(June 17 to June 23, 2013)
Welcome dear readers to the latest issue of the Weekly Gazette! Here in the Gazette, we give you the news in brief of what occurred in the past week as well as provide any news happening in Save-Point itself
Official Area
Announcements and Updates
After finding a small error, Kore put forth a notification that the forum would be Going down for Maintenance as he didn't wish any data loss to occur during the work. As the Upgrades became complete, Kore put forth a request that no one issue any bug reports to theme-based issues, specifically those for just the base themes. And with that, Kore began the process of fixing the core themes. After the Theme repairs were complete!, Kore believed he ironed out all the obvious bugs. With the current repairs completed, he now invited the theme bug reports.
Of course, the maintenance upgrades werent' the only thing on Kore's mind as he reconfigured the board for a Twitter Update, but wasn't sure about the API system. After performing some Twitter API updates and worked on an old plugin that was causing a conflict, he thought that Twitter should work now. Unfortunately, it didn't and thus ticked Kore off.
And if you think Kore was done, you were wrong as he planned to perform a SYSTEM UPDATE of the forum's PHP itself. So he told members to expect massive bugs that he'd fix. However, the Maintenance was Postponed due to rain, or due to huge storms hitting the North Eastern Plains of North America to be exact. Given that, Kore decided to wait until later so the upgrades won't be interrupted by a power loss or other possible events. Still, the next expected update will be fairly extensive and could cause a number of expected bugs, so he wanted to let the members know ahead of time.
Feedback and Suggestions
There were problems with the forum's Spoiler Tags system, and figured he would be able to fix them in fifteen minutes. He was right as his next post claiming his success was right on time.
Occasions
This week, we had the pleasure to celebrate the triple birthdays of ks51, aurons13 and JWCaisa. After that, we had the pthe privilege to celebrate both krivus's and Thomas6497's birthday. Then we had another three-person whammy when Gruemaster, immortaldefense and Pherione all had the same birthday. After that, phemto's and BlackCatSG's birthday passed.
General Chat
MetalRenard feels congratulations are in order as having reached second place in the top poster's list is What's on his Mind. Granted, Zackwell chuckled and wished him luck getting the first place slot. DerVVulfman shrugged, attributing his position to all the Weekly Gazettes he's written. That disheartened MetalRenard, but DerVVulfman gave him a hug and some advice. At the same time, Kore had been working on a CMS project and supplied a link to those interested.
Having heard about the dilemma of an unfortunate canine whos legs were broken as a pup, he hoped that people would Please Help Jones the Dog as the fundraiser he found was able to raise barely enough to repair one of his legs. Help could have come by way of donations, but even spreading the work about the fundraiser would benefit. However, Kore reported that the fundraiser was over and Jones's owners wound need to make a new fundraiser to continue. It did surprise Kain Nobel, but figured the fundraiser ended as their goal was met, so the thread was summarily closed.
Games Development
Development Discussion
Taylor posted four shots of his current battlesystem in our Maps and Screenshots Thread this week. And while he likes the stats bars and plans to include a turns bar, he's not to happy with it as he feels it appears disjointed. He would more like it to resemble a japanese battlesystem to which he supplied a screenshot link, but he believes the layout appearance works better with a dynamic camera that moves during the action. If all else fails, he may end up reworking the appearance as he suggested with a screenshot link to the original Final Fantasy game for the Nintendo Entertainment System. After that, there was some discussion between Taylor and MechanicalPen about Taylor's system. Taylor briefly mentioned the relationship between the leader and party members, the turn order bar and how faces would eventually be used within, and how he was reconsidering the use of a Final Fantasy-like row stats system. Meanwhile, MechanicalPen suggested where the turns bar could be moved and how it could function.
RGSS Support
This week, Iqus was looking for, what he figured, would be an easy RPGMaker XP script tha replicated Final Fantasy VII's Hyper and Tranquilizer Items that could bring out the Sadness and Fury states, or cure them depending on which item was used. It wasn't long before MechanicalPen poked inside with a link to his Tiered States script, and suggested some code which he felt would do the trick. And to Iqus's delight, the system worked perfectly.
But that wasn't the only request that Iqus made, as he's using a minimap script and would like to Activate a Switch with a button press, in turn turning on and off the minimap itself. He posted some code he felt would work, which MechanicalPen rewrote and suggested that Iqus use. Unfortunately, the code did not work and MechanicalPen suggested a different bit of code in its place. Still, the revised code failed. Such issues reminded MechanicalPen why he hated toggle switches in the first place, meanwhile MetalRenard pointed out that the switch system could be done with a single event system. After that, DerVVulfman posted his own bit of script code, loosely describing how the system worked.
Creativity Section
Art and Design
She's been a little bit behind in posting her work, but buprettyinpink is back and has more to show in her Pixel Art, Sketches, and Writings topic. Within, you'll notice the front view pose of a female characterset which is being readied for the ReGaL RPG Game Lab system. After that, you'll see an elegant nymph wearing a long robe, her emerald wings. If you venture further, you'll see more characterset works such as a large tree with extremely detailed and verdant folliage, an old naval vessel fighting off a large squid and a manor with desert tan brickwork.
