[Disc] Is it the Summer holidays here already ?

[bluemagica]

to me game development is mostly about logic and how tto implement that logic with whatever tools are at hand, so as2/3 dosen't matter much! But one thing for sure, clients don't care of those either, and if they ask you to make it in as3 just cause they read somewhere it was cool..... well you have no choice left! But most of the time speed of production matters more than the speed of your engine's fps.....hence i would go with a option which lets me get the job done faster!
But I support as3 for only one silly reason, if it dominates over as2, the crap content might get lowered a bit, as those who actually are not interested in game development itself, won't find as3 very encouraging!

[TOdorus]

Okaaay. I read Squizes initial post as formulating a problem with a community and now we're discussing the pros and cons of programming languages and practices? I think we've gotten WAY offtopic here and let ourselves get dragged into the regular AS1/2/3 or Flash/Unity/Java/Director fanboy battle. I'll be the first one to say that a community needs a consensus on things, but I don't think coding practices are it. I do acknowledge the board evolving in a direction that isn't in the spirit of Flashkit. Let me start about what I think is the cause of the current state of the board.

Rationalization

It's a while now that psychology and sociology have identified a trend of modernization/rationalization. Wikipedia has a way better summary of it, then I can every dream to type in English:

In sociology, rationalization is the process whereby an increasing number of social actions and interactions become based on considerations of efficiency or calculation rather than on motivations derived from custom, tradition, or emotion. It is conceived of as a core part of modernization and as manifested especially in behavior in the capitalist market; rational administration of the state and bureaucracy; the extension of modern science; and the expansion of modern technology. Some (such as the Frankfurt School) have argued that the spread of rationalization based on calculation and efficiency dehumanizes society.

If you've got problems visualizing that: some call it McDonaldization. Also Individualization is considered a dimension of it.

This concept can be applied to the kind of newcomers we've complained about. These newcomers come to the board looking for fast answers, tailored to their needs. It's the most efficient way of getting a job done. You go looking for tutorials tailored to your needs. If you can't find it, you know there are communities who will also answer your questions. And that all for free. Flashkit produced it, I can use it and I'm gone. Flashkit isn't a community in that sense, but a resource. Cody did a wonderfull job at expressing this perspective:

And the number one thing I learned

Only direct answers work. I already mastered the general education as2 and as3. Not once has indirect information worked for me.

Every answer I find online have to be topic specific or else they are a waste of good english and actionscript. I have figured out that over the past three years learning as much about flash as I possibly could. So basically when ever someone says to look at the "search" option or google.

Well... then fµck off. I had already tried the option obviously and I don't want to spend 6+ months searching for an already developed solution that might not even exist.

Also they are more keen on monetization. They're not interested in the sense of community, they're interested in getting the buck for the least amount of trouble. If that isn't rationalization I don't know what is.

I'm talking about they as referring to newcomers, but I'm actually thinking about youngsters, embedded in modern culture. A culture where there is the internet which you can use to find solutions to very specific needs. Be it to order the niche cybergothicpunkhiphopninja style clothing or how to make a movieclip move. Is it strange then that a community like Flashkit is in trouble. Hell, voluntary work is in trouble, which among others contains some much more noble goals then helping a budding coder out, so why should we expect any different from a internet community board? We're dealing with hardcore rationalists here.

Community

As I think that the problem lies in rationalization finally rearing it's ugly paw on these boards, I also think the solution lies in defining the community. From what I've learned a community in it's most basic form needs the following:

• Shared meaning: to understand each other you need to speak the same language. Not only literally. The whole OOP versus Code on MC debate illustrates that nicely.
• Identity: What makes the community the community? Is it just that we make games with Flash? Can't be because there are other boards out there that do the same. Whats so Flashkits Games board about Flashkits Games board?
• Ritual: Actions that confirm and show the identity and learn newcomers the rules of the group/community. Helping beginners, giving advice to code in the first frame, saying OOP is better (just examples, don't want to reopen the can of worms).

