Some thoughts about the board

[NoeleyC]

I'm not a Linux expert by any means, and yes indeed use Android on tablets/phones and Windows on my laptop, but I've had a Pandora since the very early days (placed my order within the first two hours of availability). Since then I've owned an orginal model, a 1gig, and the original upgraded to 1 gig (because the screen was much better on that one). I also own a Vita and a new 3DS, and between the 3 of them, that's my gaming urges pretty much filled almost all of the time. I'l go through phases of using one more tan the others, and I'll admit the Pandora has fallen a little lax of late, with games like Box Boy on the 3DS and Sealth Inc.2 on the Vita, taking up my free time. I do lurk a lot of these forums and indeed intend to buy a Pyra when it's available. I try to give feedback on new software when I can, but generally I find my level of technical knowledge wouldn't really help anyone else much on here. As for things like the endless keyboard layout threads and the like, I've long given up trying to follow them! I've generally found the community here friendly and welcoming and yes I find the general discussions here have gotten very quiet but that's to be expected as there's not much software arriving of late. For games like Diablo, I don't own it so I'm not in a position to try it, but I'm very much looking forward to the upcoming Half Life. I think the devs and contributors on here have done fantastic work over the years, there's tons of software I'd never have believed possible when I originally got my Pandora, and it seems potentilly a lot more to be squeezed out of it yet!

 

[EvilDragon]

I also didn't like Worms, so never played Hase (a game which REALLY could take off with a small community multiplayer server, where we could all play against each others).

You know, that I actually did this? It runs even on your server! Even with ingame Irc chat...

No, I didn't know that.

Was it posted somewhere outside the game thread?

Is there an area at the boards where people make appointments and meet up for that?

Why not do a little compo - I could easily throw in a few small prizes like vouchers for the shop, etc.

Stuff like that gets lost when it's just hidden in the news thread

I'm sure I'd play a few rounds as well in that case

 

[EvilDragon]

Off Topic/ I tried again FEZ last week, with updated mono and glshim, but it still segfault. Knytt Underground I have to retry, but my first try was not sucessfull at all

Well, if you get Knytt Underground to work, a lot of Multimedia Fusion 2 games should work as well

 

[Ziz]

No, I didn't know that.

Was it posted somewhere outside the game thread?

I see your intention behind that post... A shame, that the pandora blog is dead.

Is there an area at the boards where people make appointments and meet up for that?

Yes. The channel #hase in the freenode. You can even continue chatting in the game lobby and of course ingame. Afterwards you can see replays (but without the chats).

Why not do a little compo - I could easily throw in a few small prizes like vouchers for the shop, etc.

Oh, I would have love such a competition. But without interest from the board?

Stuff like that gets lost when it's just hidden in the news thread

Where else should I have posted it?

I'm sure I'd play a few rounds as well in that case

I am in #hase everytime I am online in IRC. So if I am available you can't miss me. But practise with the AI first, there are plenty of weapons to choose from.

 

[edgex004]

Why not do a little compo - I could easily throw in a few small prizes like vouchers for the shop, etc.

Oh, I would have love such a competition. But without interest from the board?

I'd be in. Would prefer to play on my Pandora, but would use the desktop version if need be.

 

[hitbyambulance]

my reason: i never got the Pandora that i ordered, thus why i'm unable to provide feedback on titles. i applied the voucher to an upcoming Pyra, so that will change.

 

[TrashyMG]

I've been bogged down in work, classes and other RL garbage. I've been having a hard time doing things I like with the Pandora lately, including testing new PNDs and such. 

 

[Night]

@Ziz,

The Pandora was at the time a dream come true for many of us. At times when all who longed for a true open handheld could do is rely on GPH's apathy and hope for the best with whatever was laying around, this machine arose along with the iPhones and the Androids and brought true freedom, which had driven the community to do great things and experience the countless adventures that were had up untill now. All of which (in my opinion), enabled this community to succeed the previous Gp32x one rather than "kill it".

