[Episode 28] The Coldest Place On Mars

[Voodoo]

http://image.colonyofgamers.com/imcast.png


Circumstances dictated an extra week off before bringing you Episode 28, but don’t worry, we’re back in full swing and the fruits of our labor are here for your savoring.

You may recall that in the last episode I talked a bit about Cyber-Wing (http://www.cyber-wing.net/), the Herzog Zwei-inspired indie PC title released late last year by Martian Arctic Games (http://sites.google.com/site/martianarcticgames/). Well, Martian Arctic founder Devin Passage was good enough to agree to join us for this episode of the show, and he weighs in on all manner of things ranging from the state of indie development / publishing, to piracy and DRM, to basket-weaving. I’m totally lying about that last one. It was a real pleasure to have Devin with us, and I hope he’ll come back again when it’s time to pitch his next project.

A great many links were promised in the course of the recording, and I present them in no particular order:

Sins of a Solar Empire Mods:
Sins of the 13th Tribe (http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/351057)
Sacrifice of Angels (http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/371686)
Requiem (http://sins.imperial.cc/show.cgi?id=sins&a=view&f=2&t=1)
Distant Stars (http://distantstars.mmobase.com/)

Gilfor’s Tales (http://gilforstales.com/game)
Flotilla and Gravity Bone (http://www.blendogames.com/)
Crosus (http://www.isotx.com/crosus/)

Due to Devin’s inclusion in the show, we didn’t do an indie or mod segment this time around (consider the whole show your indie segment, really), but we did give Total Annihilation a fond remembrance in our retro section, and that spawned another small list of links for your pleasure:

Spring (http://springrts.com/wiki/GamesDownloads), the originally TA-based open-source RTS engine
The TA 3.1 Patch (http://www.shonner.com/ta/patch.htm)
TA Universe (http://www.tauniverse.com/) and Unit Universe (http://www.unituniverse.com/)

You can also look forward to some brief unhappy commentary about both Ubisoft’s apparent burning desire to drive away its PC gaming base, and Bobby Kotick’s belief that the best way to retain the creative talent that drives the industry (http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2010/02/video-activision-ceo-kotick-speaks-at-dice-2010/) is to sack them. We recorded before the lawsuit news broke, so there’s no talk of that, but I suspect we may revisit it in the future. Let me be clear as I tried to be in the show: we’ve been hard on Infinity Ward about Modern Warfare 2 because we think they deserved it, but that doesn’t equate to us wishing them ill. Finally, listener mail, in which we are accused of being fabulously wealthy. If only. http://www.voodootechnologies.net/wp-includes/images/smilies/icon_wink.gif

Anyhow, enjoy, and we’ll probably see you all again around St Patty’s Day.

Immortal Machines welcomes you to… The Coldest Place on Mars (http://www.immortalmachines.com/public/podcast/The_Coldest_Place_On_Mars.mp3).

Hosted and Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Robert [Trebor], Bryan [Smoof], and Devin Passage from Martian Arctic Games
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

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[Voodoo]

Please let me know how the volume levels are with this recording. Prior to publishing I pushed it through a another amp filter. Thank you.

[nabokovfan87]

will do, what program do you guys edit with?

EDIT: Volume sounded good, was a lot of hissing and such. Sounded like gopher from winnie the pooh. Maybe some people are too close to the mic?

I feel kind of like an ass for that email (forgot I had even written it). It is always funny when I say something, and hear it a month later, thinking to myself "must have been a rough day". Maybe I was feeling especially poor when I wrote it or something.

Anyways, Raven/the rest of the gang, I didn't mean anything like you all are rich assholes, just that while one side of the equation is time, the other is... "well, I'm on a 5 year old singe-core trying to play crysis (Yes, it ran well), but it would be nice to have a pc that I don't have to turn everything down."

Oh well though, nice episode, nice guest, I laughed my ass off when he ripped a joke at the end.


EDIT2: I think in the "latest hardware" talk, I might have the best because mine is newest, but what I was saying was it takes a hell of a lot for me to buy anything w/o extra income.

Forgot about you all mentioning morgages and what not. Come on, I'm not oblivious to everything, but you all get what I meant by now.

[Ravenlock]

Don't worry, nab, we kid because we love. ;) You were right to point out that time is not the only constraint on gaming, and we should be happy about our (even slightly) improved financial freedom at the same time that we lament our lack of free schedules.

As an addition to the show notes, I should mention that in addition to Crosus, linked above, ModDB also has a digital distribution platform in the works that will account for mods called "Desura (http://www.moddb.com/groups/desura/news/introducing-desura)".

So there's a lot of attention being paid to how best to help mod teams get their work out there, and help mod fans keep their stuff current. How this ties in to people making profits... well, the future may still be hazy there, but I bet people are thinking about it. ;)

[nabokovfan87]

will do, what program do you guys edit with?

