Well for those of you who didn’t figure it out yet, yesterday was a joke for April Fool’s Day. Everything I wrote was bogus. The series is not over, Episode 11 is in progress. While I do think people could get tired of the format, I’m never going to run out of things to say, though some episodes will be better than others. I also have no incentive to have a road trip across the USA. I have enough scars from bicycle accidents as it is without needing to add to the collection with a motorcycle.

I think more of you figured out the joke than last year, it was basically the same trick. Since the fanbase is larger, there were a lot more comments this time. Like before, I put all comments mentioning April Fool’s or the date on hold, but they’re all posted now if you want to look through them. Also like before, I saw some suggestions that I was making up some of the comments. I’m not, these are all you guys. The only comments I made were in my name and were discussing the motorcycle trip.

Right now my plans are to finish Episode 11 of FM and the website, then focus soley on the next CP episode without having to divide up my attention on different projects.

Youtube

640x480 WMV (17MB)

I changed my mind, I’m not doing any more Freeman’s Mind; it’s over. I’ve realized there’s no way I’ll be able to think up enough material to get through the rest of the game. Enjoy the last episode; it’s kind of short, hence the half mark.

EDIT:
I think I’m going to buy a motorcycle and ride across the United States.

Youtube

640x480 74MB WMV


Well here’s the latest episode of FM, the next one won’t be too far behind. This episode will probably upset the Half-Life purists out there. I use some cheats because in my vision of Half-Life, I see Gordon as capable of doing a pull-up.

And yes, I know I said the previous episode would be the last one before the new website, but I was wrong. I thought things were going well, but all development pretty much stopped after I made that statement, and I can’t do the coding on my own. The good news I now have new help on it and progress has resumed on the site (again). I’m pretty serious about getting the site up, which is why I put the new URL in the credits. It will be called “Accursed Farms”, and will be the future homepage for all the videos. Nothing is changing production-wise, it will just be easier for me to manage the videos with the new site and will offer more features than the blogspot address. Right now it’s unfinished, so you’ll only get a front page, but I think it will be up pretty soon. I’m not giving any time estimates since everything seems to go to hell every time I do that. I’ll announce as soon as the new site is up.

EDIT:
I’m not sure why the latest episode is darker, I thought it was my imagination when editing. I think it might be a mistake I made in the recording. Unfortunately the footage is already done on the next episode, so it will be darker too, but I’ll try and make sure the future ones look alright.

I’m working on the next FM episodes and I’ll have them as soon as I can, although in the meantime I want to get some feedback on subtitles. Subtitles are going to be a big section of the new website, so I’m trying to standardize what method will be used. I have two options right now. One will have subtitles color-coded to the speaker. I thought this might make it easier for people to distinguish who is talking, since Mike and Dave use identical models for the characters. The other option I’ve heard of is to make the subtitles all the same color, but use a hyphen to distinguish when two characters are talking in the same time frame. Below are snapshots of each method:

Color coded:


Hyphenated


Let me know what you think in the comments and I may put up a poll. I’m especially interested in international viewers who will benefit from future translations. If you don’t care about the subtitles, then just ignore this. Thanks everyone.

EDIT:
Alright, due to feedback from translators and viewers, I’ve made my decision. My plans are to make plain white outlined text using hyphenated versions for the hard-encoded Youtube copies, and make both hyphenated and color-coded subtitle files (for ones that get done this way) available for download.

I’ve found a workaround for the barnacle problem I’ve been having. For those that care, if you go into noclip mode then clip through a wall while looking at them, it seems to fix the problem for the remainder of the demo. This does add an extra step and may make transitions between load zones even less smooth, but it does seem to be a solution for now.

I’m going to try and get two more Freeman’s Mind episodes out this month to make up for the delay on the last one. Since there’s lagtime between when I’m done and when it actually gets uploaded, I can’t promise anything, but that’s my goal.