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Dissociation
Looking at gmlscripts.com following a suggestion from Leif902 brought something back into my mind. Dissociation.
Dissociation: describes the disconnection or lack of connection between things usually associated with each other.
At the bottom of every page of the GMLScripts website there is a line which reads
GMLscripts.com is not affiliated with Mark Overmars, The Game Maker Company, or YoYo Games.
A single sentence which makes it clear that GML Scripts is not part of the same group as the above mentioned entities. I have seen similar sentences around the Internet for example on sites about AdSense dissociating themselves with Google and on unofficial sites devoted to certain topics.
When I was setting up this blog in April I considered adding a similar sentence to the footer of the site, but I didn’t. True adding it may help boost my search rankings by increasing the concentration of the words “Game Maker” on the site but I never got around to it.
Personally I don’t think I will add a dissociation statement on gamemakerblog unless some confusion arises or I get a letter from the incompetent people at YoYoGames (whoops, I probably will now). Of course I should backup my claim with evidence so here goes:
- GM Rumours: YYG’s terms, Gamemaker Trademark
- GMC topics: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 & 8
What
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It’s happened…
One and half months into GameMaker Blog and it looks like it has finally happened. I knew it probably would, it was just a matter of when.
Someone has taken offence to my comments.
The recently released 4th issue of MarkUp included a re-run of an article first seen here on Game Maker Blog, a review of the game Forted.
I think the ‘offending’ sentence is as follows:
Sure, this [refering to Forted] has all been seen before with the defend your castle (xrl.us/castle) game produced by xgenstudios, which interestingly I also compared Coffee Lover Proction’s trailer for Senseless War (xrl.us/senselesswar) to, but the concept was good and Micco (xrl.us/micco), the creator of Forted certainly hasn’t produced a rip-off of defend your castle.
Remember this is in an article about the game Forted, it merely contains a link to my review of the Sensless War trailer. So Coffee, the creator of the Senseless War game decided to go to the MarkUp topic in the GMC and rant and rave about an article that wasn’t even included in MarkUp. Quite what he thinks my opinion of the trailer has to do with MarkUp I don’t know. My views are my views and they remain my views.
Let’s see what Coffee says, and before this kicks of further I’d like to point out that I am perfectly entitled to quote what has been said on an open discussion board.
Ok, what is it with you and that Senseless War trailer that I made with GMCap?! Instead of JUDGING my game by the trailer and saying it’s just a rip-off of the game “Defend Your Castle”, TRY THE DAMN GAME!
Firstly he starts off by suggesting I am running a campaign against his game – I wrote one article.
Then he says I shouldn’t judge a game by its trailer. He obviously misses the point of the article. I wouldn’t normally judge a game just by its trailer but if there is one available it certainly plays a big part. The article was one of a series investigating what I thought of games based on their trailers.
Apparently I said this game was a rip off of Defend your Castle. The actual wording I used in my review of the trailer was “From the trailer it appears that Senseless War is a bit like xgenstudios’s Defend your castle game”.
I fail to see how saying a the game looks a bit (purposely emboldened in the original article,) like something can be interpreted as saying the game is a rip-off.
Coffee then follows up by suggesting that I should remove the article from my blog and that I should not write about anything he has made without his prior permission. (!) This is not China. This is not Iran. I can say what I like. I simply expressed my opinion. I certainly don’t need someones permission to review something freely available on the Internet.
I also recieved two PMs from Coffee asking me to remove the post (I assume this refers to the review of the trailer). Again and again Coffee mentions that I shouldn’t call the game a “rip-off” without having played it. I never called the game a rip-off. Anywhere. But I certainly haven’t played it. And I don’t intend to.
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MarkUp Issue 4 (June) released
Issue 4 of the MarkUp game development magazine published by GMking.org has been released.
Download links are below:
- PDF High Quality
- PDF Low Quality
- XPS
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Why you shouldn’t add a forum
Personally I think adding a forum to your website is one of the biggest mistakes you can make.
A blog post by Grego advising people on how to create a half decent forum, if they insist on having one, reiterated many of the points I had spinning around in my head.
There is no point in adding a forum to a site where it won’t be used, and as Grego and I have both mentioned before clone forums suck. Currently my sites have a grand total of zero forums – and I am quite proud of that. It shows I am not prepared to waste my time setting up forums with rows upon rows of empty boards. Of course this leaves me to waste my time on other matters and also shows that none of my sites are popular enough to warrant having a forum.
One of the sites which I run, an Internet Marketing site which specialises in sending raw traffic to sponsors sites, did have a forum – however now it doesn’t. Quite frankly a forum for a small site is more trouble than it is worth, especially if – as was the case here most of the posts on the forum were just spam.
Often I see forums with rows upon rows of zeros down the page – for the topic and post counts, or perhaps rows and rows of single digits numbers from a grand total of 3 or 4 members. Sure, forums do have a part to play in communicating online. GMKing’s forums are probably the smallest forums I visit and they do certainly serve a purpose. But the number of people who will waste time creating advert-ridden, poorly designed, buggy, and downright pointless forums still amazing me. These people expect others to come and visit their site and build a community. I’m sorry, but it doesn’t work like that – build and they will follow. Build content that is, not an empty forum.
