Yeah, ideally I’d like to showcase in that way.
This is my recent suggestion on project of the week:
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…
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Before anything: I’m really glad FEE3 exists.
I really hate to be the one to say this and being in the community for only 10-11 months I don’t know if I’m in the position to suggest this, but I think there should be a limit to the amount of FEE3 submissions.
I’m not trying to discredit any of the organizers or stealth-insult anyone, but there was a clear struggle with organizing everything with the current amount. If it became any higher, I’m worried it might be unviable to hold an FEE3 at all. So instead, I think after the submission phase there should be a poll where users choose what hacks/projects should get a spotlight and the 50/60 most voted would get into the show.
Of course, this would mean a lot of projects get axed but I honestly can’t think of a better solution. But that’s just, like, my opinion man.
Thank you for putting all of this together/organizing it. I do agree with @tbone here that gratitude goes a long way. You are not obligated to organize such an event, and I’m very thankful that such an event is even held. Thank you to everyone who made this possible, and thank you for allowing my albeit terrible hack to be showcased.
I want to be a part of this community in a positive way. I guess the first step is to try to post more.
In regards to the topic:
Number of Projects/Acceptability
For the number of projects, I would rather not limit the number of projects. But I do agree that a project has to be in an acceptable place. Something that’s well into development, or of decently good quality. If there is inappropriate content, it needs to be done well (with a warning).
As an example, the hack I showcased (Vidyaranger Chronicles, there’s no thread because I’m currently uncomfortable with the state it is in) is more or less a meme-ish hack that was supposed to be full of humor and, well, memes and inside jokes for a small community I’m a a part of. In terms of the criteria I just listed, I do believe my hack/showcase didn’t cut it. I have 5 chapters done out of 7-8, but by no means are they polished, and I personally think the quality is not that high. Nor did I broach a sensitive topic with warnings or in a proper manner. I also should have included a document for credits for mugs/animations used that I did not make, as I used quite a bit from the repository. I apologize for this mistake.
Recording/Visual quality
I would agree that the let’s play format is no longer fit for FEE3. FEE3, from what I understand, in essence, is to show what a hack or game has, its strengths, and maybe even its weaknesses. I would say this includes the type of gameplay (rng-based versus stat checks, or both. Item changes, etc), story, and other miscellaneous things that aren’t in a vanilla fire emblem game. If skills are a part, then only showcase a custom skill or two (if applicable) or just show that they are implemented. Overall–a short showcase, maybe a conversation to showcase story, 5 or so minutes of gameplay to show what type of gameplay the hack/game has to offer, and a few moments to showcase the other miscellaneous things.
I helped contribute to the problem, and I would like to apologize for that.
The thumbnails this year, at least to me, looked great this year. I think this simple style, if I can call it that, works, as the thumbnail of a video for submissions might not capture what the submission might want to showcase.
I will also happily start learning how to edit videos/make thumbnails/etc/etc/etc this coming winter. I want to be able to contribute to this event in a positive way, even if its just a little.
Planning
This year was a difficult one, and I appreciate all the effort and love that has been put into this event 110%. Thank you so much for your hard work this year. All of you. I’m not experienced enough to offer any decent ideas, but if there’s any way I can help with planning, or with the event, I will happily contribute.
Complaints
The negativity this year was jarring, to say the least. I do agree that somethings could have been communicated more properly, but the negativity and lashing out was uncalled for and unacceptable. It makes me not want to be a part of this community. But I realize that to help make the community a better place for everyone, I have to do my part as well. Thank you so much for taking the heat, and I apologize that I didn’t do anything to help stop the flame.
I don’t think I have anything else to say (its late and I have class in the morning, so maybe I’m just to tired to realize I said something dumb. If I did, I’m sorry.). Once again, thank you Pandan and everyone else for making FEE3 possible this year.
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Well
I will not make a large post cause bad at english, but first of all, i want to thank Pandan, Arch, and all the people that made it possible, and the people that helped me this and the other years.
But I agree with the idea of killing the FEE3 and turn it a byweekly event, tbh, FEE3 generate a lot of hype the months of the organization and then i think the hype goes the next days. So maintaining the hype constant in the year is better than a lot of hype for a few days.
Also the video duration is important, tbh, i think that my 7 minute gameplay in my trailer was long LMAO, if we want to have a lot of projects they need to be condensated in something that is easy to see and can atract you easily.
