable results!

Interesting. I'm really tempted to actually watch it in movie theatre now to get the full audio/visual experience. And maybe engagement is the key thing that people are taking from the film when they haven't been previously invested in the books or the Lynch film? As I said, I was not bored for one second watching it, if it has that ability to keep people with it all the way through regardless, then it's nothing short of an incredible achievement.

No, the film is easy to follow at face value because there is no exposition. But the beauty of Dune as a peice of writing is it's depth, it's knowing and understanding how the political, religious and ecological ideals are melded. The film lightly touches these themes, but I'd still maintain, it's all there, but you need to know about it in advance in order to understand what and why they're doing what they're doing, otherwise it's just a lot of stunning eye candy without explanation. What we need on here is the viewpoint of someone who hasn't any previous Dune knowledge, I'd be fascinated to know what they made of it and what they perceived it to be about.

Watched it last night. It's a very odd situation to sum up but I'll have a go. So, there is almost no exposition given. It feels like the film 'expects' you to have read the book and/or seen the Lynch film. (for info, I've done both) I feel you have to know the story from previous experience in order to know the story of this film, if that makes sense. I would imagine someone who didn't know the history might be very confused. Visually, obviously we can all see it looks great, but it's the world Lynch portrayed on screen, with modern effects to fix the bits that didn't look so good or were over-ambitious in the 1984 film. Again, it's familiar because we've sort of seen it before. I am a fan of the Lynch film, despite it's limitations. The planet Caladan was perhaps the only thing that felt a bit 'off' for me - I'm so used to the emphasis on it being a rain swept, godforsaken place, it actually looked quite nice tbh! My biggest problem with the film, but probably in truth, the plot of the book overall, is that central conceit of the Harkonnens being pushed out of Arrakis, but they're not really, they're just hiding, waiting to try and wipe out House Atriedes. Would an all powerful galactic emperor really hatch such a convoluted plan, when you're talking about the infrastructure that mines the most valuable resource in the known Universe? That part of the plot is the only bit that seems small-scale, in a backdrop of some of the most incredible lore and world building ever committed to text. Back to the movie, I wasn't that impressed with the Baron, he looks like an extra from the Addams Family doing an impersonation of Colonel Kurtz from Apocalypse Now. As silly as it looks now, I prefer the perversely grotesque interpretation of the Baron from the Lynch film, he's truly horrible. But overall, while I kept finding nagging things to flag the film up on, 2 and half hours of actually watching it went by in what felt like 10 minutes, at no point did I feel it dragging in any way. I guess I knew what was going to happen, and the way it is portrayed it felt more like visiting an old friend, just dressed in new and modern finery. And it was only half of that first book, I do find myself craving the conclusion. I keep thinking, though, would Dune be better served as a series? I watched the Children of dune series from the mid-2000's and thought it worked in that format. But this version is an impressive cinematic bit of work. The director has built upon what went before in a sympathetic and modern way. Just wish he'd included a touch more Lynth-esque weirdness and nastiness.

Bit of a suprise midweek game, just wondered into the lobby and recorded a team game for a bit of a laugh Prem tomorrow at 9am (unless you're reading this in the future, then it's already live )

Happy Sunday people And regarding live streams - apologies, haven't had chance to comment yet @MikeZski- but sounds like an interesting concept.

Have uploaded Sundays live recordings

That is awesome, dude!

That Weirdjokes is a complete amateur, couldn't tell the difference between a Ptolomie and a Seleucid. Or was it a Kushite?

Thanks @Freagarach - yeah, I can see there is a bit of digging required, but appreciate nothing is ever deliberately missed in 0AD documentation, it's usually just an unfortunate victim of circumstance. I'll try and find a way to direct people to the best source of info.

Thanks all. This is interesting. There is no mention of flares, send to the head of the queue features or practical guidance on formations in the manual on the WFG site, the Wiki gameplay and I can't find anything in the Hotkey section linked to queuing beyond what was present in previous releases. For clarity here are the places I've been looking; https://play0ad.com/category/game-manual/#post-1982 - manual WFG Website https://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/0adManual - 0AD Gameplay manual https://trac.wildfiregames.com/wiki/HotKeys - Hotkeys section of the manual I don't think Freagerach has done a vid (I can't find it if he did) - but found this existing thread. So it has the requirement for the player to manually set a hotkey in order to use it and to know what the undocumented function is called, without anything to tell them what it does beforehand? This could be a bit trickier than I thought if the actual features aren't officially referenced. Ideally I want to be linking to something the player might have accidentally missed or was otherwise unaware of, not something that doesn't exist according to the documentation and have to link to ad-hoc forum threads or 3rd party videos. @Stan` - appreciate the answer may be there isn't anyone doing this at present, or it's low down a list of priorities (understandable given the nature of the project), but does officially documenting added features come under anyone's current remit? I can appreciate how it's not practical or possible to hand hold players through every single bit of functionality within the game, but a keen, new player who is willing to do the research would probably expect to find some reference to all of the above in the official docs. Out of interest, if the Gameplay manual is more up to date than the most visible manual on the WFG website, it's an unfortunate barrier for newer players to discover things.

Hello. Yeah, I actually wondered if that's what you meant after I'd done the reply - I guess I'm so used to people asking why I don't live stream I was a bit on autopilot! My bad It's an interesting concept, actually. Essentially you'd need to be able to hear mine and Weirdjokes audio feed live. We're currently using Mumble for verbal communication. Now, I'm a complete noob with this software, but I can see it being possible - although I think we'd have to ensure that everyone else on the channel could hear Weirdjokes and I, but was muted - so as not to be an impromptu addition to the recording! I think the only issue is potentially the players might be able to tune in as well and gain a bit of an unfair advantage. I know there is the risk of this when live streaming, but there is usually a significant delay in the broadcast, but here - the audio would be almost in real time. @Player of 0AD - any thoughts on this?

