Social media campaign starts on Facebook

[xalener]

The “likes” were just to get people subscribed to the real BM page instead of the hundreds of imposters.

[marc.2377]

@higgsboson

Background pictures are expected to be relatively high resolution, which would mean huge files if they were PNGs. PNGs are not compressed much, which is why they are generally used for small, sharp graphics like logos, since those aren’t big but require sharp detail. These graphics can also take advantage of the extra transparency channel that PNGs offer, which would be pointless for a background picture or a photo.

A high-quality JPEG (10-12) is pretty much identical to an uncompressed bitmap, you will never be able to tell the difference. JPEGs can be great quality but they don’t tolerate editing (re-saving and re-compressing) much. A background picture is not meant to be edited by you anyway, so that’s not an issue.

JPEG is clearly intended to be used for larger, photographic stuff, while PNG is clearly meant for smaller graphics.

I see - just downloaded this image and converted it to jpg. Got virtually the same quality in a 4.5x smaller file. Thanks!

[Mabilis]

Letting us down slowly.

[Nightblade]

@marc.2377

I see - just downloaded this image and converted it to jpg. Got [color=DarkRed]*virtually* the same quality in a 4.5x smaller file. Thanks!

Thanks for wasting my bandwidth
But a point semi-well made. You’ll notice that you just used a PNG image as your source for that JPEG right? You wanted to downgrade the image quality by a small degree for a big saving on space, I get that, and certainly it makes sense. But for me to try the opposite and increase the JPEG’s image’s quality at the same resolution is not so easy.
Not everyone (probably only a tiny minority) want’s/cares about what I mentioned. But it’s a forum, I’m not expecting universal approval.

@ higgsboson: I know that PNG images are much larger (referring to file size) but you can notice a difference in sharpness between a JPEG and PNG image of the same resolution, at least I can, and I appreciate the quality.
That was about the extent of the depth of my post.
It’s not like I expect JPEG format to be banned, I’d just like the option of downloading high rez images in a format that best preserves their fidelity.
Most likely I’ll just hope for higher than HD JPEG’s in a 16:9 aspect ratio, add very mild sharpening and resize to 1920x1080.

@Nightblade+--

Not far off I’d guess. Maybe they were counting on a slower uptake on the Liking side of things. Still, I’d rather deal with media release delays than a regular succession of updates followed by a two month long wait for the game. Also just speculation on my part…

@Raminator

Mostly baseless, but there might be some truth deeper in. I’ve said before that there are still a few things we need to see to before we can proceed with the release campaign, once we get those straightened out there’ll be more updates more frequently. I don’t think anyone was expecting to hit 20,000 likes after only a day, though, so that may have screwed with the timeline a little…

Well, at least I got one point semi-validated. :retard:

[Briareos_H]

@Night blade whatever

Stupid debate about PNG vs. JPEG for desktop wallpapers.

Windows converts all wallpapers to low-quality JPEG anyway so who cares.

[4s4sin96]

(^_^)

[King_Kaddo]

In my “abscence” I could think about some questions I could ask here.

• Have you developped a multistage plan for the social media campaign or is it something easy?

• Is the campaign bound to a timeline or is it dependant on the devs opinion of presentability?

• Are you still in shedule?

• Is Catzeyes now your PR-manager? How far can she go?

• What could be possible content in future updates other than screenshots?

• How do you feel about the reactions by the newly interested community?

[CatzEyes93]

@King_Kaddo

In my “abscence” I could think about some questions I could ask here.

• Have you developped a multistage plan for the social media campaign or is it something easy?

• Is the campaign bound to a timeline or is it dependant on the devs opinion of presentability?

• Are you still in shedule?

• Is Catzeyes now your PR-manager? How far can she go?

• What could be possible content in future updates other than screenshots?

• How do you feel about the reactions by the newly interested community?

NO I am not the pr manager in any way shape or form. I only assist carlos in managing the fb page. That is all.

Oh, and Happy Fourth of July!!! :3

[King_Kaddo]

OH MY GOD YOU’RE BACK!!!

[Katana]

@"[YC

sgsells42;467640"]I’m sorry if this has been said in the past, and if it has please do just delete it, but I really enjoyed the way you folks handled the media release. I think that it was a good move to use the 20000 likes as a way of not only spreading the word that it was on the way, but also giving people a chance to start up there own interest in the community once more.

I’ve been a lurker for a good long while on the forums trying my best to fallow around the development of the modification through my various older accounts between crashes, wipes moves whatever, but I’ve not really ever posted that much. I thought that this would be a good time to just get my thanks out of the way, even if they aren’t needed.

