Post by ddrmaniac007 on Dec 17, 2009 19:37:24 GMT -5
This is copy and pasted from another LP forum. (Sticky?)
General LP Guidelines
Post by Schildkrote on May 3rd, 2008, 4:27 pm
Grawl wanted me to provide a little guidance for this forum in the form of some LP Dos and Don'ts, so I figured I'd give it a shot.
Grawl-edit: These are no absolute finals on how to do LPs. However, it's a good idea to take these into consideration. Got a general guideline yourself that you think should be added? Reply and share.
DOs
Do, learn to edit your videos! Nobody wants to see you miss a jump or get killed for five minutes straight. It's boring. Romhack videos may be an exception to this, but those are also very difficult to make in any sort of watchable fashion - for every one good romhack LP, there's five or six bad ones, and that's because without excellent commentary watching someone die over and over is boring as hell.
Do make test videos and listen to criticism! More often than not, people here shrug criticism off. That shouldn't be happening. Take it into consideration and improve. I know that you're not getting paid for this, that you can make whatever videos you want, that this is just for fun. Maybe it's just me, though, but unless I do something with the intent to do it the best way I can, then it's probably not worth doing. That counts for LPs, too.
Do try video hosts other than YouTube! YouTube's 10-minute time limit, questionable visual quality, and abundance of dumbass viewers doesn't work well for LPs. Try Viddler or Dailymotion instead, maybe Vimeo for LPs that require high-def videos.
Do learn how to transcode your videos! Mediacoder is a free program that allows you to seriously reduce file sizes without any effect on quality; this saves you a ton of time on uploading and, in the case of some video hosts, allows you to upload more without going over any limits.
Do accept that until a constant stream of high-quality videos start showing up from sites like this, people are going to hate on YouTube LPs.
DON'Ts
Don't make a video LP of an RPG. This needs to be said first because people keep doing it over. and over. and over. No matter how much you argue about it, no matter how many walls of text I have to read about it, an RPG will NEVER make a good video LP. They're too long, a sizable part of the gameplay revolves around repeition and tediousness, and they involve a whooole lot of reading, which doesn't work well when another person is playing. Let's look at some common objections to this:
"But an RPG COULD make a good VLP, it just hasn't been done yet!"
And I COULD stop sleeping with your mother, but that's not happening anytime soon, now is it? Sure, it's totally possible that one day, someone could make a good RPG VLP. Unfortunately, that person is not you, and trying will just make you look like an idiot. Trust me on this.
"But nobody's paying me to do this!
I can do whatever I want with my LPs!" This is true, but what we're trying to do is elevate your videos from me-too Deceased Crab imitations into decent entertainment in their own right. If you make better videos, it reflects better on the community than if you make shit.
"But my viewers/this other LPer/this hobo said they liked my 300-video LP of Final Fantasy 7!"
It's time to learn one of the harshest lessons of creating free entertainment on the Internet: viewers are stupid. Very, very stupid. You could make a 12-hour video of a bus driving through the desert with nothing happening whatsoever, and people would not only watch it, they'd proudly admit to watching it like it was some kind of badge of honor. I know this because I've done it. Second lesson: if people don't like something, they're not going to bother saying so most of the time. Instead, they're just going to stop watching your shit.
Don't make an LP without commentary. There has been one watchable exception to this that I can recall, and that was when someone did Grim Fandago without commentary. They also heavily edited their footage so it was basically like watching a movie. Given that the LPs I've seen here haven't mastered the delicate art of editing out portions of a video where you die over and over, I don't think anyone's quite up to those standards yet, so let's put commentary in our LPs.
Don't keep doing the same games other people do - this means all fifty of you who've done I Wanna Be The Guy! Contrary to popular belief, there actually no rule against doing repeat LPs. The thing is, there doesn't need to be a rule. Doing repeats of the same game bores viewers, who enjoy seeing new content. This leads into the next guideline...
Don't make LPs just for the sake of making LPs! That's not what their purpose is! LPs are for showing off a game that you feel is special enough to be shown off. The best LPs are made by people who give a shit about the game they're playing for some reason or another. Bad LPs, on the other hand, are usually made by people who see a popular fad and want to copy it for easy subs. Let's try to avoid that. If you don't have a game you really want to show off or a concept you really think will hook people, then don't make an LP. It's that easy.
Don't use crappy recording programs! If it puts a watermark on your video, don't use it! If it makes things grainy, don't use it! If the FPS is lower than what you see when you're playing the actual game, don't use it! You have Google, there's no excuse for not having some sort of decent recording program. Try ZD Soft Game Recorder for most modern games and emulators; for other stuff, Camtasia works well if you have a lot of RAM, otherwise try Fraps. If you want to record from a video game system, try a Gamebridge or its cousin the Dazzle.
Don't, under any circumstances, make an LP using a webcam or camcorder trained on your monitor or TV! I shouldn't even have to explain this. Just don't do it. Period.
Don't fellate other LPers in your videos. We don't care how hilarious you think Deceased Crab, Proton Jon, UltraJMan, or whoever are. When you extoll their virtues in an LP, all that happens is that we realize how much funnier they are than you, then leave to go watch their videos instead. Try to be funny yourself, don't rely on them to do it for you. And yes, this includes the fetid pile of unfunny that is the Angry Video Game Nerd.
Don't overuse save states. The only situation where I'd find excessive save stating acceptable would be during a romhack LP, and there's already way, way too many of those, so if you're thinking of doing one you should probably reconsider.