So why not try and look at it from another prespective? - There's now another true open handheld in the works that will bring yet even more possibilites for the future of the community, and who said anything about the Pandora not being here to stay anyway?.

What if perhaps the the "less" you're seeing with stuff like Retro in the community is more of an indicator for progress towards new material and that perhaps the fancy 3D stuff on the Pyra is just part of a new incentive to go and try something new, as perhaps some might think that the previous possibilites for Retro were already wildly explored during the Pandora period.

Either way, i do think the people of this community still do like everything Retro just as before, by now it's probably part of the place and just because lately people haven't been talking about it, doesn't meen it's not there anymore or that people outright stopped caring.

I mean sure it is a bit dry right now, but periods like these happen. As long as the community will not chose to give up on its core ideal, soon enough there's ought to be a breath of fresh air that will help new thoughts to emerge.

 

[Hồng Thất Công]

Now I miss CococreekFisherman.  Unban him and we'll get feedback on every release/game

I agree with ekianjo.  Most of the users on this forum, like myself, are between 30 and 40 years of age and have families and kids.  I was a serious gamer before having kids, but no longer have much time anymore.

I also agree with Pickle that doing things that you like is more important that doing things that others like.  Most of the time, the latter will be the bi-product of the first .

I am here because I like the knowledge and professionalism of devs and members on this board.  If I was 15 years younger, I would test every single game.

I downloaded 2x64GB SD Cards full of games from the repo, but have not had time to try them all.  The issue is time...

 

[DavidKnight24]

I'm quite keen on picking up a pyra and porting some software when it becomes available. I enjoy porting to the gcw0 but find the tiny 320x240 resolution can be a little tricky to work with.

 

[EvilDragon]

No, I didn't know that.

Was it posted somewhere outside the game thread?

I see your intention behind that post... A shame, that the pandora blog is dead.

That's not what I meant.

I meant somewhere else at the boards

Is there an area at the boards where people make appointments and meet up for that?

Yes. The channel #hase in the freenode. You can even continue chatting in the game lobby and of course ingame. Afterwards you can see replays (but without the chats).

And it seems no one at the boards here knows about that - except for maybe those who followed the Hase thread.

I didn't really, for example, as I wouldn't play such a game except for against other community members.

Why not do a little compo - I could easily throw in a few small prizes like vouchers for the shop, etc.

Oh, I would have love such a competition. But without interest from the board?

Why do you think there's no interest?

There hasn't really been any promotion.

Stuff like that gets lost when it's just hidden in the news thread

Where else should I have posted it?

Well, that's the problem I mentioned above.

If each new (bigger) update or release would've had its own newspost, you could've added to the title that online multiplayer is now possible, which would've spurred interest.

Also, a thread in the general area where the people can meet up and play against each other could've been opened by you.

But that's exactly the problem I mentioned above:

Back in the gp32x.de days, where I posted the news, this would've been a major feature I've mentioned in the news post.

If there's only the one development thread, people will miss that.

That's the reason I wanted to have newsposts for every release, but developers here were against that.

 

[Ziz]

But I made a news post myself.

A fresh new thread in the Software News section.

Why would be an automatic news post better?

Furthermore in the past it DID work the way it doesn't work now...

 

[Neelix]

I see your intention behind that post... A shame, that the pandora blog is dead.

There's always PandoraLive. It's frequently updated and has good readership figures, so if you wanted to publicise something Pandora related I think that would be a good place to do it, and I'm sure ekianjo would be happy to accept such content.

That's the reason I wanted to have newsposts for every release, but developers here were against that.

While I can see where you are coming from there, the trouble is that not every update contains interesting new features, and given that in most cases the original thread was updated as well with the same information due to the ongoing discussion therein most of the automatic updates came across as spam.