But that's not the only artwork posted this week. You may also wish to peruse Daylights Artwork and pixelart thread as he posted a number of mugshots showing the various facial expressions of his characters. Within, you can clearly see the detail work he gave Paige as the images of this redhead are double in size of his others. Still wearing the same red outfit, the only thing missing is her battleaxe. Emilie is also shown wearing her classic green hood and gray v-neck top, and the sorceress Jale is still sporting the form fitting magenta dress split down the center, with green lacing tying it together. Bass has nearly double the expressions shown, all while waring his heavy green overcoat and thick brown scarf. And lastly, Kiki is shown wearing a top that isn't much more than a two-toned gray sports bra with attached long sleeves with yellow trim.
And though she thinks her current work-in-progress is visually crude, GLaDOS wonders Whatcha think of this theme for Save-Point?. Within, she posed a layout showing a revised logo area with a new Save-Point Gem as well as a modified board layout. MetalRenard felt that the gem logo was too tall. So too did Zackwell who liked it and thought it looked very 'next gen'. And after examining the layout further, MetalRenard felt that the design could use a border effect and while he liked it, he hopes it could be made to look a little less simplified as he felt Youtube went when Google took over. Answering MechanicalPen's query if the Helvetica font was being used, GLaDOS replied no, and mentioned the three fonts she used. But she was curious about what border effect that MetalRenard implied. With that, Kore too appreciated the theme appearance and felt it could be a new default theme, though he'd like to keep the original themes as well. Feeling that forum themes are usually much too cluttered, Taylor hopes it contained a minimal of visible options. In this, he felt that most things in the Side Profile area in posts should contain bare essentials such as the username, avatar, userbars and gender while other things remain in the member's profile page. Along with that, he felt the individual post titles and post number could be removed, and the limitation of signature sizes rather than a scroll bar option
Special Projects
ReGaL (RPG Game Lab)
The Talk Box
A question was put forth by MetalRenard Regarding ReGaL, whether the system was being designed solely by members of Save-Point, and in turn release a game made by the forum with anyone willing within to join in. Kore pointed out that while the current development team consists of Save-Point members, the project could benefit from additional qualified assistance. DerVVulfman interjected that there has been some interest outside of the forum as he had talked to GubID of Creation Asylum who volunteered to work on battlesystem code as that is his forte, and had talked to both Amaranth of Amaranthia Games and ccoa herself. Both too liked hearing about the feature concepts and the planned expansion outside the Windows/PC platform. And as of concepts, Kore liked being the 'idea guy' now.
Screenies
Kain Nobel decided to unveil a screenshot that displays how the Actor's Database Tab is planned to resemble. Since most members herein are users of the RPGMaker line, most of the layout and features should be familiar. However, some new options are present such as the addition of Gender and Race options, both of which are available in conditional branches. The Race settings are very much similar to an actor's Class, in that they may their own element rates, skill sets and armor/weapon sets and limits. And Kain Nobel even put forth some simple clips to show how you can make such branches. One thing that isn't fully visible is the additional pages in the Actor's tab. Just the first page of the Actor's database is shown and doesn't show element attack rates, defense rates, and more. On seeing the screen, GLaDOS proclaimed her love to the new system. And Kore put forth a query if it were possible to have actor-specific scripts or event code built into the Actor's database.
If you were hoping for another update, Kain Nobel came forward with one regarding the Database/Classes. It may look fairly different than the Class Database tab that RPGMaker users are familiar, but it has a number of the same features. Similar in concept, there is also expected to be a Races tab to be worked on that includes a Gender system, so the characters use a combined Actors/Races/Classes system. The screencap that Kain Nobel supplied looked pretty crowded to Taylor, though he was pleased with the increased flexibility of the system. Meanwhile, he was curious about the displayed 'skill type' command in the system and wondered if it related to a Skill Type command. In answer, DerVVulfman reported that it was in reference to the whole skill grouping feature you see in numerous games such as the Final Fantasy 'White Magic' / 'Black Magic' separate groups.
And that wasn't the only update that Kain Nobel gave as he wanted to show off the Actions Database tab, though it isn't 100% planned out yet. The basic idea was that it handled common battle actions such as AttackX2, Attack (all) and other functions. And as it is a conceptual work, he invites comments on the idea.
Well, that's it for this week.
"From the moment I picked your book up until I laid it down I was convulsed with laughter. Some day I intend reading it." - Groucho Marx (1890 - 1977)
PROSPECTIVE GAZETEERS!
If you are the creator of a thread in Save-Point, you have the option of sending/writing your own entry into the Gazette. The Gazette accepts write-in announcements (which will be doublechecked). Likewise, the Gazette would welcome other content such as a comic-strip series, ongoing story arc, or the like.
Just PM DerVVulfman with the submissions. Submissions must be in by 10pm EST.