Finally other idea I think is important to considerate is about the quality criteria, having a criteria that says if you can or not be part of the event can be turned negative if it is too arbitrary, but i think is required to filter some projects, i think the “No Recolor/Reskin/Rebalance” is okay, and more importante, a quality criteria in the videos, i think that one is the one we need to focus.
But, well, even that, im so thankfull to have a space to post my work the last 4 years, game dev is my passion, and even if i dont cause a lot of hype with my projects, is nice to have a space to be watched <3
And. basically, thats all i think xd
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I really like Klok’s idea regarding summary videos. Having little incentive to watch so many videos has always been a problem; there should be some teasers for each video to allow a person if they want to watch the full presentation, and then decide if they want to check out the hack themselves. These teasers could be separated by day, and possibly categorize each day, as Klok also suggested, so that there’s a lot of diversity for each day to give people incentive to look at every teaser.
I don’t know for sure if categorizing the event into segments is the best idea, but it would be helpful to allow people to find what they’re looking for. Some people probably really do only want to see what the latest animation showcase is, and that’s great! This is the Fire Emblem E3, after all. Electronic Etertainment Expo. Funny we’ll probably outlive the source of the name, but I digress. The entire point of E3 is to show the progress made by industries, developers, etc. in advancing electronic entertainment. This expo is to show off advances made in Fire Emblem electronic entertainment. I know I might be looking too deep into it, but the way E3, and really expos in general, work is by separating groups into booths that interested individuals can take a look at. People that attend Expos are looking for something to be wowed at, and presentation is absolutely everything. Essentially, this isn’t about showing off our cool stuffs all at once, this is about finding audiences interested in what we make for those of us interested in attaining super epic exposurecoin. In the case of Path of the Midnight Sun, there’s actually monetary benefit to participating in something like E3 because we have such an audience. Money is a driving force for E3 itself; that didn’t become a problem for E3 until it warped into something unrecognizable just a couple years ago.
Presentation is everything. Everything must be laid out in a meticulous, careful manner that keeps visitors interested, creators happy, and everyone winning. Cutting videos down to a time limit is a start, and so is having a content barrier. I think both are extremely important; I don’t think anyone’s looking for something at FEE3 that just makes everyone in FE7 Lyn, but we can showcase a variety of FE7 rebalances at once in a single video, with a compare-contrast of what each does compared to vanilla. Get creative! Be daring! Have some fun with it!
Finally, although I do disagree with the idea of censoring hacks from the platform, I am completely for avoiding showcases deliberately made to shock individuals, as our goal here is to impress outsiders and put our very best out. If we have mature themes in our games, there’s nothing necessarily wrong with that; have content warnings at the beginning of the entry’s individual video of what will be depicted in the video and what else could be found in the project itself. However, absolutely nothing of the sort should appear in thumbnails, titles, or week teasers.
This shouldn’t be a job, this should be a collaborative effort between hackers, artists, organizers, video editors, commentators, and all other sorts with the goal of representing the hard work our community has put into our craft with the goal of bringing new interested parties in and rejuvenating not only the hacking community, but hopefully the entire Fire Emblem community.
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I wouldn’t mind doing an LTC of my hack.
I agree that any of the videos weren’t particularly interesting to watch, with a couple of exceptions. I haven’t thought this through so this is just a small suggestion, but I think there should be a limit for how long a video could be. Videos should showcase basic gameplay, highlights, all that, but not more than what is needed. I don’t think people click on a video of a hack that looks interesting just to watch enemy phases go by.
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I’ve watched most of FEE3, all but the last 2ish days of content due to falling into a jrpg instead and one big takeaway I’ve had is that people submitting projects for FEE3 largely don’t have a very good grasp on how to present their project in a way that will catch the attention of a viewer such that they will want to play their project. This is in part due to the identity crisis of FEE3 that dan brought up, with what audience you’re appealing to. In either case, some basic knowledge in this area would still be helpful. If you have an hour of gameplay showing off all of the big moments in your game, what reason would a viewer have to then go and play it for themselves? Not to say you shouldn’t show any big moments, but this is a topic I’ve been giving a fair bit of thought and may become its own post at some point in the future. Note that length is not necessarily inherently a negative factor, just how that length is utilized. Delegating control over the video of your project to a volunteer LPer instead of making the video yourself is a large contributor to this unless you were to do some shenanigans to railroad the LPer through exactly what you want them to show but at that point it would be much easier to just do the video yourself to ensure it shows the content you want it to and is to the quality you want it to be.
