Recently I have been working on trying to clean up the portal to reach the next B/P rank, but I'm at the point where they're over a thousand movies apart. It takes a while to go through that many movies, and during that time you'll see so much abominable dreck. Worse yet, too much of it is getting through. The problem is simple, the old delete if under score upon leaving judgement is simply too low in these modern times on Newgrounds.

The score itself wasn't necessarily chosen in error back in the day, but one must remember that Newgrounds used to be a far harsher place voting wise than it is now. It used to be that getting a movie with a score above 3 was a honor akin to getting a score above 4 today, and the highest scoring movie in the top 50 was an ephemeral 3.99. Just okay movies would often rank in the mid 2's, and sometimes people earnestly trying wouldn't quite manage to get a 2 even. Also, there used to be an army of bots that people had runnning voting a zero on every single movie on the portal every single day... thankfully that was stopped many years ago.

But these days aren't those times anymore, thanks to the elimination of many old institutions that glorifed blamming a little too much as well as the fixing of bot voting exploits. Most decent flashes will almost always score over 3 today, and truly great stuff over 4 with ease. The fact is that during my last 700 B/P points towards my next rank I have not seen even one thing of any value whatsoever come even close to being under a 2, but I have seen so much utter dreck that would have been blammed back in the day squeak by under 2 these days. The problem is that while bad down-voting has been removed, we now have people with bad upvoting trying to spam Newgrounds with shit for the lulz.

It no longer matters if you're total shit, so long as you're affiliated with one of the Negrounds Disrespect groups (I won't be naming names) you'll get enough wholly undeserved 5 to make sure your filth is never in danger of being blammed anymore. These days the only way to get blammed is to both be filth, and not part of one of these groups that making disrespecting Newgrounds an official mission statement. If the minimum protection score required were raised to 2 there would not be a single thing of value lost, but it would hamper much of the lulz-bombing I have sadly been seeing way too much of lately.

I'm not even going to comment on this, I will let the sheer WTF-itude speak for itself:

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/bbs/ph pBB2/viewtopic.php?p=1042281#1042281

So, apparently Proud Pirates have decided that all legitimate purchasers of any kind of media are to be ridiculed as "BuyFags"...

*Shakes head in disbelief*

ACTUAL POST: http://www.newgrounds.com/bbs/topic/12 21292

I've been thinking about doing this for quite a while, and I've finally decided to sit down and get this started. After all, if I don't, it doesn't seem like anyone else will either. So here's the deal, Newgrounds has not yet had a multiple author Chrono series based skit compilation, so let's work on fixing that. Here are the following guidelines for the project so far:

- Entries may be of any length you deem fit for the idea, and can actually get done.
- Entries are to be 30fps, at 550x400 (default resolution), with your stage color set to black.
- Only use Flash 8 or earlier (See update at bottom of post), have all audio files set to stream rather than event, and be sure to have everything in the symbol library have your user name as part of the symbol name (i.e.: Clovis15_Crono_Running_Up).
- I will be putting in as many entries as size limitations will allow, there will be no specific number of entries I am shooting for.
- I will accept entries that are either hand animated, or sprite animated, but I will only be accepting entries that are actually good. Also, if space limitations become an issue, hand drawn will be factored as a plus (although I will also ask Tom Fulp for permission to go over when we get there).
- Please only use original music from the portal, or music from the games. I respect Tom Fulp's wishes, so I don't want to see any copyrighted music from Record Labels showing up in here. Free use laws protect parodies of a subject matter, but the use of copyrighted music is never protected even if it is used in the context a parody.
- Deadline is currently end of April. I don't know how realistic that is, so I am willing to extend the time when we get there if necessary. However, I'm only going to permit extensions for people who can show they're working on something.
- All submissions should somehow be related to Chrono Trigger, Chrono Cross, or - if you really want to be hardcore - Radical Dreamers. I will be automatically rejecting any skits that are based around any of the Chrono Fan Games that Square-Enix has issued C&Ds, so no skits about Crimson Echoes please. Other than that, feel free to go Hog Wild.
- The use of voice acting is heavily encouraged, but - unless your skit somehow involves something along the lines of Crono and Company discovering that Lavos is really Strawberry Clock - I am not accepting anything that uses Speakonia.
- It's the .fla files you will actually have to submit, so be prepared to use Megaupload.

