Just had a very nice conversation with Matan about his point. Long read, but worth it.
Matan: oh my god
Matan: seriously
Matan: you guys want this
Matan: ill do this
HiGuy: ?
HiGuy: oh that thread
HiGuy: yeah
HiGuy: you need to stop pissing in their faces
Matan: here
Matan: i was about to post
HiGuy: if they're shit, they're shit
Matan: let me post this to you
HiGuy: that's their problem
HiGuy: if they release, then we get stuff, regardless of quality
Matan: right now im being outed with incorrect info, im not gonna let that go
HiGuy: if they don't, they don't
Matan: here before you go at me further, have a read at my post
Matan: alright?
HiGuy: ok
HiGuy: fair point
straight-out negativity doesn't seek to help anyone.
If they didn't repeat the exact same mistakes as so many mods (and their leaders) have done in the past, then we would be in a different position and I wouldn't be discouraging them. Listening to HiGuy/Jeff ranting for the last few months doesn't help.
HiGuy: i see that people previously have made the same mistakes, but people learn much better if they experience this
HiGuy: because obviously telling them hasn't done anything
HiGuy: but continue
Matan seems like someone who should give detailed advice rather than sit and expect all mods to be perfect in every way.
I did in the past. It ended up useless because not only I was ignored, but so did a few of the community members who pointed the exact same mistakes also ignored. I also don't expect mods to be in perfect in every way, but when mod leaders make more than one mod while their first mod is in progress that doesn't look good based on the history of mods in marble blast.
Likewise not only I but many others repeated numerous times our info and yet this has been ignored by pretty much everyone, including most of the people in this topic.
If they wanted my help they could have asked for that... even when I specifically talked to them (the mod leaders particularly) and personally volunteered to help out. Months ago I even offered info on how it can go better and how levels should be better designed and why the ones they showed off were not good and was completely ignored.
HiGuy: mk i see your point
HiGuy: you offered help (source?) and they refused to listen
Matan: chat logs on LBs and probably over skype somewhere
HiGuy: in that case, you're justified in ignoring them, but not really in demeaning them
Matan: but i did tell them why previous levels were bad
HiGuy: yes
HiGuy: but there's a difference between saying "they disregarded my advice" and "their mod is shit"
Matan: i specifically remember telling matt p why levels were bad and how to improve them and what people are looking for and what they shouldn't do
Matan: "their mod is shit" is out of context. it's going very bad with the current level design and the fact matt p. is doing 3 mods at once, and ive seen this in the past in 2009-2011 and it turned out disasterous
Matan: jeff is still a living example of being in so many mods, quitting lots, and the whole thing going into nopeville to the max
HiGuy: jeff is a dramatized case as he can't finish anything
HiGuy: although i see your point
Matan: but he WASN'T the only one
HiGuy: yes
HiGuy: and matt even mentioned that he was holding off on the other mods
HiGuy: "As for MBUQ, that is temporarily on hold. I only started that because I was bored and didn't feel like working on MBS or MBU at the time
"
We're still making WRR's for MBSpace and MBReloaded, and they're certainly not perfect as far as I know of.
I'm using those two mods to test for video-only WRRs and they are short mods that can easily be worked on. Also I never said those were perfect.
Reloaded died to lack of decent level creation; not because of community feedback (which was actually positive!). The staff killed it themselves.
Space mostly had youtube info, and what little topics/forums it did have, it had GOOD feedback from the community.
In the worst case, they fail and just release all their levels.
I can count the number of mods that didn't do that (even when they weren't being discouraged) on more than 10 fingers. In fact, here's a list of mods for you.
HiGuy: ok point taken on that last thing
HiGuy: i was sorta in the wrong to say that
HiGuy: but theoretically, they still could release their shit
Mods had community encouragement and died:
Marble Blast Ultimate Quest (before Matt P. there was a mod like that, but it turned out to be a whole new game, and that died anyway)
Marble Blast Plus
Marble Blast Hyper
Marble Blast Opal (ask Jeff for all the reasons)
MarbleBlast Über - HiGuy made it. Holy shit. We actually were in favor of this despite so many mods being made and it ended up being a level pack that doesn't exist anymore except likely HiGuy's computer.
Marble Blast Galaxy - impressed community, died anyway
Marble Blast OldStyle - actually a level pack, I for one super wanted to see it out, and it died.