Hello all. Just trying to gauge some opinions for a future bit of Social Media/PR comms. Very interested in what features in the game that players perhaps aren't using enough or that there is a general lack of understanding of how they work? The idea is that I'll produce a list to be published highlighting a few of these with links to the documentation of how they work and hopefully get people to experiment a little more with them. Some maybe just be down to users simply forgetting about them - for example, I've not been in a team game when anyone has used the map flares. Some might be down to not reading the documentation available (guilty I'm afraid!) - the obvious example here is the shifting of the queuing of units. We're not limited to just stuff that was added in A25, but anything historic that you feel players generally have struggled to grasp or simply ignored. Very interested to hear your thoughts

Hello dude (well played earlier, btw ) So with the 'live' games, the main reason I do it this way is purely so I can have the guest (in the case of these last few games, @Player of 0AD) on the show seeing the action at the same time as I do the commentary and we're able to interact, etc. I appreciate there is an immediacy with live streaming - but I've always deliberately avoided it. There is literally so much that can go wrong when you are 100% live. And the content I produce, I do invest a little time in it as a production - there is a bit of editing and thumbnails and stuff. The two games we recorded today will shortly be edited for broadcast on YT - hopefully you won't have to wait too long, I'm thinking of releasing those midweek. I've not completely ruled out doing live streams, but I'm really struggling for time at the moment. And I'd have to be confident I've got the streaming settings perfect and actually set up some graphics in OBS Studio to make it look a bit professional.

Hey, nice to hear from you. Glad you've found the videos useful, and yeah - it seems if you play enough games, sooner or later someone will submit one to me, glad it was a nice surprise to see yourself involved in this one. *And yes, I swear people submit games with players with unpronounceable names just to listen to me struggle!!!

Bit late posting this - happy Sunday, y'all!

Hello all. First off, lack of social media updates is a bit my fault. In my capacity for sorting the Social media/PR side of things the plan was to hopefully get at least one large news update a month, with smaller snippets of content to keep the social media accounts ticking over in between. My work and childcare schedule as a result of the ongoing covid situation have slightly squashed my efforts since the release of A25. I think anyone in my particular line of work has been solidly under the cosh since early July. I've had more luck on the Youtube front in that I've been sent some awesome games just recently, so it's really nice that the audience is growing, but as everyone here knows, it's a niche channel rather than a method of actually advertising the game. I'm hoping to strategically coincide the next lot of web and SM updates with the general buzz around the eventual release of AOE4. There will be more public interest and 'buzz' for the RTS genre around this time, so it's a great opportunity to shine a slightly brighter spotlight on 0AD, but always remember - 0AD and AAA games operate in entirely different orbits. And due to the nature of how 0AD works, Alpha 26 is the primary focus of the devs at the moment. The release and the reception to Alpha 25 has been a bit of a highlight for me so far, being that A25 seemed to have a smoother dev cycle. It has been a big eye-opener seeing more of the behind the scenes working of 0AD development and the challenges that everyone faces in making it what it is. So, do expect a big push in the comms/PR side of things shortly. And it's fantastic that people here have suggestions and ideas of their own. I'd say if you have anything, any ideas for publication on the social media, main website news - please do let me know, feel free to DM me And utilisation of the official Youtube channel is something of an interesting one. It has very big pull, the Alpha release trailers, understandably, are far and away the highest viewed 0AD related content on Youtube. Now, unlike the social media accounts, I don't have the keys to the Youtube channel - and frankly, I have enough trouble sourcing the time to maintain my own one!!!!!! But if anyone has really good ideas for the kind of content that should be appearing there, and quite importantly, actually has the time and expertise to help bring it to reality, I'd definitely be keen to hear from you. The nature of how 0AD is made, that being very much volunteer centric, means that big (and expensive) self publication campaigns are very unlikely. This project embodies the DIY ethic throughout - it can sometimes be frustrating and appear to be a limiting factor in why 0AD perhaps isn't as well known and appreciated as it deserves to be. But it's also the reason the game exists at all - that spirit is evident every time you fire up the game and play it.

Greetings and happy Sunday So, last Sunday - just before I went off on holiday, I was joined by @Player of 0AD on a live recording of a 0AD match. This was something of an experiment with my regular commentary plus a guest on the show. Massive thanks to the players who took part, it's a shame it wasn't quite the sprawling epic game we'd probably all have hoped for (darn those merc cav!) but as a proof of concept it worked. And Massive thanks to @Player of 0AD- good job, dude, we'll set up another in due course

You know some of these are going to be silly.... Zardoz - a truly terrible film - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070948/ *that features Sean Connery modelling a mankini some 25 years before Borat - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070948/mediaviewer/rm1669385728/ Zythum - ancient Egyptian beer - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zythum Ziamet - large ancient Turkish fiefdom - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ziamet

Indeed. I think I've collected a few little features that I know exist, like this one, that people perhaps aren't using. What we'll need to do is identify where these things are clearly documented and explained and then link to them from SM posts. With any luck that might actually encourage more people to explore the guidance overall. I'm just back from holiday - @Stan` - might need to hit you up for a bit of additional info

Pre-holiday treat, I can go away knowing you've got a double bill of games to watch

In prep for the release of this video, when I will sadly be at work - here is the premiere thumbnail in advance Finally done another feature on a 0AD Mod, and it's one that's quite important for my usual shows @Langbart

Happy Sunday

@andy5995 That's interesting. I'd not really considered it, but indeed, the off-topic section - you do kind of plunge into a sea of global politics. Maybe introductions ought to be separated, then new forum members can discover the off-topic section when they're feeling a little more intrepid?

We're back to 4v4 this week