Oh yes, we need a pithy name for it once its released. I'm open for suggestions.

UPDATE: I have found some help in assembling the final product, and thus we will be able to accept submissions from versions of Flash beyond 8.

A lot of people are currently in an uproar over Tom Fulp's recent comments, but he's fully in his right to make them. If you read the entire thread - and not just the first post - Tom has said he wants to protect the history of the portal, but he wants to cut this stuff off at the head from here on out. We should be respecting this; legal defenses are horribly expensive and, something which many in the thread seem to fail to get, fair use laws do not protect the usage of copyrighted music at all. Why do you think Robot Chicken always uses sound alike music, even when they otherwise copy likenesses exactly, every time they do a parody of something. Besides, for those of you thinking it's the end of the world for sprite movies, I bring you this comment from page 8 of the thread from Tom Fulp:

"We generally get the vibe that video game companies are cool with sprite movies - there isn't going to be a sprite movie crack-down unless it does become an issue, but at the same time, the bar for making front page with sprite movies is a lot higher than it used to be. Unlicensed photography is a much more pressing issue."

We can still have sprite movies, and It'd actually be great if sprite movie makers took this as a challenge to raise the bar to do more than just have most sprite movies be a collection of sound bytes from various fims and utter inane randomness. Let's be honest, shit like that is why the rest of us can't get a single ounce of respect for what we're doing. Would it be awesome if CTU was fully hand-drawn, as opposed to using sprites? Well, actually, sweet lord yes it would be. Some of you are probably wondering why it isn't, having looked at my art section (I know at least one admin - whom I shall not name - definitely feels that way). Problem is, those images take 20~40 hours on average to make; so there is simply no way I could ever make a movie if I drew it myself, at least not if I wanted to finish it before the Mayan Apocalypse.

CTU will continue to be made, and it will continue to be made with sprites. However, from henceforth no music shall ever again be used in it that doesn't meet the following Criteria:

- A) Music from the Game Itself
- B) Music from the Portal, which I've been trying to use as of late.
- C) Original Music made for the series, I've made friends with many musicians
- D) Music I got actual permission to use, it will never kill you to ask and be told no.

It's not like it'll be a big loss... for the most part it just means we'll change how we do the menu screens (I'm keeping the parody of the ancient Iria Credits in until I can think of an idea for a third set of credits, expect a new credits sequence some time next year)

On the matter of topic C, you can be suprised the help you can find if you search AND - and this here is the real trick - already have a fanbase. If you want big help then you have to prove you are the sort of guy that delivers big, as I have continued to prove to Chrono Trigger fans everywhere with continued updates to CTU. When you have lots of fans who actually like your work, you never know when one of them might be someone with amazing talent willing to lend a hand. In fact, taking Tom's advice to collaborate more, I recently met a band called "The Gloom".

The Gloom rocks, you should check out their music.

I'm not going to say too much about the plans, but there is a major moment coming in roughly episode 25 that would have used the song Thriller. As I fully support Tom Fulp, the plan had to go. However, it wasn't just a random joke; the scene coming up in Episode 25 is actually the culmination of a chain of events that began back in Episode 14. Thefore, if not Thriller, something had to be there for that moment. So I asked around if anyone knew of a song of similar bent we could use that we could actually get permission to use, either from the portal or somewhere else. Within thirty minutes of asking, over at the Chrono Compendium, I got rushed by the head of this awesome band as he happened to be a fan of CTU.

It's also for the best because, even if Tom Fulp hadn't asked stuff like this to stop, the Michael Jackson estate are some scary people to go up against. Does anyone remember how they made the MJ Zombie leave Plants Vs Zombies, they are not exactly people who take a joke at all... or even worth fighting in court. You're probably wondering why, if I knew all that, it was in the plans at all. Well - as I said before - this has been in the planning since sometime before Episode 14, we heavily believe in the use of Chekov's Gun as we write CTU; we plan in advance (we don't just make it up as we go along). So the idea was thought up quite a ways back, and Tom Fulp laying down the law finally got us off our asses to make even better plans for the betterment of everyone.