General LP Guidelines
Post by Schildkrote on May 3rd, 2008, 4:27 pm
Grawl wanted me to provide a little guidance for this forum in the form of some LP Dos and Don'ts, so I figured I'd give it a shot.
Grawl-edit: These are no absolute finals on how to do LPs. However, it's a good idea to take these into consideration. Got a general guideline yourself that you think should be added? Reply and share.
DOs
Do, learn to edit your videos! Nobody wants to see you miss a jump or get killed for five minutes straight. It's boring. Romhack videos may be an exception to this, but those are also very difficult to make in any sort of watchable fashion - for every one good romhack LP, there's five or six bad ones, and that's because without excellent commentary watching someone die over and over is boring as hell.
Do make test videos and listen to criticism! More often than not, people here shrug criticism off. That shouldn't be happening. Take it into consideration and improve. I know that you're not getting paid for this, that you can make whatever videos you want, that this is just for fun. Maybe it's just me, though, but unless I do something with the intent to do it the best way I can, then it's probably not worth doing. That counts for LPs, too.
Do try video hosts other than YouTube! YouTube's 10-minute time limit, questionable visual quality, and abundance of dumbass viewers doesn't work well for LPs. Try Viddler or Dailymotion instead, maybe Vimeo for LPs that require high-def videos.
Do learn how to transcode your videos! Mediacoder is a free program that allows you to seriously reduce file sizes without any effect on quality; this saves you a ton of time on uploading and, in the case of some video hosts, allows you to upload more without going over any limits.
Do accept that until a constant stream of high-quality videos start showing up from sites like this, people are going to hate on YouTube LPs.
DON'Ts
Don't make a video LP of an RPG. This needs to be said first because people keep doing it over. and over. and over. No matter how much you argue about it, no matter how many walls of text I have to read about it, an RPG will NEVER make a good video LP. They're too long, a sizable part of the gameplay revolves around repeition and tediousness, and they involve a whooole lot of reading, which doesn't work well when another person is playing. Let's look at some common objections to this:
"But an RPG COULD make a good VLP, it just hasn't been done yet!"
And I COULD stop sleeping with your mother, but that's not happening anytime soon, now is it? Sure, it's totally possible that one day, someone could make a good RPG VLP. Unfortunately, that person is not you, and trying will just make you look like an idiot. Trust me on this.
"But nobody's paying me to do this!
I can do whatever I want with my LPs!" This is true, but what we're trying to do is elevate your videos from me-too Deceased Crab imitations into decent entertainment in their own right. If you make better videos, it reflects better on the community than if you make shit.
"But my viewers/this other LPer/this hobo said they liked my 300-video LP of Final Fantasy 7!"
It's time to learn one of the harshest lessons of creating free entertainment on the Internet: viewers are stupid. Very, very stupid. You could make a 12-hour video of a bus driving through the desert with nothing happening whatsoever, and people would not only watch it, they'd proudly admit to watching it like it was some kind of badge of honor. I know this because I've done it. Second lesson: if people don't like something, they're not going to bother saying so most of the time. Instead, they're just going to stop watching your shit.
Don't make an LP without commentary. There has been one watchable exception to this that I can recall, and that was when someone did Grim Fandago without commentary. They also heavily edited their footage so it was basically like watching a movie. Given that the LPs I've seen here haven't mastered the delicate art of editing out portions of a video where you die over and over, I don't think anyone's quite up to those standards yet, so let's put commentary in our LPs.
Don't keep doing the same games other people do - this means all fifty of you who've done I Wanna Be The Guy! Contrary to popular belief, there actually no rule against doing repeat LPs. The thing is, there doesn't need to be a rule. Doing repeats of the same game bores viewers, who enjoy seeing new content. This leads into the next guideline...
Don't make LPs just for the sake of making LPs! That's not what their purpose is! LPs are for showing off a game that you feel is special enough to be shown off. The best LPs are made by people who give a shit about the game they're playing for some reason or another. Bad LPs, on the other hand, are usually made by people who see a popular fad and want to copy it for easy subs. Let's try to avoid that. If you don't have a game you really want to show off or a concept you really think will hook people, then don't make an LP. It's that easy.
Don't use crappy recording programs! If it puts a watermark on your video, don't use it! If it makes things grainy, don't use it! If the FPS is lower than what you see when you're playing the actual game, don't use it! You have Google, there's no excuse for not having some sort of decent recording program. Try ZD Soft Game Recorder for most modern games and emulators; for other stuff, Camtasia works well if you have a lot of RAM, otherwise try Fraps. If you want to record from a video game system, try a Gamebridge or its cousin the Dazzle.
Don't, under any circumstances, make an LP using a webcam or camcorder trained on your monitor or TV! I shouldn't even have to explain this. Just don't do it. Period.
Don't fellate other LPers in your videos. We don't care how hilarious you think Deceased Crab, Proton Jon, UltraJMan, or whoever are. When you extoll their virtues in an LP, all that happens is that we realize how much funnier they are than you, then leave to go watch their videos instead. Try to be funny yourself, don't rely on them to do it for you. And yes, this includes the fetid pile of unfunny that is the Angry Video Game Nerd.
Don't overuse save states. The only situation where I'd find excessive save stating acceptable would be during a romhack LP, and there's already way, way too many of those, so if you're thinking of doing one you should probably reconsider.