On an unrelated note, I know having public schedules for FEE3 is a more recent addition in general but they’re really nice to have. The only issue is the relative inconvenience of actually checking the schedule; this was less of an issue last year as premieres would show the day’s projects ahead of time, but ditching that format also lost this aspect. I don’t think it’s possible to get the cake and eat it too here by showing the preview as a premiere would but not being a premiered video, as a youtube restriction. The previously suggested daily recap (pre-cap?) videos would also serve to mitigate this issue, but they also have the problem of being fairly complex. Making 18 or more scripted, edited videos working only on volunteer manpower is a pretty big ask. Unless this process could be easily automated in some way or someone steps up and volunteers their time for doing specifically those videos, I don’t think it would be a viable option.
To the issue of the absence of organizers and contributors, I will say that it did not feel open to participation in these areas, perhaps less so for contributors than organizers. I do not recall there ever being a clear way to express interest in organizing the event the way there was for submitting projects or volunteering as an LPer (at least not one I could find at a cursory glance). There was also nothing like that for volunteer LPers but that was generally less of an issue as there were enough(?) of them. I’m fairly confident there are people who would have been willing to help organize the event if they knew the avenue was open to them to do so. This being something that has to predate all or most of the other steps of the process, I think it should be made clearly publically available when this opportunity will be open, and when the time comes reaffirmed that the opportunity is actively open.
The problem with this layout is that as view counts show specific content, usually specific returning projects and animation showcases, get significantly more traffic than anything else. By clumping them all together at one point in the event, you’re going to get entire days of content that someone stopping in for the few videos they want to watch aren’t even going to see that they otherwise may have when they only come in for the days with the content they want. As such, I’d propose putting one heavy hitter at the prime time slot of each day; the content since the last heavy hitter is there if they want to whet their appetite while waiting for the big name project, and it helps keep views up throughout the entire event as opposed to wave(s) at one or more specific points throughout it.
sorry if this post is incoherent its like 3am and i need to sleep lol
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I don’t think it’s a good idea to host FEE3 on other channels. Yes, it brings more exposure, but if someone’s channel goes bust, or they decide to leave the internet, then we lose the videos. We have lost a whole year of FEE3 archives because of this in the past. No disrespect to the YTer whose channel it was, but that can’t and shouldn’t happen again. We should focus on growing our own following rather than piggybacking off someone else’s - what if we’d decided to host FEE3 on a channel, and then that channel gets hit with a community scandal? That’s a very real possibility.
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(And then, from the old thread:)
I broadly agree with all of the above, and I think these ideas dovetail neatly together. Specifically: we could use the channel to highlight whatever is the current Project of the Week, picking up everything that wouldn’t otherwise make the cut for the main annual show, where a higher standard is expected. And then, you know, actually do them at something resembling weekly frequency, subject to availability. New hackers can get exposure throughout the year and see a constant drip-feed of their fellow community members creating cool new stuff, and wouldn’t feel constrained by the deadline - but we’d still get to showcase the community’s biggest and most spectacular efforts.
The main challenge I see here is drama and hurt feelings over what goes where. To some extent, that’s unavoidable any time you have to apply a quality standard; but I think there are some objective-ish measures we can apply. Please note that the following is complete spitballing and I’m not trying to overrule anyone else about this.
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Animation and other art-asset showcases by people who qualify for pingable roles on the Discord should get in.
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Any project that has been worked on more or less continuously for at least a year, and has either active participation on the forum and/or its own Discord server, and doesn’t have any obvious major strike against it (i.e. inappropriate content) should get in.
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New tech demos should get in as long as they’re actually new tech in addition to being new projects, and not just expansions of existing ideas (i.e.“look at all these skills I made”; to me those are more like art assets, and they don’t make for good video content).
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You should also probably be able to get in if you’re able and willing to make your own trailer (<10 min) and it actually sells the project as something that belongs on the stage with the others.
So how about it?
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One objective measure is FEU users with the “regular” badge. On one hand, it could exclude some people who choose not to be active on these forums. But on the other hand, this is quite specifically an FEU showcase. It’s not outrageous to have it limited to the actually active FEU members.
My inclination is to make regulars generally have priority over those without the badge. We still technically accept submissions and requests from everybody, but with long wait lists and no guarantee it will actually be featured.
Gotta say im not a fan of this measure, im not super chatty but ive been lurking on these forums for a while as i make my hack. Obviously I would be excluded by this and there may be others who feel the same, however I feel plenty passionate about FEU and hacking.
Also determining how much activity makes someone ‘regular’ could be a bit arbitrary. I can certainly understand your idea though I’m not sure its the best solution, though obviously I am biased as someone who is more of a lurking type than an active poster.