I don't think the problem lies in shared meaning. We can all understand each other, even if we're talking about advanced concepts. We can all make this explainable to beginners in actionscript. I don't think communication is an issue here. I do think the problem lies in ritual and identity. I believe Squize to be an important person to this community, so when he posts a example of the lack of ritual and identity, you know it's in trouble.

Threads which are just flame bait are being posted to as an alternative to answering newbie questions which have been covered off dozens of times before.

I know I shouldn't be a hypocrite, and if I want to chat about micro-transactions ( Which are far and away the biggest buzz in Flash right now ) then I should start the threads myself, but... I really don't know if I can be bothered any more.

Squize (yes I'm going to grill you for this comment) himself can't be bothered to actually post about microtransactions. We aren't bothered to answer newbie questions. There is no ritual conforming the identity that Squize fell connected to when he became active in Flashkit. How the hell are nextgeneration rationalists going to be socialized into the norms we value as a community, if we don't show them ourselves? Like Squize already noted, complaining about it won't help. We need to show what Flashkit is all about. If we complain about the current identity of this community, the only ones to blame are ourselves (grill!).

[Pazil]

Boy, is it handy to have an expert in sociology!
Actually, I'm being serious. I think you summed up what everyone was thinking, but couldn't put to words.

Through this thread, I think we've all been hypocrites. Or at least we've all said how we don't like how this board (essentially, us) is turning out.

We need some old posters back. I miss seeing renderhjs around...where's that guy been?

P.

[Squize]

"Squize (yes I'm going to grill you for this comment) himself can't be bothered to actually post about microtransactions."

I think that's more of a personal thing, in that I'm pretty much done with FK. It doesn't hold my interest like it once did.
This thread, and some of the responses, has just crystallised that. I don't suppose for a second suppose my sloping off into the night is really going to affect anything at all here. Maybe less rude words that slip through the filter.

As to my lack of energy about the micro-transactions, I was just using that as an example. I've not seen one thread about GamerSafe either. I can't remember seeing any pixelblender experiments. Hardly anyone touching on HaXe. Lot's and lots of things are happening out there, which aren't reflected here.
These are just general topics, and it's not like they're some big secret that only I'm in on, so why isn't anyone, myself included, taking the time to post about them here ? We're still in a position where people are posting threads about what you'd like to see in the portal they're going to make ffs.

Great post TOdorus, good work for getting it back on track before it went too far down the usual waste of time path.

Squize.

[lesli_felix]

The scope of flash gaming and related technologies has increased massively since I joined in 2000. Much of that has happened since 2005, and that's had an effect on the scope of this forum too, hence the disparity between the newest noobs and the most experienced posters.

When I first started posting here it was only a hobby, and flash 5 had just been released. What's incredible is that this board had been here several months with only flash 4 games being discussed.

Guess it's inevitable things will change, but I'll keep hanging around while the forum still gets lots of traffic. It might be worth seeing how things pan out over the next couple of years.

[EvilKris]

I'll be honest, all I want is a board where the members have deep discussions about game design in relation their favourite retro/modern games and took a pop at copying the game mechanics etc, aren't up their own arses yet have some skill and ALSO talk about the weekend, beers, chicks. They post demo's and WIP alpha's all the time, write tutorials regularly, and yes, swearing is allowed. Most importantly they are hardcore gamers and get into double digit threads with titles that ring of "If you were to make Fallout 3 as a Flash 2d version how would you do it?"

What I'm saying is where is the TRUE skilled coder+hardcore gamer board?
Show me that board and I'm off. I'm too old to have my hand slapped by the mods every time I want to use a naughty word.

That being said, this place is better than nothing. I suspect Render might have buggered off for the same above reasons though. Hell, let's set up our own FlashKit for mad hardcore gamers, what do you say?;-)
I can see it getting wildly popular, imagine you've just played GTA4 and then you see somewhere online where they actually teach you how to code the basics of making an engine similar (albeit in Flash)- you know, just some 2d guy running around a 2d city busting into cars. Wouldn't that be awesome?