Marble Blast Emerald 2 - ask HiGuy/Jeff how did that go. I'm putting this here because in the topic it had positive reception. It then had a 2nd topic revival by Luke and burned down big time.
Marble Blast Adventure - Legend of the Seven Gems - all the stuff moved to elite? not sure what happened to all the content.
Project Dragon - ??? did this turn out to become MBPU?
Mods that had no attention due to not enough info for community decision, or were supported/discouraged slightly:
Marble Blast REVOLUTION
Marble Blast Diamond
Marble Blast Neon
Marble Blast (no name - 2?) - turned out to become MBFuture and that had both community support and despite that still released as incomplete
Marble Blast Crystal - little info, said demo is coming out in 1 week, nothing happened
Marble Blast Deluxe - had nothing but general info on it, still received "good luck" for the community though
Marble Blast Xtreme - as above
Marble Blast Universal
Marble Blast Universe - as Deluxe/Crystal
Marble Blast Megas
Marble Blast Sapphire
Marble Blast Turbo - Ian V. mainly encouraged and discouraged
Marble Blast Clouds - actually just a mod to MBP's skyboxes, not an actual mod.
Mods that were frowned on:
Marble Blast Light / MarbleBlast Worlds - it came during the "mod explosion" of 2009-2011, and being one of the 20 or so mods that were started out and died nearly instantly, the community already decided it was going to die. It DID have some staff on it, but they all quit on it. The mod was then remade as MarbleBlast Worlds and that received GOOD community support, but died anyway. It also had a release but I have no copy of this.
Marble Blast Black - CoolPokeDude did it and yeah, turned out bad.
Marble Blast Darkness - a download link to the installation instructions text file???
Marble Blast dzemal - best mod ever. Uses MBP 1.04 graphics. I didn't even know 1.04 existed. showed a picture of battlecube and that's it. Some people did say good luck but that thread is funny.
Marble Blast Hyper - also goes under the community encouragment section, but also been frowned on
Marble Blast Zircon - started by Jeff's brother, Greg. That didn't turn out well with some inside angry posts.
There are also mods that DID release:
Marble Blast Advanced - it did not fulfil its original goals, staff got lazy, quit on it...
Marble Blast Emerald - HiGuy pulled it through...
Marble Blast Elite - a demo is out... and that's about it.
Marble Blast Revived - very good community reception for a mod mainly made by one person
Marble Blast Space - mentioned above
Marble Blast Reloaded - mentioned above
And the inprogress mods:
Marble Blast Fubar - Community support still up, will release at some day
PlatinumQuest - As with fubar. Even if incomplete, it WILL be released.
Note that not all mods are listed as the Vault/Archives did not exist back then so topics were deleted instead.
...now if the people that did work on the above mods released what they had when they died.
HiGuy: sweet jesus that's a lot of mods
Matan: i told you
Matan: i fucking am telling you
HiGuy: uh huh
Matan: i am not pulling this shit
Matan: there were a fuckload of mods
Matan: ive been through the 2009-2011 explosion
Matan: i saw at least 5 mods where their leaders were in at least TWO mods
Matan: at least 10 of them had staff that were in at least TWO mods
Matan: we have a damn history and it's a terrible one
HiGuy: indeed
Matan: I am saying super is going to become next if he continues in the way of 4 mods at once
HiGuy: perfectly reasonable assumption
HiGuy: although it's nowhere near "dead"
Matan: the levels are bad, I want to see them better by me saying make levels for public consumption and THEN use that feedback to get BETTER levels specific for Super
HiGuy: ok
Matan: however im constantly being ignored on THAT point
Matan: somethign that has been reiterated since 2009
HiGuy: so we've laid out that the mods don't actually CONTRIBUTE anything to the community
HiGuy: but do they take all that much out?
Matan: by nobody, pablo, oaky, myself, pf, andrew, rokoshu, tech warrio, do you want me to go on?
Matan: if all the people who worked on these mods
HiGuy: dw i've read the mod-killing megathread
Matan: worked as a single entity mod
Matan: we'd have more mods out
HiGuy: you see
Matan: more levels
Matan: but they don't
HiGuy: the issue is
HiGuy: not that mods are hard to create
Matan: they go on multiple mods instead
HiGuy: but that intermediate/advanced levels are
Matan: matt p. is doing the exact same things!!!
