SOLITAYRE'S PROFILE

Solitayre
Circumstance penalty for being the bard.
18257
"Solitayre is a robot sent from the future to kill us all."
-Skie

"Captain Reviewer, saving the day, one review at time."
-Irili

"Can I be your number one fangirl?"
-Nessiah

"He's fantastic at everything."
-Ratty

Formerly Editor-in-Chief, Review Submission Manager, and Featured Staff Writer of RMN.

I live in Michigan and work in advertising. I like dogs.
Aetherion
Summer 2011 Contest Entry

Search

So what's your favorite book?

Because I'm older than dirt, I like to read books. Anybody else engage in this archaic activity? Post your favorite books!

Some of my favorites:

The Magus by John Fowles
The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman
The Chronicles of Prydain series by Lloyd Alexander
The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker

Books!

2017 PSA: Online Safety

Hello RMNers,

Recently, we learned of an incident where a user on RMN attempted to 'dox' another user with the intention of stirring up trouble for them. If you are unfamiliar with what 'doxxing' is, this is to publish personal information about someone, such as their real name, social media presence, or perhaps even address or place of employment, usually with the intention of that person being harassed or to cause problems with their personal life. In extreme cases this can result in threats to the individual's safety.

Attempting to organize campaigns of harassment against our users is a serious offense and won't be tolerated. The person who instigated this attack has been banned and will not be coming back.

Obviously, everyone is responsible for keeping their own personal information safe on the internet and everyone should take care as to how any information they publicize can be traced back to them offline. However, this is a creative community. People publish their work here, often under their real name or with contact information so that players can share their thoughts on their projects. We have no wish to discourage this, so with that in mind, as a community we have a responsibility to help keep our users safe.

How much information you choose to reveal about yourself online is a personal choice. We want users to be aware of what they are posting and how it could potentially be used against them. Everyone has different ideas of what best practices people should use to protect themselves and our community. Feel free to discuss them here. But one thing is clear; attempts to weaponize another user's personal information are a serious form of harassment and anyone engaging in such behavior shouldn't expect any sympathy from our staff. As always, harassment will not be tolerated on RMN. Please report any incidents to one of our Moderators.

We thank you as always for helping us build a better community. Let's all have a safe and productive 2017.

Sincerely,

The RMN Staff

New policies for 2016 and beyond! (April Fools Day)

Hello my fellow RMNers!

Change is coming to RMN, and while change is never easy, it is sometimes necessary.

As most of you know, kentona has become increasingly busy these past few years between his job and his family and no longer has the time to put into RMN that he used to. That is why he has made the decision to step down as RMN's administrator. Effective immediately, Liberty and I will run the site as co-administrators. ankylo will remain on-board to fix the site when Liberty inevitably breaks it. The moderation staff will remain in place.

I'd like to take this time to discuss some new policies that will be implemented going forward.

1. As most of you are aware, there have been occurrences on the site in the past few months of individuals airing toxic and unwelcome viewpoints on our website. On RMN, harassment and intolerance are not condoned which is why from this day forward all opinions on RMN will be strictly moderated and any opinion the moderation staff finds potential offensive will be deleted. This is to ensure the maximum level of safety and enjoyment for all members of RMN.

2. It has come to our attention that certain users have user avatars that occasionally contain offensive imagery. At RMN, we do not condone offensive imagery which is why effective immediately all avatars will be changed to an image of Anita Sarkeesian as we have determined that this is the safest and least offensive of all avatars.

3. As many of you who have been in the community for several years likely know, there has been some confusion and discussion about the website's name, 'RMN' and its url, www.rpgmaker.net. I am pleased to report that we have finally solved this dilemma. Effectively immediately, RMN will have a new name that better reflects its role and place in the new internet age. 'RMN' will officially be renamed 'SJW' to reflect our growing dedication to promoting social justice across the internet. Our URL will remain the same.

