mysticjim

Bit of an odd one this week!

Yes, familiar with most of those - looking to retweet and share a few on the Social media platforms shortly, especially that last one - I've had contact with him in the context of my Youtube channel, he's really sound guy and is pretty taken with 0AD.

More Sunday Fun!

Got to admit - so many of the players and contributors speak such good English, it's easy to forget just how international the 0AD community is. Being a native English speaker I'm probably guilty of taking it for granted, so I think you make a great point regarding translations. I'd imagine getting it translated into Spanish, German, French and Italian wouldn't be all that tricky and would cover the largest reader-bases. Beyond that, I think it would be best endeavors - you can easily make a case for Portuguese, Russian, Mandarin and Cantonese, Urdu and Punjabi, then you're into the realms of a major translation exercise to rival that of the game itself before you even get to Middle Eastern, African, Eastern European and Scandinavian languages. It would be quite an effort (apologies to everyone I've not mentioned, too!) I don't think me running it through Google Translate would really cut it, and I'm not sure how we'd present it all either. But - I've met people from all over the world playing 0AD, it's one of the best things about this community - we do have to think internationally.

Thanks - it's part of the PR/Social Media Strategy I'm enacting. The announcement also appeared on the website and was either quoted in full or linked to the website announcement across the mainstream social media platforms. I think @Stan` has done some of the more niche platforms - pretty sure he posted on Mastodon, but for now I'm focusing on website, forum and Twitter/Reddit/Facebook and Insta. The plan is there will be one main announcement per calendar month like this one, then ad-hoc postings and retweets/shares across the SM platforms throughout the month. It's just to keep the Social Media accounts ticking over with activity, spread the word a bit and get some trending on the 0AD hashtag, etc - hopefully giving the project a little more visibility and accessibility.

Absurd, yes, but priceless as well

C'mon, it's got to be Starfish all the way!

Sneak Peek of 0 A.D. Alpha 25 A provisional date of June 2021 has been proposed for the ‘Feature Freeze’ – the point at which new features for the upcoming Alpha version of 0 A.D. stop being added and the development team focus solidly on bugfixes. This is not the release date. The feature freeze is one of the precursors to release, with the specific launch date to follow. You can find more information here. First Impressions of Alpha 25 Be sure to tune into the Tom0AD live stream on YouTube on Friday 7th May 2021 at 9pm CET to see a preview of the latest development version of Alpha 25 in action. The broadcast will feature Tom and fellow YouTubers, Alistair Findlay, and Jim Cogan (0AD Newbie Rush) putting the dev version through its paces live on air. And there will also be a live Q&A session with 0 A.D. Developer, Stan`. New Features Following closely on the heels of Alpha 24, this latest iteration of 0 A.D. will look to further build on functionality and further expand the existing feature set while also fixing existing bugs. With a shorter planned gap between alpha releases this time around, most of the proposed additions are subtle and geared toward small improvements in the current and future player experience rather than headline features. But there are a few notable things to look out for. Single Player Campaign Support: The ability for 0 A.D modders to create their own single player campaigns will be added. Alpha 25 will only include the base functionality for this with full campaigns scheduled to be added in later iterations. Improved Multiplayer Responsiveness A technical improvement that players may ‘feel’ rather than see, this is another progressive improvement step to smoothing out multiplayer gameplay and enhancing unit pathfinding. Before commands in multiplayer were processed twice per second, now five times like in single player. Ongoing Balancing Changes Numerous changes to balance of the game by way of micro adjustments to various civilisations, buildings, and units. For a full list of all proposed features/changes visit the Alpha 25 Wiki page. Get Involved! Your Chance to Name the New Alpha Every new iteration of 0 A.D. gets a name, and this is your chance to contribute your suggestions. The Alpha 25 Name Suggestions thread on the 0 A.D. Community Forum has been open since January 2021, but there is still time to vote for your favourite and put forward your own suggestions. 0 A.D. release names start with the letter of the alphabet that corresponds to the release version. Alpha 22 was Venustas, Alpha 23 was Ken Wood, Alpha 24 was Xšayāršā, and Alpha 25 will start with a ‘Y’. Check out the thread here.

Dude, I'm running out of outlandish superlatives to use in my titles! I'm having to delve into the perfectly, linguistically correct - but slightly risque sounding ones now!!!

For the 45th consecutive Sunday! It's Newbie Rush time! Premiere about to start!

Premiere in about an hour from now

Hi @Stan` and @Lion.Kanzen - sorry, doing multiple things at once atm! If you message me what you want announced I can work that into the posting going out shortly. If it's something ongoing them can certainly timetable for further posts as well

It's @Langbart's mod, he's done all the work for it. I've mentioned people are asking about it, but not sure if he'll be up for releasing it officially. Hope he does, cos it's well cool

Bit late psoting today! But here is some more Sunday 4v4 action, and check out the NROC mod, it's getting better every week ( massive thanks to @Langbart for his outstanding efforts with this!)