If there is one thing that I could say that I did not like about the way that it was handled, is the way in which it was announced, it just didn’t seem to do the ‘event’ justice. I don’t know if it was intentional, and may never know, but I think more advertising of it, would have done more for interest in the modification.

It doesn’t mater to me if the modification launches this year, or in five years time, as long as the end product is in a complete, and playable state, which dose the source material justice.

Wishing everyone the best of luck, in there wait for the modification, and its development -John

Just to clarify, your main criticism is that the event was not well-advertised? Keep in mind that AAA games make a big effort to get their events and advertising around; if we wanted to keep 99% of our developers on-task, then we had to just post where we could think of with the remaining people. We don’t even really know the process for issuing a press release to gaming magazines.

[Nightblade]

@Katana

Just to clarify, your main criticism is that the event was not well-advertised? Keep in mind that AAA games make a big effort to get their events and advertising around; if we wanted to keep 99% of our developers on-task, then we had to just post where we could think of with the remaining people. We don’t even really know the process for issuing a press release to gaming magazines.

I’m sure all you’d need to say is; “yo, you guys wanna plug Black Mesa?”
They’d fall over their feet in the rush to fill you in.
…
That sounded weird.

EDIT:
Look for a comment made by Nick Hubbard on the FB page made today. I am so tempted to point out that he mistook an insult for an agreement, but that would ruin the fun of just laughing at him from across the interwebs! :lol:

[dblkion]

I’m sure valve themselves will make a nice pop-up announcement via steam when Black Mesa is released.

[danielsangeo]

The gaming community is going to have a meltdown when this sucker is released.

And I bet there will be regular news organizations that are going to pick up on it, too.

[MRPolo]

What we really need is new screenies. The old ones got boring to… They got boring

[PumaB]

aw cmon i wanna use black mesa’s content in source film maker

[D3lta]

@PumaB

aw cmon i wanna use black mesa’s content in source film maker

I don’t think that would work.
Getting L4D2 content into it causes the tool to crash already.

[Nightblade]

@dblkion

I’m sure valve themselves will make a nice pop-up announcement via steam when Black Mesa is released.

In Jamaican mama’s voice:[/SIZE] They had betta do more dan dat!

I’m demanding a full blown poster background on Steam, I don’t just mean the spotlight thing, I mean splattered on the main store page!

@TehBoxNoob

I don’t think that would work.
Getting L4D2 content into it causes the tool to crash already.

As they extend the functionality to other versions of the Source Engine I’m sure that will improve. All we have to do is wait. If you’re reading this chances are you’re already pretty good at that.

EDIT:

@danielsangeo

The gaming community is going to have a meltdown when this sucker is released.

And I bet there will be regular news organizations that are going to pick up on it, too.

From your keyboard to Conan O’Brien’s mouth.

[Spooboy]

I’m not one to complain, but it I have to agree that a video really would be great. I remember when I was hyped for Uncharted 2, I watched the E3 demo about 60 times, and it kept me sane. If there was a 3-5 minute demonstration of Black Mesa (any level would do), it would keep me happy till release. There would be no more need to see any new media, and whenever I got over excited about the mod I would just re watch the demo and think: okay, this is going to be awesome, now all I have to do is wait.

[Nightblade]

@Spooboy

I’m not one to complain, but it I have to agree that a video really would be great. I remember when I was hyped for Uncharted 2, I watched the E3 demo about 60 times, and it kept me sane. If there was a 3-5 minute demonstration of Black Mesa (any level would do), it would keep me happy till release. There would be no more need to see any new media, and whenever I got over excited about the mod I would just re watch the demo and think: okay, this is going to be awesome, now all I have to do is wait.

Well it’s a media campaign, so to start with the crescendo wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense. I think we’ll definitely get a trailer at least a month before the release though. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen the BM trailers.

[Spooboy]

@Nightblade+--

Well it’s a media campaign, so to start with the crescendo wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense. I think we’ll definitely get a trailer at least a month before the release though. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve seen the BM trailers.

I’m aware. Just stating my opinion on actual game play trailers. It’s far more impact-full on an audience and after that I would have no need for any new screen shots, but hey, that’s just me. The campaign is a nice change of pace for the mod and I appreciate it… but if there would have been a game play trailer that wasn’t leaked/awful quality then I would have no need to ever hype about the mod. Not that I do anyways

Also, the trailer that was already released has been viewed many times. I just can’t really place myself in the moment. Again, I’ll reference the Uncharted 2 preview, it did an amazing job letting people know how the game was going to play. Personally I believe a game play trailer released for Black Mesa right now would be better than screen shots (and it’s not like I’m saying they won’t, just throwing it out there).