EDIT: Volume sounded good, was a lot of hissing and such. Sounded like gopher from winnie the pooh. Maybe some people are too close to the mic?


Why do messages have to be 10 characters.

[Ravenlock]

I'll let Clayton answer the editing question, as I have no idea what the answer is.

The low quality recording is my fault, though - the program we usually record with was unavailable to us, and I had to second-string it with some freeware. Just the way it happens sometimes.

[nabokovfan87]

I'll let Clayton answer the editing question, as I have no idea what the answer is.

The low quality recording is my fault, though - the program we usually record with was unavailable to us, and I had to second-string it with some freeware. Just the way it happens sometimes.

Is it over skype or locally each person?

[Voodoo]

Is it over skype or locally each person?

We record the podcast using Skype. Our cast can range from 3 people to 9 people. Normally, I use Pamela Professional to record the podcast at 44.1khz & 128kbps. Along with that recorder we usually have 1 or 2 backup recordings going with other participants using a free Skype conference call recorder. This recorders do their jobs at 16.0khz and 64kbps. For this episode the main recorder shit the bed and I had to go with the backup recordings.

Prior to editing, I convert the MP3 to WAV and run it through the Levelator. Once that is done, I'll edit the podcast into sections using Audacity. Finally, I'll arrange those sections and add music. With this episode I did one final step of running it through the Levelator again to mitigate the volumes between the speech and music. Unfortunately, this displayed the sampling and bit-rate differences rather obtusely.

I plan to have two computers ready on Episode 29 so that if one is having trouble recording I can jump to the other. Should work out very well. Also, I can not imagine how much longer it would have taken me to edit a podcast where each person was their own local track. Wow... For one episode there would have been 7 voice tracks for each section that I would have had to line up. Who's got that kind of spare time laying around?

[nabokovfan87]

I plan to have two computers ready on Episode 29 so that if one is having trouble recording I can jump to the other. Should work out very well. Also, I can not imagine how much longer it would have taken me to edit a podcast where each person was their own local track. Wow... For one episode there would have been 7 voice tracks for each section that I would have had to line up. Who's got that kind of spare time laying around?

Lol. I think with the way you all do the show, segments instead of just a long chat, is kind of condusive to the editing process though. For my time, editing each trach (so far at most 3 people, but I record with anywhere from 50 to 250 ping, other host is UK based). It helps me to make sure the lag doesn't kill the show and to keep the blips, beeps, cutouts, and static out of the audio, which is worth the 3-4 hours of editing.

Why convert from mp3 to wav and then recompress to mp3. Doesn't doing so lead to some wierd audio hiccups in the end? It isn't really uncompressed and so you go from compressed to "uncompressed" and back to heavily compressed. Why not just record in higher quality mp3, if possible?

Not trying to tell you how to edit, just sharing my experience and trying to learn more. I assume the program you use is not free? BTW, when i asked what program do you use to edit, I know in the 2nd post I said skype, but I meant what audio editing software do you use? Perhaps I have some tips or something to cut out the hissing or what not (you mentioned you had used a new filter, is why it occurred to ask).

[Voodoo]

Lol. I think with the way you all do the show, segments instead of just a long chat, is kind of condusive to the editing process though. For my time, editing each trach (so far at most 3 people, but I record with anywhere from 50 to 250 ping, other host is UK based). It helps me to make sure the lag doesn't kill the show and to keep the blips, beeps, cutouts, and static out of the audio, which is worth the 3-4 hours of editing.

The editing as the episodes sit already takes 3 to 4 hours. If I had to do an additional 3 to 4 hours of editing along with the original 3 to 4 hours, we'd only get one of these out a month. Since the way we are recording works out extremely well for us and is compatible with current schedules.


Why convert from mp3 to wav and then recompress to mp3. Doesn't doing so lead to some wierd audio hiccups in the end? It isn't really uncompressed and so you go from compressed to "uncompressed" and back to heavily compressed. Why not just record in higher quality mp3, if possible?

All of my answers are in my post above yours.


Not trying to tell you how to edit, just sharing my experience and trying to learn more. I assume the program you use is not free? BTW, when i asked what program do you use to edit, I know in the 2nd post I said skype, but I meant what audio editing software do you use? Perhaps I have some tips or something to cut out the hissing or what not (you mentioned you had used a new filter, is why it occurred to ask).

The program I use isn't free, it is called Pamela Professional. For Skype conference recording, it is very difficult to beat. Those that join the show use a free Skype conference recording software as a backup to my primary. In the unlikely event (has happened twice out of the 28) that the primary recording dumps, I can jump to one or more of the backup recordings. Certainly the audio level is lower but it is higher than absolutely nothing.

In my posting above yours I identify my editing software as Audacity.