Now what did this post have to do with Game Maker?
No idea, but many users of Game Maker produce these forums.
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Please help me steal gamemaker
A post on the GMC:
I dont know why i am doing this,and im probably gonna get done in real bad because of it but…
can i have some1’s Activation/Registration key/code ?????
(PM me)You don’t say,….
(Topic has been deleted from the GMC)
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Slow server is a feature of Freewebs
From the recommendations topic in the Distributing Games forum at the GMC:
FreeWebs
- Name: FreeWebs
- URL: http://members.freewebs.com/
- Hosted URL: Subdomain
- Space: Initial 40MB, can request up to 100MB on free account.
- Bandwidth: up to 500MB of user bandwidth per month
- File size limit: unknown, but I think it’s none
- Upload options: Browser
- Adverts: One FreeWebs text link at the bottom of the page when using the page builder
- Requirements: none
- Other Features: Very slow server, guest book, chat, web counter, e-forms, easy page designer.
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Game File Hosts Compared (part 2)
There wasn’t all that much of a comparison in my last post about game file hosts as I reviewed the first file host mygmgame. At least now I have something to compare further sites I test with.
Next in the firing line is Host-A which appears to be one of the most popular file hosts currently at the GMC judging from the number of people who post Host-A download links and claims to offer ‘free file hosting for the masses’, as opposed to what?
At registration I am pleased to note that my 120 character e-mail address, as we all have, was acceptable – however the captcha test was a little tricky for my liking.
The dashboard is certainly better than mygmgame – however I have to admit I’m no fan of sites with dark backgrounds and light coloured text. It appears you can get extra bandwidth if you refer new people to join Host-A using your link, however this suggests that bandwidth, as well as storage space, is limited. Indeed 550MB of bandwidth is all that a new account is given for a month which really is pathetic.
There’s no progress bar or indication as to how much of my file has already been uploaded as I wait to see if the file is accepted by Host-A. What joy, what joy an error appears. So I go back and try again.
This second attempt is more successful and the file uploads. I am given an option of two linking methods and code can be generated in either HTML or BBCode – a feature which was lacking with mygmgame.
The link provided appears to link directly to the file however when it is visited up comes a page prompting me to select a mirror – I have a choice of 1, or download directly from the site. I take my time selecting the only mirror available, it’s such a hard choice and the download begins after about 5 seconds.
Or when I say begins I mean prompts me for a save location. The file does not actually start to download.
So Host-A is a miserable failure in this test. File space is limited to a measly 20MB, whilst bandwidth has a pathetic 550MB/month limit. Despite the fact that my download didn’t actually commence by bandwidth was still used up. The site seems more concerned about having people upgrade to get features which available free elsewhere such as reasonable amount of bandwidth and storage space.
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Game File Hosts Compared (part 1)
There are loads of sites out there who want to let you have the privilege of storing your game on their servers for download. Indeed there are so many of these sites which I see advertised daily in people’s signatures at the GMC and in the download links provided that I am amazed by the poor quality hosts some people choose to have.
Today I am going to examine the features of 3 of the best game file host sites used by the gamemaker community, and I will also highlight some of the appalling hosts some people insist on using.
The hosts I am featuring are ‘instant upload’ hosts, so fully fledged webhosts such as parahosting which half the GMC seems to have fallen in love with are not going to be included in this article.
To test the various sites I am going to attempt to upload and host a 1,365KB .zip compressed folder containing a very simple gamemaker creation on all of the sites.
First up is mygmgame [gmc] [url], a site which enables users to upload webpages as well as files for download if they wish. The design here seems to change at a rate of about twice a month, but from what I can make out new features are being added as the site develops.
The site has had problems from spammers in the past, in particular, porn has been posted on the site on at least once occasion and was not removed instantly even when I notified the site.
I click to register as I assume this is what I must do to upload a file although there is nothing other than my instinct to suggest this.Straight away the site looks poor – the register page has a different design from the rest of the site. Not quite sure why they want to know my time zone, but these extra questions and checkboxes certainly don’t win it any extra marks.
After I submit my details up comes a page which looks like it is supposed to be the members dashboard, it certainly doesn’t win any marks for design or ease of use. Indeed I have still not come across any directions of how to use the site. Guessing my way along I decide to upload the file, I’ve no idea what the ‘Directory’ box is for, perhaps I can choose where on the server my file is stored – I’ll leave it blank.
It took a long time but eventually the progress bar was completed and it appears my file has been uploaded, ‘Upload Succsesfull!‘ says the site hopefully. No URL for me so share with my friends is present, but by clicking on the uploaded file name in the dashboard I am taken directly to download the file. The download takes 30 seconds, with no nonsense ‘click here to start download’ pages.
The site could be a lot more user friendly, but it serves its purpose. The file downloads.
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