HiGuy: if they all joined together
HiGuy: you'd get 10,000 learning to rolls
HiGuy: 10,000 learn to jumps
HiGuy: 10,000 learn to collect gems
Matan: NO!
HiGuy: and maybe 10 actually good intermediate levels
HiGuy: and yes, I realize that he's doing similarly
Matan: what im saying is if we had those 15 people actually working together we'd see an actual mod with reasonable levels and not 10000 of whatever it is like we have right now when people make their own mods like in 09-11
HiGuy: but if you look at most of these dead mods
HiGuy: you'll notice a pattern
HiGuy: 20ish beginner levels
HiGuy: maybe 3 intermediate levels
Matan: actually
HiGuy: and maybe 3 advanced
Matan: i checked the topics
Matan: i didnt just pull the names out
Matan: you are wrong on that
HiGuy: ok
Matan: they had plenty of int/adv/exp in plans
Matan: it wasnt beg only
HiGuy: in planning, not in actuality
Matan: beg was done first in actuality yes
HiGuy: that's the issue
HiGuy: but how about this
Matan: but some had int/adv done first, not beg
HiGuy: instead of going nuts about how people didn't create any of these advanced levels
Matan: also im gonna post what i gave you
HiGuy: why don't we (shocker) ask them for their unreleased progress
Matan: since clearly ive got good reasoning behind it
HiGuy: yes
HiGuy: your reasoning is pretty good, but there are still points in the opposition
Matan: I agree and I don't disagree with them, but based on my experience of marble blast mods this isn't going well for them
HiGuy: indeed
Matan: if it finishes i want to see a full release
Matan: any incomplete release is death to me and another 1 that joins the history
HiGuy: i agree that they are not looking very well in terms of completion
HiGuy: but this extreme negativity doesn't help them at all
HiGuy: yes, they will probably fail
HiGuy: yes, they will most likely fail
HiGuy: but constantly showering them in this negative "you'll never succeed" talk isn't going to help at all
HiGuy: say what you will about their prospects
Matan: here's me saying: "if you're going to work on 4 fucking mods, it's dead"
Matan: if you work on 1 fucking mod, you're good
Matan: thats all im saying
HiGuy: that's not really true either
Matan: the moment he starts doing more than 1 mod, WHICH BASED ON THE HISTORY, it dies... because people damn do that
HiGuy: i can name countless examples of people who worked on 1 mod only, and it died
Matan: and i can count several examples of people who worked on several mods all at once and they all died
HiGuy: yes, working on more than 1 is worse
HiGuy: very much so
Matan: then here's me telling him STOP THAT
Matan: now will he listen?
HiGuy: well then
Matan: fyi
Matan: one more thing re: several mods
HiGuy: mk
Matan: when mod creators started new mods (IN THE PAST) the mods they were making (first ones) were dying fast
Matan: and it all went to death very soon
Matan: me saving super is by telling matt p to stop doing 4 mods and either concentrate on super only or you're letting everyone on staff kill it
Matan: because if they see matt p doing other mods and not contributing to super they aren't getting the encouragment needed to finish the mod
HiGuy: 100% agree with that
HiGuy: i can see what you're trying to tell them
HiGuy: what you're trying to tell Matt *
Matan: im saying it wrong in the topic but it's exactly what im saying here right now
Matan: he is losing faith, he's doing other mods
HiGuy: but the issue is that it comes out as negativity towards the whole mod in general, not towards the act of working on multiple mods
Matan: super is going to die if he doesn't get a good slap right now
Matan: i specifically outed matt
Matan: not the mod's staff
HiGuy: when you say "this mod is dead", I know that you're saying "this mod will die if you keep working on multiple ones", but it comes off as "everyone on this mod has stopped caring and it's effectively shit"
Matan: and it will happen very soon if matt doesn't get his shit together
HiGuy: yes
Matan: so both sentences are correct
HiGuy: the second one not yet
Matan: no but it is already on the way based on history
HiGuy: because there are people currently working on super who still care
HiGuy: so rather than TELL them that they've already failed
HiGuy: warn them that they will fail IF they don't start concentrating on one mod
Matan: and i love seeing that, but if the LEADER, the ONLY CODER, is not doing that, how good a mod is that