The hissing you hear in this episode is due to the 16khz recording rate. The final filter I passed the podcast through, as I said, was a second time through the Levelator. There have been complaints about the sound levels of the music being higher than the speech. The final passthrough of the episode through the Levalator fixed this but it can't fix the original 16khz recording rate.

[Ravenlock]

Alright, I'm going to suggest we take the tech talk to PM's if it needs to continue from here. I'd like to keep bandwidth open, so to speak, for people to talk about the content of the episode if they want to. ;)

[nabokovfan87]

So I'm listening to things again, still feel like an ass for the email, but I have some input for clarity's sake.

When you were reading, I mentioned I was from the Pre-Internet, 3d, and HD era. Reason for doing so was to point out things that have happened in the past 20 or so years. A lot of new things have happened, the medium is constantly changing.

Afterwards, Clayton I believe, mentioned that he can build a pc for 600 dollars and it will last for several years. Keep in mind this is a ridiculously new idea. when I build my first PC in 2004, it cost 2500 bucks and was a slot 939 single core AMD 4000. My newest pc is a top of the line quad-core with everything except a video card and it was around 850.

Memory price fixing lawsuits, intel getting sued, seagate/western digital and amd/nvidia price wars have dropped the price of hardware vastly.

Edit: Keep in mind raven, right now all of my income goes towards school, I'm unable to get assistance from a scholarship or something. Once I graduate and get a job, money is no longer being sucked out at 3-7 grand every few months when i make 150 every 2 weeks.

[Ravenlock]

All fair points, which is why I tried to be clear that I wasn't calling your claims invalid, just saying that some of your stated assumptions about our post-education lifestyles were incorrect. ;)

Personally, I actually felt like I had more financial freedom in college than I have now, in some respects. My education was largely being covered by scholarship, and so the money that I did earn was more or less mine to do as I pleased with. Now, in married, working, adult life, I have demands on my time and my money that didn't exist then. Sure, I make more of it, but I pay out a lot more of it too. So it's different for everyone.

[Voodoo]

Afterwards, Clayton I believe, mentioned that he can build a pc for 600 dollars and it will last for several years. Keep in mind this is a ridiculously new idea. when I build my first PC in 2004, it cost 2500 bucks and was a slot 939 single core AMD 4000. My newest pc is a top of the line quad-core with everything except a video card and it was around 850.
$2,500 in 2004 for a gaming computer? That's is an insane amount of money to spend, even six years ago. I've rarely spent above $1,000 on a computer going as far back as 1986 when I bought my first home computer. That quad you built for $850, are you reusing a card from a previous machine?
Memory price fixing lawsuits, intel getting sued, seagate/western digital and amd/nvidia price wars have dropped the price of hardware vastly.
The # of people purchasing home computers helped tremendously too. I remember back in the late 80's when I couldn't afford to purchase an Intel based computer. I always went with Zirlog or AMD because I purchased what made sense to my income.

I also didn't buy all my parts new back then, my income didn't allow it. So I went to recycle shops and scrapped together the remaining parts I was missing. Always worked out very well. I remember the last time I went to a computer 'scrap yard', I picked up a 21" CRT monitor in 1998 for $5. It was so cheap that I bought 2 for when the first one blew out. I continue to visit 'scrap yards' to this day because of the power of your $ at these places.

[nabokovfan87]

$2,500 in 2004 for a gaming computer? That's is an insane amount of money to spend, even six years ago. I've rarely spent above $1,000 on a computer going as far back as 1986 when I bought my first home computer. That quad you built for $850, are you reusing a card from a previous machine?

Kind of, I replaced my video card in early 2009/late 2008 with an msi 4850 quadpipe. I gave away my old x800xl (4 generation leap ftw), and essentially had the 4850 for around a year.

I agree it was an insane amount, here is what I bought and the price (the case was a complete pile of crap, and a huge waste, I bought it for btx compatability... that worked out well). I'm looking it up now, was 2k not 2.5.

here is what it included:

200 gb wd sata 1.5 hdd = 98
corsair xms ddr 400 2x1gb= 336.1
dvd drive = 48
creative audigy 2 zs gamer soundcard = 114
thermaltake kandalf case = 185.5
asus a8n-e mobo = 114
antec tpII-550 psu = 115
ati x800xl = 319
amd 4000 = 475
tax = 130
shipping = 60

Can't believe some of the things cost that much, but like I said memory, cpu, and video were all price fixed until the lawsuits came (coincidently, they are double the price from nowadays).

Personally, I actually felt like I had more financial freedom in college than I have now, in some respects. My education was largely being covered by scholarship, and so the money that I did earn was more or less mine to do as I pleased with. Now, in married, working, adult life, I have demands on my time and my money that didn't exist then. Sure, I make more of it, but I pay out a lot more of it too. So it's different for everyone.

Agreed, I am in an extremely rare scenario, its a huge pain in the ass.