Also as many have said, thank you Pandan for your contributions to FEE3 you’ve done a stellar job and have hopefully set a good prescedent for future events.
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Maybe users with 1d or more of read time could be included as well? You’re at 19 hrs it seems. I would be happy to include lurkers, though they’d have to accrue time on an account.
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I think you’re overengineering it, Vesly. I think the requirements for entry should be placed more on the type of project rather than the type of user (exact criteria TBD, but there’s good discussion here).
If I joined the hacking scene a month or two before FEE3, would I be able to enter even if I had a project to show? It would feel unwelcoming if I wasn’t allowed in because I was too new. Perhaps I’d be more sympathetic if my project wasn’t allowed for XYZ reason, but that also may leave a bitter taste in my mouth unless it is clearly communicated and understood requirements, such as the format (ie no memehacks, no reskins, etc.)
I’m reading these replies and there’s a lot of good discussion. I’ll reply more in depth later on, but one particular post caught my eye:
This is huge. It’s easy to conflate length and format with interest, but it also comes down to the project showcased and who is showcasing it. There are some hour long videos that are fantastic and engaging, and there are some short videos that are not. There will always be this inequality, and I have a hunch that video length is only one aspect that determines how ‘good’ a video is, and that there are more factors that we can also control for.
Creating guidelines and resources for creators to better determine what to show will help, but also more strictly vetting LPers and providing guidelines on what to talk about in a showcase. I think we have enough learnings from 10 years and talent in the community to make this happen, at least. Agro’s helpline suggestion I think makes a ton of sense and will help make the event feel more collaborative since our goals are all the same - make the showcases awesome.
Lastly, “Why are we doing FEE3 and who is the audience” is really important. Every response here that brings this up has a slightly different twist. Perhaps it is inevitable that FEE3 will mean something different to each of us, but the more we can align on a clear vision and purpose for the event, the better we’ll be able to make the content to suit those goals and objectives. Something to consider - lots of good discussion.
Will keep reading - thanks everyone for sharing your thoughts so far.
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Did not know you can check read time, still, the fact ive only accrued 19 hours despite probably first interacting with feu through the discord, and indirectly through hack discords, and then the forums like, a year ago makes me unsure its the best metric.
Its certainly a possible solution and i dont want to dismiss it as it has merit for sure, but im uncertain of its fairness.
While suggesting solutions. I know im a nobody but after discussing it on discord i thought id bring up this idea (my apologies if something like this has been stated already, ive kinda been skimming the thread)
I previously attended university doing game develoment where we had an annual ‘E3’ event much like this for our course. As part of this each team was required to make a trailer/pitch for their games and I believe something like this could maybe be transferred to fee3.
If we put responsibility on submitting hack creators to provide a brief trailer as part of their submission and offer a basic step by step tutorial on trailer making (we all had to learn how in a few weeks for our uni game trailers) we could potentially solve the length/attention span issue and take some weight from event organisers. Ofc there would still be more longform LPs but they’d maybe be more of a nintendo treehouse/boothe/demo room esque thing. This also mildly curates as it makes sure submitters are at least willing to do a little trailermaking. It also makes QA easier as trailers would be shorter by a long mark.
Ofc this is only one suggestion by a relative nobody and im sure it has flaws, but based on my own personal experience it worked fairly well for our course and our games and we got the whole event done in one day not 18. Id be interested to hear others thoughts ofc but i thought id throw my hat in the ring with a longpost tm.
Tldr; have hack makers submit their own trailers as part of their submission. Offer a simple trailer making tutorial. Have LPs be ‘extras’ to add onto trailer showcases for the curious.
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Personally I think there needs to be some barrier to entry for projects, as exclusionary as that sounds. While it was cool to have over 70 projects this year… we also had to show over 70 projects this year. That’s a ton of videos, many of which are pretty long. I think requiring a trailer would go a long way to slimming down the volume of projects that get shown. You could also format a bunch of trailers into a highlight reel, basically like a regular Nintendo Direct, and have longer let’s plays or streams shown off afterwards. That could also make this format better fit for happening multiple times a year rather than just once, which I think would be for the better. Not every project is gonna be ready to show off at the same time, after all.
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I think something gigantic that’s being a little overlooked here is the consideration of who is the audience? With the leaving of MK404 from the event and judging by the view counts, relatively little viewership outside FEU occurred. So that means… we’re the audience of our own showcase. Well that’s… silly. So I suppose we need to consider what we really want FEE3 to be and who it would be for.