4. As you are aware, in order to maintain order among a user-generated community with many denizens across the web, certain sacrifices of personal freedom and expression must be made by all. I would like to remind you all that supreme social justice overlords administrators Solitayre and Liberty as well as their moderation staff have the final say on whether or not your personal expression should be allowed and that any defiance will not be tolerated. Any disagreement with the administration staff will be grounds for immediate ban without discussion or appeal. You might believe that such a policy is borderline fascist, but we trust you will understand the necessity of strictly curating all internet content is necessary and logical to promote safety and security for all users. Or else.

We thank you for your immediate capitulation to our new site policies. If you have any concerns about the new administration or the direction the site has taken, we invite you to direct these concerns to somebody who gives a crap.

We wish you all a safe and productive game-making year, as long as that game-making adheres strictly to what we find acceptable.

Happy SJWing!

Solitayre

Supreme SJW Administrator of the SJW Network

What does your writing style say about your personality?

I thought this was pretty cool.

http://watson-um-demo.mybluemix.net/?reset=true

Enter a snippet of text, and it will analyze the personality traits of the writer. It's still a demo but I find it fascinating.

Individual readings can vary a lot, so I've found the best way to do it is to run multiple samples of your writing and look for patterns.

Common traits for me are melancholy, compulsiveness, intermittent, and a strong desire for challenge or prestige.

Here's a breakdown on me based on this post.

You are a bit compulsive, somewhat critical and shrewd.

You are intermittent: you have a hard time sticking with difficult tasks for a long period of time. You are unstructured: you do not make a lot of time for organization in your daily life. And you are laid-back: you appreciate a relaxed pace in life.

Your choices are driven by a desire for prestige.

You are relatively unconcerned with tradition: you care more about making your own path than following what others have done. You consider independence to guide a large part of what you do: you like to set your own goals to decide how to best achieve them.


Individual Personality Traits:
Big 5
Openness
68%
Adventurousness
37%
Artistic interests
3%
Emotionality
41%
Imagination
87%
Intellect
81%
Authority-challenging
50%
Conscientiousness
2%
Achievement striving
6%
Cautiousness
47%
Dutifulness
7%
Orderliness
1%
Self-discipline
0%
Self-efficacy
8%
Extraversion
59%
Activity level
1%
Assertiveness
77%
Cheerfulness
44%
Excitement-seeking
78%
Outgoing
20%
Gregariousness
69%
Agreeableness
24%
Altruism
7%
Cooperation
31%
Modesty
13%
Uncompromising
4%
Sympathy
93%
Trust
2%
Emotional range
80%
Fiery
83%
Prone to worry
67%
Melancholy
98%
Immoderation
55%
Self-consciousness
96%
Susceptible to stress
33%
Needs
Challenge
100%
Closeness
1%
Curiosity
79%
Excitement
98%
Harmony
100%
Ideal
52%
Liberty
100%
Love
45%
Practicality
100%
Self-expression
93%
Stability
90%
Structure
15%
Values
Conservation
3%
Openness to change
93%
Hedonism
15%
Self-enhancement
66%
Self-transcendence
93%

New Policies for 2014: A Public Service Announcement

As the year of 2013 has ended and we welcome a new year, there are a couple important things that happened the past year that require some changes to.

There were numerous stories in 2013 of disgusting controversies surrounding female gamers and game developers across the internet. There have been an astounding number of cases of women being harassed, attacked, and threatened by men because they made the decision to be game developers while also being female, or because men somehow took issue with something they said or believed and took it upon themselves to punish or drive out women from the industry.

If you're not familiar with these controversies around women in the game industry in the last few years, look up Anita Sarkeesian, Jennifer Hepler or Zoe Quinn just to name a few that I can think of off the top of my head. There is currently outrage regarding the Mighty No. 9 Kickstarter project because one of the community managers (a woman) dared to suggest there be a playable female character in the game. These actions are often committed in communities where the staff actually condones or encourages this behavior, or in other cases does nothing to stop it.

Regrettably, some of the women who frequent this website have reported incidents of them being harassed or threatened here on RMN as well.

Guys, this kind of thing is absolutely disgusting and is 125% not acceptable on RMN. It is not condoned by the staff, it will not be tolerated, and individuals who commit such attacks are not welcome here.