- Neelix

 

[ptitSeb]

Now I miss CococreekFisherman.  Unban him and we'll get feedback on every release/game

^^

I agree with ekianjo.  Most of the users on this forum, like myself, are between 30 and 40 years of age and have families and kids.  I was a serious gamer before having kids, but no longer have much time anymore.

that's no excuse. I'm a bit more than 40, with kids and wife. The point is not to spent all day on the Pandora!

Well, that's the problem I mentioned above.


If each new (bigger) update or release would've had its own newspost, you could've added to the title that online multiplayer is now possible, which would've spurred interest.


Also, a thread in the general area where the people can meet up and play against each other could've been opened by you.


But that's exactly the problem I mentioned above:


Back in the gp32x.de days, where I posted the news, this would've been a major feature I've mentioned in the news post.


If there's only the one development thread, people will miss that.


That's the reason I wanted to have newsposts for every release, but developers here were against that.

I didn't liked the automatic news post, and still don't think it's the answer. I make post for every release I do, not a new thread, but at least a new post, to be sure it's in an "unread" state.. It's true that some dev don't do post for their release, in that case, the automated post can be good.


As mentionned earlier, if the automated post can be disabled (for some name), I'm fine, but I prefer my manual post than the automated ones.

 

[Wrath Of Khan]

I'm quietly waiting for The Pyra, then the scene will come alive again. We'll get some new blood too; it's inevitable.

I will of course be more active when the Pyra drops in my lap. I'll make a few videos etc.

We need fs-uae. I'll ask/pester or make a deal with frodsolheim when the time comes.

Also regular news updates like Ed said make more sense. It's a streamlined approach. Simply put, the more people that are aware of your software the more feedback and help you can potentially receive.

 

[EvilDragon]

But I made a news post myself.

A fresh new thread in the Software News section.

Why would be an automatic news post better?

Furthermore in the past it DID work the way it doesn't work now...

In this case, it wasn't the missing news post, but the title

I, for example, didn't read your post as I initially wasn't interested in Hase.

If you had a " - now with online multiplayer tournament!" in the title, I would've looked at it

 

[PowerGod]

@Ziz: here my wall of text

I never knew about that GP32X and started following only from the Pandora forum, and when the first competition happened it was great, with a lot of things to try, and a difficult choice to make...

I liked very much to try EVERYTHING new, and find new projects, but at some point all my SD were full of things still to try out, put there waiting "for the time"...

There was a thing in the Pandora that was really missing for me, a wireless dialup connection with my phone, but I was ignorant about Linux and how it was working on the Pandora... so I started asking on the forum and found many people helping me with bits of informations that at the end made possible for me to create BTDUN, also I made it with just the Pandora itself !!.

I made it working for me, but then polished it for the others.

There are still helping people around, nothing changed here.

My actual situation is that I have only a working Pandora, and the display is dead... and as I see there are many around with broken or not total functioning devices, you know, years have passed and an handheld device is subject to many enviroments and bad movements...

Still I have many halted projects I didn't finished, and are there in the SD waiting... but yeah, no one asked me to hurry so I'll take my time

I don't think the device is "old", it is still able to do a lot of things... damn, I'm using a 15 years old PC to write this, and excluding "Games for Windows" it can do everything I need, and the Pandora is MORE powerful than this !! Really !! (Just tried JDownloader 2 on both, and the Pandora won !!)

I'm not following the Pyra development as I did for the Pandora, at the time I was like a thirsty vampire and every bit of information was like blood for me, mostly because I had no portable devices at all, also I had no consoles, but now that I played with that device for years, I already done most of the things I wanted to do...

I like the idea of a better device, but I will use it just as I used a Pandora, and I still have to do a lot of things with a Pandora...

Ziz, I liked very much Snowman, but it's too damn difficult for me, I tried so many time to play, it's charming and well animated, but at some point I resigned...

I followed (but never tried) Hase just for curiosity, but I'm not so much into Worms or multiplayer things...

but you should put some info about the multiplayer, #hase channel and link to the thread on the repo page to have more visibility

Single player games with a story are the ones I like better... sometimes I play them even if I don't like the game itself, but just for the story...