Hi Robin, @Yekaterinamentioned this to me recently. I was initially not sure - certainly probably wouldn't want to commit to putting my whole archive of videos on BiliBili - but I reckon as an experiment I'd probably be happy to let you transport one or two to see how much interest and traction they get. Whats the gaming landscape in mainland China like at the moment? And what about RTS games specifically? I'm guessing there must be some demand when you're talking about a population that big? Out of interest - is there a natively produced RTS game that is huge in China but largely unknown/under the radar to the wider world?

Have finally gotten into the 0AD Twitter account (thank you, Stan!) and retweeted to TeamYoutube. I've linked them to the website and the wikipedia page (apparently having a wikipedia page used to be an essential requirement) - we'll see what happens next. I'm wondering if it's the lack of updates on the Wikipedia page that may be the problem? It says it's not been updated in a while, although the correct Alpha version is listed, but evidently this is such a minor update as to not count as an update at all.

First day on the job. Tweets a threatening message to Youtube on Twitter, purporting to be Wildfire Games! Claims the ultimate power granted to him was way too much! Goes into self enforced exile! It's okay, Stan, I got this ( threateningly brandishes a baseball bat ) Just kidding

Indeed, I do use the Alt-D thing to get my thumbnail angles, I'm just a bit rubbish when it comes to making them look classy! I deliberately tend to go for a more over-exposed, punk rock look to mine! Whereas for the official Social Media posts, I want something that shows off the pretty bits of the game

As part of the Pr and Social Media work I'm doing for 0AD at the moment, I got the keys to 0AD's Twitter account. It's been suggested that I tweet at Youtube's Twitter account to highlight the vanishing of 0AD from Youtube's gaming section - will be good to do that from the 'Big Dawg' account! I'll let you know if they reply.

Greetings all Wasn't sure where best to post this, but as it's an art related request, i thought here might be quite good So, I'm now responsible for some of the PR and Social media posting from official 0AD platforms. I'm trying to ensure that regular comms are going to be posted on the mainstream SM channels and while I'm doing okay for the actual written content, to properly engage it's pretty much standard these days to have an eye catching bit of imagery to head up the post, especially on Insta. As anyone whose seen my thumbnails on the videos on my Youtube channel will testify, while my take on graphics is sometimes amusing, it's probably not what is called for here! So I thought I'd throw it out to you guys to see if anyone can assist. Essentially we will be having a monthly news item on the official 0aD website, and elements of that will be echoed or linked to on each of the social media platforms, so I need a lead image for the website article that can be branded up and resized if required. I think a sensible resolution shot of something cool within the gameplay would probably be enough, just something representative of the game, not too bothered about biome, etc, maybe some of the good looking vistas and landscapes, maybe some cool looking close quarter combat. Images may get used more than once, or possibly cut into sliced montages to get a bit more mileage out of them - there will probably be more demand for these stock images as the number of SM postings increases (ultimately hoping to do one major announcement a month and smaller ones every week) If anyone wants to be involved or has any images to donate, just drop me a DM. Many thanks Jim

My Sunday offering! Enjoy And @Yekaterina- which particular Chinese language does Robin speak? I'm guessing either Cantonese or Mandarin?

And for the 42nd consecutive Sunday, another game for you! And how on Earth did I not know that palisade walls could be build in neutral territory in A24??????

Lone developers working on vanity projects do exist, and I suggested 0AD isn't that project (which it isn't). But when context is taken into consideration and is applied logically, that also suggests that not all lone developers are working purely on vanity projects, which clearly they aren't - and clearly I didn't suggest they were either - nor did I suggest a lone developer working on a vanity project is good or bad. The logic you're applying is akin to announcing that I'm allergic to rabbits, therefore I must be anti or against all furry animals, presumably because you say I do. And exactly what is wrong with a lone developer working on a vanity project if that's what makes them happy?

Hi @happyconcepts - I'm sorry you feel you've had a bad time of it. I don't know the circumstances, possibly a little elaboration would help in understanding? Regarding your comments directly towards me, I don't understand your comment about my 'anti attitude against lone developers.' I'm not clear precisely what you mean, and apologies if I've misunderstood. I'm certainly not anti or against lone developers and don't think I've ever expressed any such opinion. And my personal marketing of my Youtube channel has been fairly standard - I post regularly on the 0AD forum, Reddit, Facebook, Twitter and few discords, with varying levels of engagement. 0AD is a niche game, and commentary on matches is 'more niche.' It's not something that is going to blow up and go viral in a couple of months. My channels growth in terms of views, watch time and subs is roughly in line with how the Tom0AD channel (the biggest 0AD youtube themed channel and far more established than mine) grew in it's first year, fairly slow but steady. Month on month there has been a proportional increase on all metrics, and I can accurately measure what kind of impact my marketing efforts have had. On balance, while I'd love to have a bigger audience instantly, getting an extra 30 odd subs each month (44 last month, hoping for 50 in April) is sustainable growth. I believe the strategy I've employed would scale up proportionally for an appropriate game with a much more vast audience, but I like 0AD