Thanks. I was under the impression that serenesforest hacking scene was dead like it was in 2020 when I joined feu, so I haven’t visited there lately.
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Of course it didn’t. People were trying to handle other things, like the dramatic change in lifestyle this required, and-or were expecting the restrictions to be lifted soon, because that is what most healthcare recommendations initially were.
Which led to this phenomenon, where people became used to things and realized “Hey, I have time to do X and Y because I’m not doing those other things!” as the assorted shutdowns were iteratively and slowly winding down.
This would be completely against the main point of… having the event.
Bluntly, the purpose of playing one part of a game in a demo is to get you interested in playing the whole game. A full playthrough would appeal to people who don’t want to play the game themself.
And that’s fine, but the thing is that the point of FEE3 is to create hype and excitement for playing the games, by raising awareness of what cool projects exist.
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There’s been a few dual-releases on both forums, and a few unique to them. Not many, but they do exist.
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I didn’t want to give this deeply unserious post any more air, but fuck it, I spent weeks on the hacks I submitted I’m not going to take this callous disregard for the work I and everyone else who was a part of fee3 2023 lying down.
OP is misunderstanding the point of fee3, as far as I see it. Views are nice and all, but fee3 is first and foremost a celebration of what the hacking community has been able to accomplish over the past year. I knew going into fee3 2023 that my Cerulean Coast showcase wouldn’t be able to compete with the amazing trailer of 2022. Not only is my 32 minute showcase a much bigger commitment for a casual viewer compared to 2022’s 3 minutes, but the 2022 trailer is just on an individual level fucking awesome, and LTCs (although also awesome) have much more limited appeal.
Despite this, I still asked to help Rivian with his fee3 entry last year because I wanted to show my friends and other FE fans with my own words why I love that hack so much.
And although unrelated, I would like to bring up that 2022 had the advantage of a 3 year drought in mainline entries. This was probably the main thing taking interest away from 2023’s presentations, as Engage released earlier that year.
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Very kind words to hear, Lowres, you’re awesome.
For what it’s worth, pretty sure the views in FEE3 2022 is just from chicken thumbnail clickbait. I’m 90% sure the only metric for high view counts (apart from factors like being Nuramon, a re/demake or day one) is how clickbait your thumbnail is.
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I mean, yeah. I wouldn’t have called myself a crackhead for it, not only due to it being against the main point of the event as you say, but also due to the likely chance that it doesn’t even do much for what I’d hope it’d do - attempting to increase views/subscribers through the Youtube algorithm to increase the visibility of the FEE3 event (considering people could just not watch the videos and play the games themselves).
It is a point I’d wish to push myself but there is neither viability or any good concept behind it.
While at times I do complain about isolated gameplay and how it hardly is an optimal representation of what the game can offer, I do see why full playthroughs would not really do much at all.
Speaking honest? Pretty much. I’ve seen FEE3 as more of a “game showcase” for romhackers to display their games - or animations, rather than a celebration of Fire Emblem and the romhacking foreground, mainly due to my lack of involvement with the people that partake in either the making of the hacks for E3 and the organizing side (and honestly, I have no plans to involve myself in either).
I’ve overfocused on whether or not the FEE3 '23 is “a success” just by looking at numbers instead of considering the effort that is behind it and the community that is holding onto it, and it’s something I should’ve taken more in consideration.
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well said.
yeah it’s by the community, for the community – growth and views are great, but it’s not a goal of the event. It’s for us to showcase what we’re working on.
As for “declines”, so many online services and communities are noticing relative decline from the peak COVID years where everyone was inside. I think a lot is snapping back to pre-2020 growth trajectories vs. being a true decline. Given the additional self-service requirements this past year, I am not surprised to see a dip in submissions.
For me a successful FEE3 is one w/ low drama, it runs smoothly, and we see some cool stuff from folks.
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This thread’s basically over, but I’d like to submit my viewpoint that the reason people like me talk about the behind the scenes of the show is because we’re involved with it for months and as such it’s a much larger part of the event’s identity to us.
Previous years have had hellish run-ups where people were stressed out of their minds, overworked, running all over the place, just trying to get the show on the road at all. The fact that the event is growing steadily and that the logistics have only gotten easier with time is a huge sign, to me at least, that it can support yet further growth as the scene evolves.
However, rather naturally after the huge boom during the pandemic and release of Builder, things are quieting down. The fact that more and more of the newer high profile projects are going back to being collaborative, or that a lot of those older solo projects just flat out got finished and released, isn’t helping the “numbers” perspective.
People have already explained, and you’ve agreed, that the event is far less about advertising and growing the scene, and far more about the community coming together to show off each other’s hacks and start some conversations about them all, to celebrate just how varied and unique those projects are. However, I understand the appeal of looking at the numbers and hoping to see the scene continue to pick up more attention and grow.
I just don’t think FEE3 measures its success based on how well it accomplishes any particular goal beyond “making people happy to be part of the community.” If you come out of FEE3 excited to see what your fellow hackers will do over the next year, then that’s a success in my book, and I personally found this FEE3 to be one of the most exciting ever in this regard.
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