What has happened to Charas?

[Dr. Ace]

I went to check back to what Momeka was talking about and it brings joy in my heart to see so many familiar faces. However, I have to agree whole heartily with Momeka. To get the site more active the site needs a change. RPG Maker 2000 and 2003 are both a decade old now, and much better software has been made for game development since then. I think the website and forum both will profit from a major overhaul, it would certainly make sure I will come back as an active member to help out. Things need to change.

Also, this horrid forum layout needs to be fixed as well, it's horrendous to the eyes. You can barely see where one post begins and another ends, black text on a dark background. What the hell happened to the old one? Why DO you keep this one?

Oh, and those verification, come on man. Seriously? The re-captcha is barely readable and like seven human verification questions?

EDIT: I'm pretty sure I set an avatar as well.

[fruckert]

Oh, and those verification, come on man. Seriously? The re-captcha is barely readable and like seven human verification questions?

I haven't experienced that, yet.
Honestly want to go make a dummy account just to see how terrible it is.

I mean, we don't have any bots anymore, but almost every single new person ends up bitching about it, so I'm guessing it's pretty bad.

Also, regarding the theme, uh...working on it.
Slowly.
One could say I'm not working on it at all, even.

[Archem]

We're muddling around in a pit of despair over here.

[Grandy]

I have been trying to stay silent for a while but after reading Val's old posts and seeing us in our glory days I just keep getting nostalgic. Heck that's part of why I came back! Though what I see...saddens my heart. Old members now gone. People no longer interested in RPG maker hardly at all and since I left not ONE mention of a new Charas Chain game, nor any kind of chain game I might add, and the zaniness that used to soak the walls? Gone! Gone! Well I won't stand back and let this happen to the forums I used to love! I say we bring back the crazyness and off-the-wall way we used to be. I say we WORK to make it like it was! Now I ask you...What can we do? Hm? How can we bring back the good times, and just to be clear I will not see reality, nor reason or any form of order. Got that? So suggestions now! Go!

I remember the good old times...

Lord Raffles.

Ugh.

Anyone remember that guy?

[Prpl_Mage]

Of course, he was in Darkfox's doom(?) mod with charas members. Remember Alex' harp weapon and Sai casting spells and something like that.

[fruckert]

Now that guy was before my time.

Darkfox's Doom mod, however, wasn't. I liked that, despite it basically solely referencing stuff I didn't know about.

[DragonBlaze]

Oh god, Lord Raffles and a bunch of people who didn't know how to deal with trolls...

I agree with Momeka that we need to redesign the charas generators. Minimum changes needed would have to be:
- Allow custom sizes, templates/layouts, and any image/color type. Sizing, formatting, and exporting to specific makers can be done easily enough on the server side. This will also allow these resources to be used in any maker, as well as by people who code their own games.
- Tools to adjust colors. Instead of uploading multiple files for different colors, we should just have sliders for hue, saturation, and contrast for each part.
- Editing tools, give the user the ability to edit resources directly in the editor.
- Make the generators look better.


Does anyone actually have access to the site's source files? It really would only require some css tweaks and simple html edits to give this site a complete refresh in terms of looks. From there, we could add sections to support things other than rm2k/3, advertise a bit with google/facebook, and *poof*, our site is back in business.

In case you guys haven't noticed, I really want this site to thrive again :p It seems like there aren't any good community game making sites out there anymore, and I know charas can fill in that gap. We just need to DO something.

[Moosetroop11]

Anyone know flash AS3? I use that quite a bit so I'd be up for modding that section if we decided to do something like that.

[Prpl_Mage]

I say we mod DB, he's always been a great guy and it sounds like he actually know what needs to be done here.

[Archem]

I would agree, if only because every member who has more than three years of service is now staff for some inexplicable reason.

I mean, except for people who were once admins. **** those douches.

[fruckert]

I would agree, if only because every member who has more than three years of service is now staff for some inexplicable reason.

Pfft.

[Cerebus]

every member who has more than three years of service is now staff for some inexplicable reason.

Yeah, screw you all.

Wasn't DragonBlaze already a mod before, though? Pretty sure he was. Unless there was another "Dragon" something I forgot about...

[Felix-0]

I would agree, if only because every member who has more than three years of service is now staff for some inexplicable reason.

I mean, except for people who were once admins. **** those douches.

Been on charas for 5 years as a regular member. :3c
Also yea. I wish the complete resource section would be sorted by XP and VX such. So people would upload more resources of such.

[DragonBlaze]

Wasn't DragonBlaze already a mod before, though? Pretty sure he was. Unless there was another "Dragon" something I forgot about...

Haha yes I used to be the mod for the RPG Maker Programming and the Tutorials sections, but alas a few years of inactivity has it's tolls. Honestly I don't care if I'm a mod or not, it's really just more of a title at this point, it's not like we have some super crazy awesome secret forum where all the mods hang out, or at least I can't image our moderator section has been all that interesting since I left :p

That'd be me.

And hey man, that's good to hear. We've been needing someone who's both able and willing to do changes. Most people with th knowledge don't have the time or the desire, and most people with the desire to do something don't have the knowledge or the time.

Hey Lucas, I'd love to help out with new development and hopefully a site overhaul. We should sync up sometime to discuss the technologies Charas uses and how I can build upon them. I wouldn't require access to the direct charas source files, just a copy of them so I can develop on my local computer.

If everyone is down for a revamp of the site, we should have a separate discussion of the direction we want to take the site, new technologies/generators we want to use, new content to include, and a new look and feel for the site.

[Prpl_Mage]

Sounds like a plan

it's not like we have some super crazy awesome secret forum where all the mods hang out

That's exactly what we want 'em peons to think.