We are lucky to have some really cool and prolific ladies on this website, and even on our staff. We also have a number of cool and prolific members who are openly LGBT. Discrimination or harassment of such individuals is hate speech and is unacceptable.

If you are subject to harassment of this nature, you do not have to suffer in silence. It does not matter who said it.

Harassment should be reported immediately to myself or kentona so that proper administrative action can be taken.

This holds true on the website, our IRC Channel, or any media directly sponsored by RMN, such as our Facebook page.

Individuals who threaten or harass users for any reason will be banned forever and will probably not be missed.

Additionally, there have been repeated occasions of media submissions, especially Let's Play/Let's Try videos casually using insulting gendered language, such as flippantly referring to female characters as "whores" or "prostitutes."

We regret that we have not taken action on this issue in the past, as RMN's policy has generally been to allow all content to exist until someone lodges a complaint. People have made complaints about this issue and action shall be taken.

Degrading language towards women in submitted content is banned as per our Terms of Service.

If any of you think it would be clever to cite that this is an infringement on your freedom of speech and that we are horrible fascists for expecting you to behave like civil human beings, sorry, but this is not the case.

Freedom of speech only applies to what the government allows you to say. If you are a United States citizen and wrote an article for a newspaper saying that you think President Obama is a terrible leader, a squad of stormtroopers will not kick down your door and drag you off to Gitmo to be tortured forever. That's Freedom of Speech.

What you are allowed to say on this website is subject to RMN's Terms of Service and the judgement of this site's administration. Posting on this site is a privilege that can be revoked at any time by the staff. Additionally, use of hateful language on this website is already forbidden. You may not use racial slurs or degrading terms towards homosexuals. You may also not use degrading terms for women.

Our Terms of Service are undergoing revision to better reflect the policies of this website.

This does not affect the standards of game submissions, as there are legitimate uses for sexism or racism in establishing a setting for a game universe. However, games deemed objectionable can still be denied at the discretion of the submission managers, myself and Deckiller.

In regards to video submissions, especially Let's Plays/Let's tries, we face a dilemma here. These sometimes contain hours of video footage and staff members don't always have time to watch a video for several hours to make sure nobody says a naughty word. We are relying on those who submit content to adhere to this policy. If you notice offensive content on the website, report it to myself, kentona or Deckiller.

2014 promises to be an exciting year for RMN as we are looking to launch our Storefront and hopefully help bring deserving RPGMaker games to a wider audience. As commercial games gain prominence on this site we must take special care.

An RMN user, KisarethStudios, was recently banned for attempting to use an alternate account to review her own commercial game and post negative reviews of competing commercial games. RMN intends to uphold a fair environment of competition for commercial and non-commercial users alike. Attempts to supplant this environment and sabotage competitors are fraudulent and will not be tolerated.

Alternate accounts are not allowed.

Additionally, a Kickstarter project that was advertised and supported by RMN recently failed due to lack of organization by the development team. We do not wish for RMN users to donate to projects only to see them fail, so new policies are being implemented to combat this.

If you wish to have your Kickstarter project supported by RMN you must provide, at minimum, a working demo or prototype of your project to prove you can do what you claim you can.

Other policies on this subject will be announced.

If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to post them here.

We at the RMN hope that you have a very safe, happy, and productive new year!

Sincerely,

The RMN Staff

Final Fantasy V Four Job Fiesta

Hey kids! Do you like Final Fantasy? Do you like playing games for charity?

Then you should check out The Final Fantasy V Four Job Fiesta.

In Final Fantasy V there are 22 (26 in the Advance version) jobs available for you to play as you choose. In the Four Job Fiesta, however, you will be assigned a random assortment of four jobs, one from each crystal. And you can only use those four jobs as you play the game!

There have been several donors who actually will donate money equal to the number of players who beat certain challenges (such as beating the game, killing Omega or Shinryu, etc.)!

The more people who sign up and complete the challenge, the more money goes towards Child's Play!