You might notice I asked around, but I didn't ask at Newgrounds. This now brings me to the suggestions part of this journal that I mentioned in the header. Newgrounds really needs a watch system like they have at places like Deviantart or Youtube, that way when people can log in they can find out if anyone they're watching released new movies or statements while they were away. Let's face it, many good movies never make the front page which makes it really easy to miss the release of something new. Sure, you can always check everyone's user page non-stop, but that's a bit tiresome and something most people honestly only do once every blue moon. Had there been a watch system here, I might've asked here also. I certainly wasn't about to ask in the forums... didn't you hear, all sprite animators are the scum of the Earth.

My other suggestion for Newgrounds are folders. While it wouldn't matter so much for me, it definitely would for some other artists. Many artists' galleries would become infinitely more parsable if they could group their movies/art by series or topic. I know something like this would have to first wait for the redesign to go through, but I think it's a really good idea to consider for afterwards.

Ciao, all.

Chrono Trigger Unglued: Episode 22 has finally gone live, sorry about the delays! This time we watch as Crono and Company find themselves trekking through a raging Post-Apocalyptic dust storm, much to Crono's chagrin. During this time, Marle realizes she still has something very important to tell Crono... other than the fact she likes Ice Cream, which she totally does. In order to remember whatever her important something is, she decides to start from the beginning... and I do mean the beginning!

In other Ultra Publications related news, we've recently uploaded the Eighth Episode of our podcast series, "The Revue"! Picking up where Episode 7 left off, we continue our three part coverage all things pertaining to the main universe of Megaman by discussing the X Series. Along the way, we also get a bit into why it seems that piracy, while it's definitely not a good thing, apparently has almost nothing to do with games who fail to have good sales.

Speaking of all things Megaman, we're currently doing a Megaman Legends Let's Play over at Youtube! This is actually our third Let's Play, following on the heels of our already completed series for both "Castle of Dr. Brain" and "Pitfall 2: The Lost Caverns"! I do hope you'll consider taking the time to stop and give them a look-see.

Lastly, the Ultra Publications Forums recently hit Post 50,000 on precisely its 3rd Birthday!

I sent the following message to Nicalis last night:

"I recently acquired Cave Story Wii after the updated version went up, and it has been a blast so far. However, I encountered a vexing oddity tonight that refuses to go away. When I loaded Cave Story tonight, the main character had the red of his hat and pants replaced with a very dark - nearly black - navi blue; afterwards, when I loaded up my save file, he was suddenly the same way in that as well. Up until now his hat and pants had been red colored, the save had been made just before you go into to the desert area. Nothing I could do could get this to stop, I have even deleted both the game and save file along the way numerous times already. So far, once it started doing this, the main character only appears in his correct outfit colors on all copies of the game I have installed if I don't create a save file at all (but you can't really play without a save file). Do you have any idea what I can do to remedy this?"

I got this reponse this morning:

"You actually haven't encountered a glitch, but a trick (or treat) we put in for fans. The main character is getting ready for Halloween.

Sorry if it has caused you some confusion."

*head hit floor repeatedly*

So, basically, I freaked out and deleted my save over a time sensitive Easter Egg (this only works if you redownloaded the game after they updated it on the 18th of this month).

This update has a metric fuckton of stuff to talk about, a normal imperial fuckton simply won't fit the bill for today. Nosiree!

To get things started off here, the progress on Episode 22 of Chrono Trigger Unglued now stands at 20%. Furthermore, I intend to keep at this drive until this episode comes out in the near future (losing my job at Wal-Mart will help me to have a lot of time for that). I must admit, I wasn't exactly burning with energy to work with flash right now; however, today I saw that Ericho (the same Ericho that helped Kirbopher with the production of TTA, a series I adore) posted reviews on Episodes 17 and 19 of CTU that proclaimed they were the Super Mario Bros Z of Chrono Trigger. Hearing such magnanimous words, more specifically from someone who had actually been part of a major long running flash project series, caused me to burn with creative energy. So, look for CTU-22 in the near future.