Well, gotta dash. Just throwing out ideas.

[.hooligan]

The main thing I loved about this board was people pushing the envelope of flash. Everything now seems to be less impressive with each new version of flash.

I remember seeing mode7 racing and HA3 and thinking wow, how did they do that. Now I see these same things released now and its not as impressive. Papervision was impressive and now its just ok, because I've seen flash do these things on many occasions.

The thing was back say 7-8 years ago we were all learning together but now the gap between new flash devs and the pros is too big to be enjoyable. I was excited learning with all the other guys. That's why I think things like Unity are really taking off because Its new and most people are learning it. That's what make it interesting. I was almost making mini games on a daily basis when I started flash and it was fun. Now feels like a chore because I don't have as much as a drive to do so.

I've never been one to show work in progress. Just never want to give away too many things.

[bluemagica]

guys, leaving this place, or creating your own FK isn't any solution, it will just make you more lonely! You guys were once the noobs that formed FK, and you guys were the ones who loved it, isn't it time you guys work together again to bring it back on track?
And to me, the only way to do that is minimise the gap between the pros and the noobs.... if they can't bridge the gap themselves, you have to help them get across it, and stop expecting everyone can learn things by themselves!

[alillm]

bluemagica - I don't think that's the point, helping people is a very important part of flash kit, and should never go away. The thing is that the usual cycle that used to happen with newbies learning a bit and then going on to help the newer newbies with the same problems they have just learnt to solve themselves isn't happening any more. Everyone's out for themselves and that just makes it a chore for the more experienced members because the simple questions that often take a lot of effort to answer are just being left, and more interesting discussions are being pushed away because of it.

I actually think that a new board, perhaps even an invite only one, would be a great idea. The guys at the poppenkast (they use mainly game maker) have done just that. Anyone can join and post in the general section, but other sections are for invited members only.

http://www.thepoppenkast.com/

It may seem snobbish and antisocial, but you only have to look at how creative those guys are, and the sense of community and the love of what they are doing that's going on. That's what flash kit used to be and what I want from a flash community now.

I know that I personally would be much more inclined to help people out in a general help section if there was another section to the board where I could discuss game design with my peers, show off alphas and betas in private and participate in design experiments and challenges.

Shame that nobody will ever start something like that for us.

Ali

[bluemagica]

well ali, why do you think the new comers aren't helping new comers anymore in the first place? isn't it because their path of learning has become too steep for themselves to follow, let alone helping others?

If we were to create a community where people already with knowledge could get in, wouldn't that just increase the void(between older pros and newcomers) even more?

[alillm]

No I don't think the learning curve is too steep. Why should it be any more difficult than it ever was? Sure there are more options, newer technologies etc, but the core of flash is still the same as ever. When I was starting out I would try to figure things out myself, then post here if I hadn't figured it out after a day or 2. I would get help from people who at the time I thought were experts but in reality they were usually only a year or so more experienced than I was.

Yes it would create a void, but not a bad void. It would separate those who want to learn and those who want to discuss. I don't think that’s a bad thing because those are two very different things, why should they be combined? Once a newer member has developed into a beneficial member of the community they can be invited to join as a full member.

Of course you could simply have two boards and forget the invite bit, I just think that a collective group of experienced and creative individuals would push game development in flash a lot more than if just anyone can chip in.

Ali

[bluemagica]

earlier you could "try to figure out things" by yourself, because there was enough resources on the net to do so..... from the view of an experienced flash user or programmer, there is still enough resources, but from the view points of a new comer, there's hardly any resources to learn from!

"Once a new member has developed into a beneficial member of the community"? well if that was really happening, the void wouldn't be this big..... the main problem is that the new comers see no way of adapting themselves to the new technologies and developing into a beneficial member!

Yes, I also believe that noobs should be separated from actual beginners, But i don't agree with your viewpoint that "those who want to learn" should be separated from the pros, cause those trying to learn are the next wave towards future!