The rules are simple. All you need is a twitter account. If you don't use/like Twitter, it's easy to make a throwaway account for this.

Follow the instructions on the site above. The Twitter bot will select one random job from each of the four sets of jobs in the game. You must play through the game using only those jobs! There are other challenges you can impose on yourself too.

If you're interested, check it out!

Where do you get original materials for your project? Post about it here!

Tired of using the same VX RTP as everyone else in your games? Do you not want to use game rips in your project, but have a hard time finding decent original resources for your projects? You are not alone! Not all of us are artists, and the internet is a big places, filled with content of dubious quality, and it can be hard to find what you're looking for, especially since a great deal of RPG Maker resources are found on Japanese sites, which can be hard to navigate. The community asks for your help in making it easier to find resources!

Please provide any information you can about the resources that are scattered across the internet. It is our intention to compile a list of where to find these resources so that everyone can make use of them.

-Find a link to your favorite original resources (not game rips.) Post it here! It could be anything from artwork to music or anything else related to game-making.

-Provide as much information as you can about the material: The web address, who made it, what platform it is for (2k3, XP, VX), what the materials are (tiles, charsets, monsters, music, etc.} and what licenses you may use the materials under (commercial, non-commercial ,etc.)

-If you have made material yourself that you have allowed for free use by anyone, feel free to post about it here.

PLEASE DO NOT GET INTO AN ARGUMENT ABOUT THE VIRTUES OF USING RIPS ON THIS THREAD. THAT IS NOT WHAT WE ARE TALKING ABOUT HERE.

Scientific journal to publish article on theoretical precognitive abilities in humans.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19712-is-this-evidence-that-we-can-see-the-future.html

Even being insane a psychology person myself, I find myself skeptical of this, but apparently nobody can find anything wrong with it....

"My Nemesis:" A poem

I wrote this poem in college five years ago (I am getting so old) and since its the only poem I've ever written that I actually liked, and since it depicts a situation I am sure we can all identify with, I thought I'd share.

I hate writing poetry as a rule and haven't done it in eons, and this obviously isn't a serious attempt at "real" poetry (whatever that actually means) so you can critique if you want I guess but I am not attempting to hone my technique or anything.


My Nemesis

Pallid casing,
dusty layers, dangling thendrils,
but darkness within

"Job Spooling"

Rays of twilight,
Chromatic spray,
Capturing the light I create

"Paper Jam"

You screech to life
Whine in pain, the scream of a demon
Processing the night's labor

"Ink Cartridge Empty"

Recalcitrance
Why do you resist?
An agent aligned against me

"No Connection"

Metallic chrome organs
dark heart of colors,
a blinking light of mockery

"Paper Tray Empty"

Dawn approaches
The sun paints you with blood
Cursed machine

"No Device Detected"

Discussion isn't drama.

It seems like a lot of reviews lately (including not a few of my own) have been generating a large number of comments. And there seems to be a stigma surrounding this that is absolutely ridiculous. Any review or forum thread in which discussion or arguing occurs is invariably labeled as "drama." Even the four pages of (mostly) civil discussion on my To Arms! review was labeled in the latest Snews as a "drama-storm," and that this was a sad thing to have happen in a review.

I completely disagree. Discussion should never be stigmatized. It should be encouraged. Especially considering the reams upon reams of reviews on the site that pass completely without comment from anyone, even often including the developers of the game themselves. The same often occurs for articles, blogs, almost everything on the site. Game development doesn't occur in a vacuum. It occurs with discussion, conversation, criticism, and often with input from others. Yet I see these kinds of discussions frowned upon or lamented. Is it a bad thing to have people talking about a game on a site about game development?

This kind of discussion should happen far more often. Never be afraid to voice your opinion or want to discuss something out of a fear of creating "drama." This creates a sea of sterile games that will never improve because this site cultivates an atmosphere that it is bad to ever disagree with someone. In my opinion, this is the worst thing that could ever happen here.

Go forth and discuss many more games.

This has been Solitayre with your weekly awareness raising rant. Thank you for reading.
Pages: first 123 next last