Also, we recently released Episode 6 of the Ultra Publications: Revue. In this episode of our ocassionally updated podcast series, we go into great depth on the subject of the US release of Dungeon Fighter Online. Our guest for this episode is a long time regular of our forum, Wedge. Long story short, it's a great for anyone who liked arcadey beat'em-ups... but please do still listen to the episode all the same!

Finally, speaking of Wedge, the Ultra Publications Crew has recently started a team Let's Play of The Castle of Dr Brain! So far only four episodes are out, but new episodes will go up regularly (usually multiple episodes per week). You can find these epiosdes on the Ultra Publications Youtube Account. Remember, just be sure to tread lightly around the Demonic Lawn Flamingoes of the Damned!

Sorry about the fact I sort of stopped talking there for a while, but my Mom's recent diagnosis of Cancer was a major spirit breaker. Thank you again to Ericho for giving me the power to work up the energy to continue on CTU again. At times like this, I especially need to be keeping myself busy.

ADDENDUM: Sorry for some misinformation above, but it actually turns out that Ericho did not help in the production of TTA. While he was indeed one of the people that Kirbopher based a character on during season 2 of the epic flash series, he himself was in no way directly involved in production. Sorry for the earlier misinformation.

Secret of Mana Theater

All 286 episodes are now online once more, no longer lost to the virus plague that wiped out everything! I highly recomend this for viewing, as it was a major source of inspiration for me in my work with CTU. While the series never reached its conclusionb ack in the day, it's still well worth watching all the same. Fear not, these 286 episodes are far shorter than the average CTU episode (it was, after all, updated two times a week during its prime). I think I will now have to get reacquainted with an old friend in the near future.

This is a post Cryo recently made at the Ultra Publications Forums:

"So...how should I begin this?

Well, I will get it out in the open to start. I am officially stepping down as the lead writer of Chrono Trigger Unglued. I know, shocking gasps all around. Over the last few episodes, my role has been slowly shrinking in scale from being in charge of the whole writing half of CTU, to being in charge of individual episode progression, to simply writing the dialogue for each episode. And while I enjoy writing for CTU immensely, I've found that this new role is quite limiting and I'm unable to put the heart and soul into it like I could when I was doing the full scripting.

Unfortunately, Clovis' vision for the series (which I back wholeheartedly, I want to make clear) is different from my own and while we accommodated for that in the past, the truth is that the more Clovis takes over for plot progression and storyline, the less and less my scripting meshes with his vision. And the harder it becomes to come up with quality writing.

Clovis and I had a nice long discussion about the future of CTU and I decided that I wouldn't feel right trying to write up his scripts if it meant putting out sub par jokes and dialogue while at the same time being unable to meet the needs he had for each script. And so after much mental deliberation, I decided the right thing to do would be to step down as lead writer and give that position over to Clovis in full.

I want to make it clear that when I say "I decided", I don't mean "it was decided for me". Clovis offered to give me back full control of CTU if I wanted, but I felt it's future was more secure in his hands, especially since he has done so much to raise the quality of the actual animation aspect. We both agreed that this was the best outcome, at least for now.

Now this doesn't mean I am wiping my hands of CTU altogether, though. I will stay on as a consulting position for the series; reading over scripts, offering dialogue advice, providing additional jokes, etc. I may even provide filler specials from time to time. This way we won't feel forced to compromise each other to make a union of ideas work. I still have plenty of ideas/jokes for the series and I know Clovis is still interested in knowing what they are.

I am very thankful for all the support everyone has given the series and I hope you will continue to watch and enjoy CTU, even if I am not directly part of the creation process. I think the series is in very good hands."

Original Post

Anyways, I just want it to be known that CTU will continue onwards. In the near future I will begin making Episode 22, which will be the final script that Cryo will pen all by himself. If any competant writers would like to tale a stab at writing in the future, get in touch with me (must have something you've already written to show to me).

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/
539992

Much like the Spanish Inquisition, no one ever expected this episode of CTU to come so soon after the last one. Also, there are many other things in this episode that no one probably ever expected to see from CTU. I think I will probably get a third episode of CTU out before this year ends, especially since the content in this next episode is something I've been looking forward to for a long time.

However, for now, I'm going to be doing some work on a secret new flash project called TFOFT...