December 2018 update- changes and new content

Hi everyone! Merry christmas, and, err, sorry.

Been a bit of a bumpy road this year. In some ways I think the content has definitely improved, but getting that to happen has taken way longer than it probably needed to. I had a lot of personal issues that didn’t help matters, but the truth is I just got too distracted by unfeasibly large projects- every video I’ve been working on has snowballed into a massive endeavour that I couldn’t handle in the time I wanted, on top of the time I spent looking into our new discord. Was very hard to manage it all and clearly I let the patreon fall by the wayside.

SO. I want to thank everyone who stayed on the patreon program for their patience. I have been writing nearly every day, so I like to think the support was justified there, but of course it’s frustrating to not see that funding produce more videos inside of a year and not see all these promises for updates fulfilled. I will therefore be making some changes to my plans, my patreon, and will become more upfront with you guys as possible about what’s going on. 

Patreon changes and future projects

For now I’m sticking to monthly payments if only because I feel the work towards videos has been ongoing, to the point where it’s still taking a major chunk of my time to create. I have plans to continue my big projects but have created, in the interim, some smaller scripts that will hopefully keep things more active. One of my goals for next year is to create more feasible content that still feels substantial, like my Cuphead video, and to try and release that more frequently. There are some great opportunities to plan ahead with things like Psychonauts 2 on the way, and I’ll be sure to release some beyond words to try and keep people generally updated on my progress. The Fargo video was something that came together incredibly quickly, way more than I thought it would, and was originally starving off a video that I’ll discuss later in the unmade video part of this post- it made me feel like, if I did more of those, I could really keep the channel going. It’s just a matter of remembering that it’s okay to write less.

One project that I can now confirm will address this is my musical series! Beyond Broadway has, ever since I hit funding, been in the writing phase for a while and I’m pleased to say I have quite a bit mapped out for that already. Originally it was going to be super long and comprehensive but I found that making it that big wasn’t necessary and actually detrimental to getting the basic concepts across, so the main focus now is in double checking it with musicians and ensuring that i’m delivering something substantial. I’m not going too in depth with composition however, and will mostly be approaching it from a dramatists perspective- there are many musical theatre talents who would classify themselves as dramatists and I feel that’s a good enough reason to talk about music dramatically as much as technically when presenting the content overall. I don’t know when it will be out specifically but I’ll be trying to give it some strong focus in the coming year. 

Unmade projects- including sly 3

I spent time writing a LOT of projects this year that snowballed into huge video scripts I didn’t really think worked. One of those was the script for Sly 3- I have a full first draft done and have tweaked it a lot, but I think there’s something fundamentally wrong with the structure and the way its written compared to the previous entries, so I’m still messing with it until it sounds right. Sly 3 is put together so differently to the previous two games, and my videos which attempt to both tell the story and dissect the overall content as we go doesn’t format well to how that story is told. I’m probably going to have to do a lot of non linear back and forthing to really get the effect I want. I got a lot of questions asking when it will be and if it will ever get done. Don’t worry folks- it is happening, I am 100 percent committed to making it happen. There’s a lot in the current draft I still plan on using, I just have to rearrange stuff until it all clicks. 

I also had a Spectacular Spiderman video I was determined to get out this year because of the shows tenth anniversary. Unfortunately I’ve missed the boat completely as, while I pushed all of September and October to make it happen, I never quite hit my groove with the second half of the script and knew I needed to get Spyro done. I had a lot of input from some of my fans as well as my friends, and am highly considering putting script progress up on Patreon as a reward to see if that helps too. If you guys would be interested in that, please let me know. I probably won’t put up a lot if only because I am often very committed to maintaining secrecy so that the final result doesn’t underwhelm people. Either way, Spidey should be out in the new year. He’s had a lot of success recently and I think Spectacular will always be relevant to the ongoing conversation. 

The last project I’ve been hammering at was a very different kind of retrospective for a comic book. This project was actually supposed to be quite small but I got carried away and it became completely unmanageable. That isn’t on any set deadline but it does mean I have a good script I’m now looking to cut down and get out in the new year. I hope you guys will get to see that soon enough, it’s really different from my other stuff. I think, with Stan Lee’s passing, it’s become even more important that I put it together. 

Spyro

I’m really happy that people have taken to this video so strongly! Lots of comments liking the Dvorak intro- I wanted to create something that served as a sequel to the crash N sane introduction, so I figured another piece of classical music in a video game style was called for. I wanted to use brave new world as a much more classical piece, where it was 8 bit but still the same as the original, focusing on all the ways the new game looked lush and then start to slowly reveal the flaws as the music went sour. Then while searching different variations of the song I discovered the Paroparo dancing mix and the whole concept changed in my mind. 

I hope it’s clear how much more impressed I am with what the team created compared to Crash or at least the foundations they laid down to try and make the game not a disaster. It’s got a lot of issues thanks to the inconsistent processes that brought them there but they genuinely tried to put a floor down before they built the house artistically, and that is truly something worth commending. It was a very easy game to review because there were so many things they released about its production over the course of development, and it was really obvious what they were going for at almost every turn compared to Crash again. Still, I think it’s very important not to get complacent. I was worried I went on too long about all my issues, but honestly I feel like it’s always more important to bring those up than repeatedly wax lyrical about how good something is. If it’s good then I’d rather not have that changed and just have the team keep doing what they’re doing- if it’s bad it should be addressed as soon as possible. 

That’s just about everything. I would like to add some thanks so that it’s always around for posterity for some of my fans contributing to the videos- Bullsquid offered to add some effects for the thanos sequence, Lucid has put captions in the latest video with translations into french provided by Bubuche, and the thumbnail was created by my buddy Ferf. This is on top of the several people who looked over my incomplete scripts and offered feedback and advice that made things a lot more palatable. I cannot begin to express how brilliant all of that is and how great you guys are for getting involved. We have a Discord now with a VERY strong community of friends which also makes me feel like we can see the real results of the work, bringing people together to discuss, joke and become friends off the back of funny shrek edits disguised as analysis. In all seriousness, it’s been a strong year and I thank all of you for letting that be possible. What a cool bunch of bunnies. 

See ya next time, and maybe, hopefully, for Sly 3. 

Merry Christmas ya’ll.

-B