FIRST SEED MATERIAL / REFMAP GONE; RESOURCE RECOVERY OPERATION GO!

REFMAP and First Seed Material have returned!

Website: https://refmap.wixsite.com/fsm-material
Blog: http://refmap-l.blog.jp/

RM2K(3) Stuff and License:

author=Archeia_Nessiah
Oh I wanted to update REFMAP is back but I got beat.
If the site is confusing for some:
Terms of use w/ ENG: http://refmap-l.blog.jp/archives/cat_11868.html
They also reposted their Rm2k3 stuff: http://refmap-l.blog.jp/archives/cat_202341.html

You can see the directory on the side under: カテゴリー
Right now it's organized by number of posts and they have tons of resources in them.

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Mirror topic over on RPGMakerWeb
http://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?/topic/27123-first-seed-material-refmap-gone-resource-recovery-operation-go/

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As a large number of us will likely know, the REFMAP resource suite and its host First Seed Material have been a long-standing fixture in the RPG Maker community. REFMAP has long been the gold standard to which all other original resource works are compared.

Today, I unfortunately came to find out that Tekepon, the home of First Seed Material and REFMAP, has died and gone away from the internet. Eaten by the passing sands of time. May it rest in peace.

First Seed Material URL (no longer working): http://www.tekepon.net/fsm/ (last checked 05/24/14)
Wayback Machine URL: http://web.archive.org/web/20140214073503/http://www.tekepon.net/fsm/

What can we as a community do about this?
While this is a sudden and very sad turn of events, I believe that we as the RPG Maker community should come together and commence an operation to recover as much of the lost First Seed Material and REFMAP resources as feasibly possible. First Seed Material and REFMAP have had a lasting impact in our community and I feel it is our duty to ensure that they are not forgotten.

To this end I have searched for and uploaded to my locker the following official (as provided on FSM prior to its demise) REFMAP resource collection archives:
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6088/locker/project2000.exe - RPG Maker 2000 resource archive.
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6088/locker/project2003.exe - RPG Maker 2003 resource archive.
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6088/locker/vx_sample.exe - RPG Maker VX resource archive.

I have also procured and uploaded the two game archives for Material Quest Vol. 1 & 2, which served as sample games showcasing REFMAP resources in action:
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6088/locker/material_vol1.exe
http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/6088/locker/material_vol2.exe

Please note that you must extract and run the games under Japanese locale (emulators like AppLocale will also work) in order for them to function properly.

PepsiOtaku's archive:

PepsiOtaku
Here's all the 2000/2003 resources I have that are FSM. Oddly enough, I don't have any of the actual people charsets, but I have all the chipset related charsets, as well as monsters.

I included all of the chipsets, including some popular edits and obscure ones found through the forum. I also included the mackie facesets, of which I believe are all there, as well as the roco facesets (although I'm not sure those count).


http://rpgmaker.net/media/content/users/40/locker/firstseedmaterialrm2003.zip

Little Wing Guy's archive:

Little Wing Guy
Okay here are the 2K3 side battlers I told you about, as well as some random extras, like the pixel facesets which you might not have.

First Seed Battlers

The ones in this style:

GrandmaDeb's Mediafire mirror for vx_sample.exe:

GrandmaDeb, on 23 May 2014 - 3:45 PM, said:

If you have the vx_sample game you have 27 char sets and the tiles. =]

Mack's two-tile high Characters and outstanding Tiles from his Blog, available in a VX sample game (You do not need VX to access the tiles and character files.)

(please do not repost this link elsewhere - thank you.)

GrandmaDeb's archive of Mackie's facesets (also available inside PepsiOtaku's and Little Wing Guy's archives above):

GrandmaDeb, on 24 May 2014 - 04:40 AM, said:
I do not have have the original compressed file by Mackie, which I believe was called face_m,

and held sixteen files with sixteen faces each.

But this is the complete set, I believe.

Here are Mackie's Faces

What are we missing?
As of writing (05/18/2014), we are missing any and all resources that were not covered under the archives I have uploaded above. A good example are the sets of REFMAP facesets. The two Material Quest games contain some of Mackie's facesets, but they are far from being complete.

As of 05/20/2014 we are still missing the two facesets done by 梅 (Ume). I believe we have most of the facesets by Mackie and わちゃ (Wacha), if anyone can cross-reference that would be awesome. PepsiOtaku and Little Wing Guy have also provided a plethora of REFMAP-related/derived stuff, thanks guys!

It would also be greatly appreciated if other community members can mirror the archives we have provided above. Having only RMN as the only source to download these archives is unreliable from a POV of redundancy.

The First Seed Material Terms of Use (the English translation is unfortunately not available) does not state any restrictions to redistribution of REFMAP resources or the Material Quest games as long as such actions do not infringe upon laws and regulations in your region and do not harm or defame First Seed Material.

Closing words
If an administrator or applicable staff member can sticky this topic and bring more attention to First Seed Material's demise, it would be highly appreciated. I was unaware that FSM was gone and the revelation honestly took me by surprise.

EDIT: I sincerely apologize for the triple post. I have no idea how that happened beyond that this post took forever to post itself.

Update from Archeia over at RPGMakerWeb:

Archeia, on 19 May 2014 - 06:28 AM, said:

Okay I just checked twitter and it is domain expiry.

http://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?/topic/27123-first-seed-material-refmap-gone-resource-recovery-operation-go/#entry260265

Small update on FSM's current state from RPGMakerWeb, courtesy of Archeia and Twitter with translation by yours truly:

@Archeia_Nessiah 私の分かる範囲で言うと、First Seed Materialのレンタルサーバーの期限が切れていて、利用できない状況です。関係者ではないので、それ以上のことは私にも分かりません。力になれずすみません。

Translated into English:

As far as I know, it appears that First Seed Material's hosting plan has expired resulting in the site being inaccessible. Unfortunately I don't have any further information as I do not work at First Seed Material. I am sorry I cannot be more helpful.

The keyword there is レンタルサーバー, "rented server", aka a hosting plan.

So I guess my initial guess that FSM had its hosting plan expire was correct. Doesn't make the situation any less of a crisis though. :\

http://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?/topic/27123-first-seed-material-refmap-gone-resource-recovery-operation-go/page-2#entry261481

GrandmaDeb has provided another mirror for Mackie's facesets (link added to OP).

Cross-referencing that archive with PepsiOtaku's and Little Wing Guy's archives, I think we can safely say we have all of Mackie's facesets as all three archives contain the same 16 facesets.

Still on the look out for Ume's 2 facesets, if anyone happens to have them please provide them so that they can be safely collected here.

FSM still down as of 05/24. (*´Д｀)

Those are Kaduki's resources, came to prominence and popularity back in RMVX thanks to its outstanding quality and also because Kaduki's resources were compatible with the Tankentai side-view battle system.

As far as I know though, Kaduki isn't related with First Seed Material.

06/17:
tekepon.net returning a "domain error" (bad DNS settings?) as opposed to the Coreserver 403 page that used to be returned. tekepon.net/fsm/ returns a 404 error as well.

I wonder if this is a sign that FSM's admins finally managed to get around to sorting out their hosting plan. We'll have to keep on watching and waiting, but I hope this is a good sign.