[alillm]

I (and I think I'm right in saying many other people from back in the day) learnt primarily from the flash help. Sure the occasional tutorial helped out when you wanted to see some working code but I actually spent months figuring out flash, learning how things worked. I also bought a book on it which I believe you can also get for AS3. There's nothing better than that kind of learning because figuring things out for yourself causes you to remember them and understand them. The help of members here should always be a last option, not a quick easy method of getting the code you want. If I could learn action script with no prior coding knowledge at all from just the help and a book then people can still do that now.

Yes, I also believe that noobs should be separated from actual beginners, But i don't agree with your viewpoint that "those who want to learn" should be separated from the pros, cause those trying to learn are the next wave towards future!

I agree completely with that, I benefited a lot from help here and I'd like to think I've done my fair share in return back when I was more active. I guess what I'm talking about would not be a replacement to flash kit but rather an additional place to go for the pros who want to be creative, push the limits of flash and just generally get to know each other without having 100s of "how to I make the screen move?" topics getting in the way. Nothing like that exists at the moment which is why we all hang out here in the "help" board. I think that's the primary problem, the spectrum from beginner to pro has just become too wide to fit here.

Ali

[bluemagica]

Hmm, ok, if enough people are interested maybe we can get together and really create a community for pros! I have the resources to setup and maintain one.... but more importantly, at this stage of time, we should consider helping the noobs more, by setting up some proper guides, where adobe failed!

For example, one of the prime hindrances in moving to as3, is the wrong workflow concept imposed by the flashIDE! Most beginners can't think outside the timeline..... the solution would be to move away from the IDE and use something better like FlexSDK+FlashDevelop , but there aren't any basic guides which can help a complete beginner get accustomed to this!



As for the self-tutoring part, almost all of us here are self taught, and i don't mean "super specific tutorials" by that! I learn most of the things from livedocs, but when i do get stuck, atleast i knew that there would be answers already available somewhere! The situation was like, try yourself, if stuck, look at guide book, close it, then try again..... the situation now is, try yourself, if stuck, try yourself.....

[Incrue]

Look,all of you are wrong, the main reason why this is dying is because of the bad vibs
So lets go everyone lets sing:
kumbaya...kumbaya....

[Pazil]

The way I learned was my first question on FK Actionscript 2 forums: "How do you make a movieclip move with the arrow keys?". The only thing I knew to do before this was how to make buttons. Thankfully, someone provided the full code for an onClipEvent (enterFrame) script to move the MC. From that piece of code, I started to understand the patterns of programming, etc., and then just referring to Flash Help, or doing a quick google search and reading a paragraph or two.

I think that we need more tutorials, but the right kind of tutorials. I never liked tutorials, since the title "How to make tiles" sounded too narrow, and even though you still learned other things, the whole focus on tiles distracted my imagination.
I think if we all created a group of tutorials together, about actual programming in general, then we could point a lot of newbie's to there, and know that they will have a decent amount of help reading there. And I don't mean the "This is a "for" loop" approach...now that I think of it, I don't really know exactly what I mean...but I'll have to think about it.

Also has anyone else noticed for the past year the "0 new Tutorials added!" on the front page?

P.

EDIT:
Kumbaya...Kumbayaaaa

[bluemagica]

I support the idea of creating a list of proper tutorials together Pazil! I think that's the only way that can really fill up the void!


PS: Kumbaya.....Kumbayaaaa

[tomsamson]

Yeah, Kumbaya all.
Sorry if any of my comments sounded harsh to anyone, i had the feeling some things said were heavy so i replied in probably too heavy tone.
Maybe its due to my general unhappiness with where flash and the flash scene is going more than anything else.

[Ray Beez]

Im trying to stay off forums. All I do is talk instead of creating Flash stuff.
How do you juggle making games, staying on top of Flash trends and keep a relationship going too?

[bluemagica]

err by being dedicated to what we like doing... making games!