EDIT: oh, by the way ekianjo should really find a solution for the not working RSS Feeds of PandoraLive, else I will forever forget to read the new issues

 

[pmprog]

Development-wise, the Pandora was a bit of a nightmare for me. Allegro doesn't quit cleanly, and some of the comments I got regarding the Tournament Hub demo I released were most disenchanting. Surprisingly, it took the release of Sky Supreme for somebody to tell me why neither ran for a number of users (which was the inclusion of the graphic driver libs, copied by copy_libs.sh; being still newish to Linux compilation, I didn't have a clue, it worked on my Pandora). The end result was that Tournament Hub was put on indefinate hold, which is a shame, because I was quite liking it's style and progress. Felt quite polished despite being incomplete.

I have a game close to ready for the Pandora. Mcobit said he'd do me some original graphics for it, and I also need to fix the network play (which occasionally gets out of sync); but otherwise it's ready to go.

However, between the training for my triathlon, and my newborn, computer time is rare unless I'm at work.

With regards to other peoples releases, unfortunately, most of it doesn't appeal to me. Even as a Starcraft fan, whilst technically brilliant, I don't feel Starcraft suits the Pandoras controls (probably because I already dislike the Pandora's nubs, and you need a hub to connect mouse), so I've not put that on. Even those that do appeal to me (Hase does interest me, yet I haven't booted it since the very first beta that you put out, Ziz) I rarely get chance to play/use

But ultimately, at the minute, my Pandora is literally an expensive MP3 player that I take to work. I'll use DeadBeef and VLC2. Occasionally I'll boot up FBA and play some Street Fighter, maybe a webbrowser, sometimes SMplayer for some videos; and in rare situations I'll probably boot up VICE to play some C64.

One of my conundrums is whether it's actually worth getting a Pyra. I rarely code/compile for it (Canseco took over KeePassX), and as I said, the only thing I seem to do on it is play music. That said, I like the idea of HDMI out, and connecting USB devices without a hub (you can do that, right?); and should I get back to coding/compiling, I'll appreciate the speed improvements. So I probably will, but I can foresee it being an expensive media player for a while

It'll be interesting to see the landscape change of the Pyra community, especially with the Debian repos providing a fair amount of kit out of the box.
 

 

[TrashyMG]

. That said, I like the idea of HDMI out, and connecting USB devices without a hub (you can do that, right?);

Shouldn't be an issue with the Pyra.

 

[iprice]

The lack of feedback isn't a new thing, or occurs only on this board. I mentioned exactly the same thing back on the GP32X boards years ago. Nowadays, with games coming at you left, right and centre for free or for a few pennies, there is just very little apparent value to them. Nobody cares about how much work has gone into them, or what the coder/artist/designer etc. has sacrificed to get that game to them. It's far too easy to grab a product, maybe use it/maybe not then move onto the next thing.

Most people (I'm speaking from my own experience now) as has been mentioned, seem to have less time now than ever before. Myself, I've got games from two or three Christmas' and Birthdays ago, still in shrink wrap because I don;t have time to play them. Big AAA games too, for major formats. I'm pretty much playing games that take about two minutes to do a level and then saving, to resume later - that's my spare time gone. Either that or when I have time I'm too exhausted from work to play/enjoy them. My coding output has been virtually nil in the last three months and I've not released anything since my Advent Calendar on 31st November 2014 - and before then it was the Picross game (that ED requested and offered graphics, music etc for )

If you are only coding for feedback, then perhaps it is time to go and do something else, as at the best of the times, providing new games is thankless. Feedback is incredibly rewarding - you get to know that players liked or disliked your game and ways that you can improve it. The lack of feedback can be very demotivating, but don't let that stop you doing what you're doing if you're enjoying it. Code firstly for yourself - do what you want to do for you, not for others. Challenge yourself to do something new and different or to work out how something works. That's where the real rewards are. And if other people enjoy it too and leave feedback, consider that a bonus.