Recent updating

Will · April 22, 2008, 01:37:35 PM

Hey Jon, you've broken your own record on this site by updating 4 days in a row, which I've never before seen. Sweet! I wonder what it would be like to update 31 days (in other words a month) in a row.

Eggz · April 22, 2008, 01:40:21 PM

I think you mean 5 days in a row, 17-21.

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This looks like a job for Science!

JonLeung · April 22, 2008, 09:00:15 PM

I'm trying to update with either some maps or a couple thumbnails every day.

It also helped that the games I updated were Mega Man games, which are easy to put up.

If you want, I could put up a map a day by not putting them all up when I get them, and deliberately saving them for later days, but that would be cheating.

I made four new thumbnails today...one was a remake to a better one; all four of them are for Mega Man games!

Will · April 22, 2008, 11:02:40 PM

Still I wish the thumbnail Gallery existed as I had read about in many previous posts. No matter what I never seem to see any Neo-Geo thumbnails on the front page no matter how many times I refresh the page. Could the Neo-Geo thumbnails have a micro chance of showing like 1/999 or were they never made in the first place? If the latter is correct, could you Jon please make at least one thumbnail of a Neo-Geo game any time soon?

Maxim · April 23, 2008, 04:36:37 AM

The front page random stuff is done in a really nasty way. Can't you get a PHP coder to sort it out for you? Even I could do better than that, I just don't have the time for it

DarkWolf · April 23, 2008, 02:06:43 PM

I'd be willing to write a server side version of the random thumbnails, just say the word.

JonLeung · April 23, 2008, 06:02:30 PM

I was thinking of doing a thing with frames to organize the thumbnails better, but it sounds like you guys have better ideas than me.

If you do have time, DarkWolf, that you can make something super-duper simple for a code-hating person like myself to easily modify whenever I add more thumbnails, I would welcome it.

I was also thinking again about somehow restructuring the site...do I wait for the urgings to go away (again) or do I deal with it?

I know that's going to take a lot of work...

DarkWolf · April 23, 2008, 07:17:37 PM

I sent you an e-mail with the code. I based it on a simple text-file database, so you can updated it with notepad or whatever.

It would be cool to see the site move to a more dynamic platform with web-based controls and the like. But yeah, lots of work, especially if you plan to do it yourself!

JonLeung · April 23, 2008, 07:53:34 PM

'Kay, I'll check it out, thanks, DarkWolf!

And for Will Mallia...today's two new thumbnails are Neo-Geo ones.

Don't worry, I keep a list of the games I have yet to make thumbnails for.

If anyone's wondering why no Japanese games have shown up yet, I'm wondering how I should title them. Since I really don't think I want to do the original kanji when spelling out their names, obviously I'm left with the anglicized-spelled title, or the commonly accepted translation. Do I stick a (J) at the end or not?

There's "Rockman & Forte" for the Super Famicom. Do I put it as "Rockman & Forte" or "Mega Man & Bass", since that's the literal translation and the name of the worldwide-released GBA version? However, this is the Super Famicom release we're talking about.

Is it "Castlevania: Rondo Of Blood" or "Dracula X: Rondo Of Blood"? I suppose I should check what the newer PSP version is called. Or do I go with "Akumajo Dracula X: Chi no Rondo"?

Maybe it's easier than I think it is, but I just need to make a choice I can stick with.

JonLeung · April 23, 2008, 08:05:53 PM

Hmm...DarkWolf, I put the .php file up, but then it seems to not want to load up parts of the main page...

Obviously I'm doing something wrong.

Yeah, laugh it up, everyone knows I'm a n00b at this stuff.

DarkWolf · April 24, 2008, 02:55:51 PM

Could you upload it renamed as something else like index2.php? I tried using the index.php I gave you on my local web server and other than the images missing, it loads everything correctly. Perhaps it is something on your end? I did forgot to get rid of the boarder around the images though, so I will need to send you an updated file for that.

Eggz · April 24, 2008, 08:09:18 PM

I say, if it had a North American release, or even part of a series that's available outside of Japan, go with the commonly accepted English title, and possibly add the (J) if it was a Japanese-only release overall.

Unless they are more well known as they anglicized titles, such as Seiken Densetsu 3, keep it as such. Despite the fact that it's part of the Secret of Mana series, most fans know it by its Japanese name.

And then when it comes to Japanese-only games, stick with the anglicized names, with the (J) at the end. The original kanji is just way to much work for it.

That's just my opinion. If anyone has any better ideas, go right ahead.

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This looks like a job for Science!

Maxim · April 25, 2008, 03:14:03 AM

I say, put Japanese text with a couple of English versions as subtitles - I try for Romaji + translation + anglicised name where possible. Japanese text is cool and foreign and you can pretend you can read it.

DarkWolf · April 25, 2008, 04:45:45 AM

When I did Momoko 120%, I used the Kana for "Momoko" in the maps' title cards. But Kana is easy enough to do. If it had any Kanji I wouldn't have bothered though.

Maxim · April 25, 2008, 10:10:19 AM

It can be tricky to render kanji in a pixel-font-looking way. However, almost every kanji font has bitmaps at low sizes anyway, which is close enough even if not stylistically the same - that's how I achieved the (unreadable) kanji here:

http://www.smspower.org/maxim/smssoftware/picrossscreenshot.png" width="590" height="283" alt="User posted image" />

Kana is indeed easier, you just need to grab an 8x8 font from an appropriate game.