To try to preserve the historical purpose of FEE3, we NEED a way to find outside viewers. Otherwise…
FEE3 is almost entirely redundant in my eyes. For me at least, I already at least ponder through new hack posts/updates, so I more or less know what to expect from each showcase and what I might want to play.
Do we want FEE3 to show off everything we’ve been working on? If so, then to hell with any kind of vetting, but the showcase would be really long. Do we want it to be the best the community has to offer? Then I suppose some sort of selection process/criteria need to be in place. Somewhere in between? Again, the intended audience of the event needs to be considered before making this assessment.
Honestly out of all of the problems brought up, the fundamental identity of this year’s FEE3 seems the most pressing issue.
As a project creator, I think I would be against being asked to condense material into/create some sort of edited trailer. It’s not a bad idea for superior content, but it sounds time consuming. That’s time I need either for irl things, actually working on hacking, and honestly sleep.
I agree with some form of barrier to entry, though. If this is carried out, guidelines for entry (regardless of how specific they should be) need to be agreed upon and made public well before any deadlines for sure. A few parameters for entry I can see working might be
- Time that the project has existed: Asking only for submissions for projects that have had some release or perhaps an announcement post for some amount of time may limit the number of “brand new” projects that don’t have a whole lot to show yet. Absolutely this would need to apply conditionally to different submission types, though. I mentioned before a question about what slice of the community do we want to show. Everyone starts somewhere, I but I believe that these projects that are just starting out should not be in FEE3. The showcase should be for products that have been around for a while that have something really cool to show off. If a project is too young to be shown, then it can be shown next year if the creator(s) show enough commitment.
- Limitation of hack types: Do we really need projects in FEE3 where their concept can be summed up in the title? I know axing reskins, weapon reversals, and such has been mentioned, and I could get behind that. I don’t mind them or anything, but if we’re looking to reduce the submission count… I could get behind the argument that this is overkill, but I don’t think this specific issue has been discussed a whole lot.
- “Community marks” and “bad taste” content: Absolutely shut that shit down. I 100% agree with pandan that that lewd stuff should have no place in this community. When I saw the Lilina OnlyFans thing on the thumbnail of a video- not somewhere obscure in the video briefly, not even in a chapter not showcased, on the thumbnail- I thought to myself, “How in the hell was this accepted?” So yes. Deny entry to projects that contain “bad taste” content without apology. It has no place here. Can we really expect to get decent outside viewership if we have these problems floating around?
By supporting some sort of criteria for entry, I don’t want to come off as elitist or attacking any projects or creators in any way. I do believe, though, that FEE3 should not show every new project.
Finally, thank you to this year’s FEE3 management team and especially pandan for all of your work. You really are the hero this community doesn’t deserve.
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I definetly agree with points youve raised here Snsk. And I’d agree yeah when we were making our games at uni a lot of us felt we’d rather work on them than make trailers. But also it took like a week or to make a decent trailer with no tutorials barring those we found online and the payoff was huge. The event in my opinion is becoming too massive to sustain LP type videos, 18 days is insane, I have a full time job and a hack to make.
Our purpose is to draw attention to hacks, shorter videos and event timespans will get people viewing more hacks ideally and trying them out. I also believe, as Krash said it is its own type of curation. It demonstrates the willingness to learn attitude that produces solid quality hacks and most importantly commitment. It only excludes those who cant be bothered rather than things like community involvement etc, and tbh if you want to be hosted at fee3 you probably should be bothered otherwise why are you even there.
I can tell you from first hand experience its not that much work, it takes like a week of on and off work to throw something passable together. Of course i can see that not everyone may like it but i think asking a bit of hard work from prospective fee3 projects wouldnt go amiss, and trailers would make the event infinitely more consumable. Believe me though i get you, working on hacking and sleeping takes priority for me, but pr and a bit of video editing is a useful life skill especially in gamedev
As for your ideas on curation while i do partially agree with the first point it will be a hard one to balance. After all fee3 is a good place to secure interest in a project, see vision quest attracting artists after its 2018 appearance. But there is definetly such a thing as too early i wholeheartedly agree.
I also agree that yeah, these ‘gamemode’ type hacks, while they deserve attention, fee3 is big enough as it is. Perhaps a different way to showcase these projects is in order.
As for mature themes while i definetly agree massively, we should need some guidelines and be careful how we police mature content. However then again im yet to see a hack I find respectfully uses mature themes that isnt either horny, offensive, poorly handled or all of those things so maybe we dont need that.
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Stick to the core values of the event, right?